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Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
MegaZone @ Nov 30th 2008 7:29PM
You know there *are* Blu-ray/VHS combo decks, right? ;-) http://www.engadgethd.com/2008/08/25/panasonic-intros-dmr-br360v-blu-ray-vhs-combo-player/
As for streaming, it is just a value-add. Same as with TiVo supporting download services and streaming. It gives you more flexibility. Personally I prefer Blu-ray for movies because I love the quality - video and audio. But from time to time I do download a video from Amazon VOD to my TiVo because it is cheap and/or an impulse thing. I could see using Netflix, or Blockbuster, the same way. Actually, I don't have a Netflix membership because I don't rent nearly enough movies to justify it, so Blockbuster's pay-per-view approach appeals to me more than Netflix. I'm not going to pay a monthly sub to Netflix on the off chance I actually use it that month.
As for quality, Netflix is adding HD streams (which won't even come close to Blu-ray, probably not even VUDU quality), and Blockbuster will likely add HD. Since they're downloads and not streaming, they could offer higher quality as they don't need to work in real time.
But it makes me wonder - how will it work with Blu-ray players? BD-Live players are only required to have 1GB of storage for online content, mainly as a buffer. Unless Blockbuster is going to switch to streaming like Netflix, you'd need a lot more storage. Bring your own USB hard drive?