Here are 8 good reasons you might not want to jump on board with Sony’s Blu-Ray format. Sony has a history of building “technically superior formats”, but at much too high of a cost. This always leads to eventual failure.
Sony HiFD
The Sony HiFD (High capacity Floppy Disk) was an attempt by Sony to replace their own aging 3.5 inch floppy disk, which had proven successful in the mid-1980s war to replace the 5.25 inch floppy disk. This did not happen, however. A few months after launch it emerged that the HiFD suffered from frequent crashes during read/write operations, and had a tendency of having its read rate drop into the low kilobyte per second range, effectively rendering it unusable. Initially it was thought that a new driver could solve these problems – instead, Sony issued a full recall at the start of the following year.
Sony MiniDisc
A MiniDisc (MD) is a magneto-optical disc-based data storage device initially intended for storage of up to 80 minutes of digitalized audio. MiniDisc was announced by Sony in 1991 and introduced January 12, 1992. The MiniDisc was targeted as a replacement for the Philips analog cassette audio tape system. MiniDiscs are popular in Japan as a digital upgrade to cassette tapes, but have not been as popular world-wide.
Sony Dynamic Digital Sound
SDDS is a cinema sound system developed by Sony. Digital sound information is recorded on both outer edges of the 35 mm film release print. The system supports up to 8 independent channels of sound: 5 front channels, 2 surround channels and a sub-bass channel. Out of the 1,400 plus films mixed in SDDS, only 97 of them to date have been mixed to support the full 8 channels, mostly because most mixing studios are geared towards producing 5.1 mixes rather than 7.1 mixes. Also the additional sound equipment required for 8 channel SDDS makes it more expensive to install. SDDS is not currently available on any home format.
Sony ATRAC
Adaptive Transform Acoustic Coding (ATRAC) is a family of proprietary audio compression algorithms developed by Sony. MiniDisc was the first commercial product to incorporate ATRAC in 1992. ATRAC allowed a relatively small disc like MiniDisc to have the same running time as CD while storing audio information with minimal loss in perceptible quality. On August 30, 2007 Sony announced that its online music store, Connect Music Services, would no longer support the ATRAC audio format.
Sony Memory Stick
Memory Stick is a removable flash memory card format, launched by Sony in October 1998. The original memory stick was available in sizes up to 128 MB, and a sub-version, Memory Stick Select allows two banks of 128 MB to be on the same card. An 8 GB card was unveiled at the 2006 Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas and, according to Sony, the Memory Stick PRO has a maximum potential size of 32 GB. While the Memory Stick has outlived most other flash memory formats, with a longevity comparable to CompactFlash and Secure Digital (SD), it has never enjoyed as widespread popularity as these competitors; the majority of portable devices that use it are Sony and Sony Ericsson devices. The significant third-party licensees that manufacture Memory Sticks are SanDisk and Lexar.
Sony HiMD
In January 2004, Sony announced the Hi-MD media storage format. With its release in later 2004 came the ability to use newly-developed, high-capacity 1 gigabyte Hi-MD discs, sporting the same dimensions as regular MiniDiscs. In 2006, Sony positioned Hi-MD as a Digital Audio Tape (DAT) alternative, placing the MZ-M200 Hi-MD Walkman under the Pro Audio section of its “Broadcast & Business Solutions Company” website, alongside its flash memory-based recorder, the PCM-D1. Though not a complete failure,it does continue to struggle.
Sony SACD
Super Audio CD (SACD) is a read-only optical audio disc format aimed at providing higher fidelity digital audio reproduction than the Red Book audio CD. Introduced in 2000, it was developed by Sony and Philips Electronics. SACD was in a format war with DVD-Audio, but neither format managed to replace regular audio CDs.
Sony Betamax
Sony’s Betamax is the 1/2 inch home videocassette tape recording format introduced on April 16, 1975 (in market on May 10) and derived from the earlier, professional 3/4 inch U-matic video cassette format. It was the most popular video format in 1983, gaining almost a third of the UK video recorder market, while Sanyo’s VTC5000 was the top selling UK video recorder. By 1985, however, the market had turned sharply towards VHS. Sony’s attempt to dictate an industry standard backfired when JVC, and parent Matsushita (Which owns the brand, Panasonic), made the tactical decision to forgo Sony’s offer of Betamax in favor of JVC’s VHS technology.
#9 This spot is reserved for a certain special someone.