Path: utzoo!mnetor!tmsoft!torsqnt!news-server.csri.toronto.edu!cs.utexas.edu!samsung!zaphod.mps.ohio-state.edu!ceres.physics.uiowa.edu!news.iastate.edu!ccvax.iastate.edu!taab5 From: taab5@ccvax.iastate.edu (Marc Barrett) Newsgroups: comp.sys.amiga.hardware Subject: Re: Want CDTV info. (here it is!) Message-ID: <1991Feb10.103752.1@ccvax.iastate.edu> Date: 10 Feb 91 16:37:52 GMT Sender: news@news.iastate.edu (USENET News System) Lines: 100 In message <1991Feb10.142143./22256@ncsuvx.ncsu.edu> writes: >Note for following: I've been a CD-I advocate since 1988. > >|>I've also heard that industry standard CD-I players are going >|>to be released later this year. What is Commodore planning to do >|>to compete with the CD-I players? >| >| I too have been concerned with the potential CDTV and CD/I battle. >| Here is what I have found after asking many questions: >| >|- CD/I has yet to be shown to anyone after years of waiting. CDTV >| will be out for a while before CD/I is introduced. > >CD-I has been in industrial use since at least Spring, 1990. The US Army >has developed a disc giving quick online aid to doctors about battlefield >injuries. Renault has implemented a CD-I system for training its >dealerships worldwide; the info is in a choice of languages on one disc. >Principle Mutual Life has a training CD-I kiosk in Des Moines IA. > >The home consumer units could be out this summer (at last). Over ten >companies are manufacturing players. They've been shown several times >at Japanese electronics exhibitions in the last year. > >In addition, there is work being done on using CD-I over ISDN networks. >And one company will be making applications available over phone lines. >> >| Besides, I suspect that CDTV could emulate a CD/I unit if necessary. :-) > >Sure :-) It would "just" need the CD-I OS ported to it (possible); and add >the CD-I video hardware (dual, coprocessor-equipped 8-bit video systems >with hardware fade and 16 million colors, combinable to a 15-bit output, >realtime color RLE file display, faster cpu, etc)... again possible. $$?? > > >So the question is, if a consumer walks into a store, will he choose from: > A) dozens of CD-I players (including LCD portables! already shown in Japan) > from giants Matsushita, Yamaha, Sony, Philips, Pioneer, and so on, > all compatible with the CD-I global standard (which will also bring > huge competition in features and quickly dropping prices)? ..OR... > B) the lone, single-source, incompatible, and video-inferior CDTV unit? > >I *will* say that only CBM/Amiga could've thrown together "competition" to >CD-I so quickly. However, the main thing I think CDTV will do, is piss >off some early consumers who naively spend $$ on it before CD-I hits town. >That's partly why I oppose CDTV in the home market. Ooops. Has this >become an .advocacy item already? - kevin I agree strongly. I really don't see much of a chance that the CDTV will succeed, since it will be marketed directly against the better- supported and technologically-superior CD-I machines. If anyone doubts this, I take you back several year, to the battle between the Beta and VHS video-tape systems. Sony came out with Beta first, and for a long time Beta VCRs were the only VCRs on the market. Not only that, but the Beta systems were superior to the VHS systems, that came out later. This didn't help Sony much, though. You have to look very long and hard to find any Beta VCRs being sold today. And it is equally difficult to find any video-tape rental places that stock prerecorded tapes in Beta format. Even Sony themselves has all but totally abandoned the format that they pioneered, and is selling VHS machines almost exclusively now. What happened to Beta? Exactly what will happen to the CDTV. For a long time, sony was the only company selling Beta VCRs, while a huge conglomorate backed VHS. The result was that VHS recieved more support than Beta, and consumers bought VHS the better-supported VHS machines instead of the superior Beta machines. If consumers have a choice between two competing formats for what is essentially the same product, the consumers will buy the one has the most support, even if it is technologically inferior to the others. Consumers always opt for convenience over performance, and this is the reason that IBM-compatible systems outsell Amigas and MACs, and is the reason behind the success of VHS over Beta. Once the CD-I machines start to come out, they will get far more support than the CDTV. There will be far more outlets cropping up that sell CD-I software than CDTV software. And, as a result, consumers will buy the CD-I systems over the CDTV. Commodore is in a very bad position with the CDTV. The CD-I systems are not guaranteed to succeed wildly, either. If the CD-I systems succeed, the CDTV could fail. If the CD-I systems fail, the CDTV will probably fail with them. Needless to say, I am not very optimistic about the CDTV. I really don't see how Commodore really has the smallest chance aginst a conglomorate of competing companies. The only way that I envision the CDTV succeeding, is if Commodore finds a way to make the CDTV run CD-I software, and this doesn't seem likely in light of the video superiority of the CD-I hardware. -MB-