The ignorance of SACD & DVD-A marketing idiots....

Ncarv, is that a latter model Sony Blue Ray player?

Plenty of mistakes to go around.
The one success was CD. They all managed to get together and create the Cd.
Everyone got behind it and it florished.
Then later the same with DVD.
Both of those formats were gigantic successes.

I guess that went to thier collective heads, as the next set of so-called 'improvements' were only marginal, and infighting was very predominant.
First the DVD-A vs SACD battle: instead of cooperating ,various companies decided to fight it out. So BOTh were doomed to failure.
Then HD DVD vs BluRay, BluRay won, but too bad it is still a nitch format because it is not enough of a leap ahead of DVD. The lesson IMO is to succeed, a new format has to actually be much better than the previous one, and reasonably priced, and have 100% of ALL the manufacturers.
Then it might have a chance. So the fighting ours is better than theres may seem fun to some, but proves a failure in the marketplace.

One other format war no one remembers was the Laser Disc vs RCA movie disc (I do not even remember the name of the RCA system.)
The Laser disc was far better than the RCA system, and RCA nearly bankrupted themselves in the stupid moves they made with thier crappy system. (they were miffed they gave away the VCR patents they controlled via Amperex, sellingthem off the the Japanese, who made BILLIONS off the development of the VCR, so they gambled it all on the 'next best thing' and LOST, bigtime)

Finally Sony was too big and too self devisive to make SACD a success. (they got what they deserved from the karma of the Beta/VHS fiasco, where, just like the DVD-A vs SACD, and HD DVD/BluRay, Sony always thinks they are too big to have to compromise, What a joke, they can go to Hell) (they really lucked out on CD, how I do not know) One corporate division did not cooperate wih the other, and finally the chief homcho left, and the new guy is a dud. Seems he it too stupid to have ANY vision for the once great Sony, and should just go stick his head in a bucket, for all the useless mistakes Sony has made since his arrival.
Agree Sony SHOULD have just switched to exclisive SACD and CD combination discs. They had the chance to flood the market right off, but failed to do so. And then failed again when they just dropped SACD as soon as they had destroyed DVD-A.
So now, plenty of folks hate Sony. I will NOT buy Blu Ray. Screw Sony IMO. I have a Love/Hate relationship with Sony. And currently the Hate is pretty strong.

I still use my Toshiba DVD player for some of my HDCD's. To bad, I liked that format.

Seakayer, That was EXACTLY my experience in a Best Buy too. Ditto.

blu ray was a bad idea from the get go. After watching SACD and DVD-A fail, why would you think a disc based delivery system, even though better, would do well?

Download technology was in full bloom by the time BluRay came out. It's analogus to SACD vs MP3. MP3 stomped SACD, even though the quality difference was so huge.

Convenience sells.