Only problem now is that $ony won't admit defeat so
we'll have two competing formats like we do with
dvd-a and sacd and like we did with vhs and betamax.
The trouble is that companies have already shown their
alliegence to one or other formats so it looks highly unlikely
at the moment that we will get dual format players.
Foxy, I've copied this from thedigitalbits which is a bit
more detailed and it also has a link to a more comprehensive
report which you have to register to be able to read ....... Well... we have some news for you today about HD-DVD. As we mentioned a few days ago, the 17-member steering committee of the DVD Forum was expected to vote in New York last week on whether or not to adopt Toshiba and NEC's Advanced Optical Disc (AOD) proposal as the basis for the eventual HD-DVD format. In a previous vote earlier this year, the proposal failed to pass because members of the Blu-ray group, who are also DVD Forum members, either voted "no" or abstained. While AOD was developed within the DVD Forum, Blu-ray is being developed outside it, and is being positioned as a direct competitor for HD-DVD. By voting AOD down, or abstaining, the Blu-ray group members were effectively working to kill momentum for AOD, and thus give an advantage to their own rival product. For last week's vote, however, the DVD Forum changed its rules so that abstaining votes no longer counted as "no" votes. In the resulting ballot, the steering committee voted to adopt AOD as the basis for HD-DVD by an 8-6 majority. That moves HD-DVD a step closer to becoming a reality, and a step closer to eventually replacing existing DVD (although there are still a number of technological issues to be addressed, including the creation of a more robust copy protection scheme, before the high-definition format could be launched).
Meanwhile, the Blu-ray group continues to develop its high-definition disc format, and now China's EVD had entered the fray as well. It's worth noting, however, that EVD is a red laser based format that uses greater digital video compression, while both AOD/HD-DVD and Blu-ray use blue lasers and higher capacity discs.
You can read more about this vote (and EVD) here at
http://www.videobusiness.com/login.a...D=6572~catID=4 (you'll need to register, but it's free). You can also bet that we'll be talking a LOT more about these next-generation, high-definition disc formats in the months ahead. In the meantime, our best guess is that the first hardware and software could start appearing in the U.S. in late 2005. Keep in mind that everything we've been told by manufacturers and industry reps is that both AOD/HD-DVD and Blu-ray hardware will be backwards compatible with existing DVD software.
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I think Blu-ray is going to be much more expensive and they won't consider using far more efficient codecs like WM9 and H264, stubbornly sticking with MPEG2. 
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