Ask S&V

Q Some of my friends argue that spending extra money on Blu-ray Discs is unreasonable since DVDs offer almost equal picture quality for less money. Worldwide, DVDs sell much better than Blu-rays, which many people still consider to be a format for videophiles. Do you think it’s possible that DVDs will ever disappear from the market? —Tomek Ciecwierz, Warsaw, Poland

A First, the next time your friends claim that DVD offers near-equal picture quality to Blu-ray, confront them with the math. DVD resolution is 720 x 480, which adds up to 345,600 pixels. Blu-ray resolution is 1920 x 1080, which adds up to just over 2 million pixels—a sixfold increase. Not only does Blu-ray provide high-definition video, it has high-resolution sound: up to eight channels of lossless 96 kHz/24bit audio. Dolby Digital and DTS soundtracks on DVD, in contrast, use lossy compression. To discerning eyes and ears, the differences between the two formats are notable: video and audio quality with Blu-ray is a dramatic leap over DVD.

As for your question about DVDs disappearing, it appears that that it’s already starting to happen. According to the Digital Entertainment Group, an industry group that tracks DVD and Blu-ray sales, physical media sales in 2013 dropped 8% over 2012. As of this September, sales were down 8.2% over 2013, and the year’s not even up. Meanwhile, online movie downloads from sources like iTunes, Amazon Video on Demand, etc., shot up 47% in 2013 over 2012, a number that will undoubtedly surge even higher in 2014.

Considering the trends at work here, it’s probably just a matter of time before all physical media—Blu-ray, DVDs, and CDs—are replaced by streaming services. At least there’s one physical format that will survive the steaming media apocalypse: vinyl records.