Sony Retires Its Last 4K Blu-ray Player in Japan, PS5 Is All That's Left

Posted by speckx 1 day ago

Comments

Comment by beloch 1 day ago

There are a few things to unpack here...

1. The end of Sony standalone players (in Japan) isn't necessarily the end of the bluray format. There are other manufacturers.

2. However, it is concerning that Sony, the creator of the format, is moving away from it. If the PS6 does away with the disc drive, that's complete abandonment. It's possible Sony plans to implement a high quality streaming service to replace physical media, but not guaranteed.

3. 4K Bluray likely struggles because it's not a huge upgrade over 4K streaming or even 1080P for the average user who watches on a small screen. A majority of users prefer convenience.

4. Given that Video/Audio-philes are a niche market, we may see a contraction of what is available due to tariff barriers. Some low-demand products are only viable if one manufacturing location can amortize its costs across the entire global market. If trade barriers are put up, that market shrinks and becomes less efficient. Products that were barely profitable become unprofitable. No U.S. manufacturer will on-shore production of such products because the U.S. market isn't big enough to make them viable. That may have contributed here.

5. There is nothing to prevent high quality audio/videophile oriented streaming services from picking up the slack, but we can probably expect them to be expensive and openly hostile to the concept of ownership. The joy of finding a title you've been looking for in the bargain bin at a local store could become a thing of the past. Sony probably views a 4K Bluray discounted to under $5 as a lost opportunity.

Comment by phire 1 day ago

I think it’s really obvious that the ps6 won’t have an optical drive.

IMO, the main reason Sony are discontinuing ps5 disc manufacturing now is so by the time they get around to launching the ps6, the move away from optical discs is old news. They know the move is unpopular and they don’t want the drama associated with the launch of their new console.

I’m less sure about what will happen to bluray movies. But this is not a good sign.

Comment by lokar 1 day ago

For (5) see https://www.kaleidescape.com/

Comment by mostlysimilar 1 day ago

> The Ultimate 4K System includes every 4K movie available (at the time of shipment) pre-loaded onto two Terra Prime 120TB movie servers along with one Strato K movie player.

What? How are they getting away with that?

Comment by jasomill 1 day ago

The system retails for over $100,000, and appears to essentially be a streaming service with local cache, so the bulk of licensing fees are probably only paid for movies customers actually watch.

Comment by lokar 1 day ago

It’s the Sony version of “buying”

But I think the lower end systems start at 1/10th that

Comment by 1 day ago

Comment by lp92 1 day ago

I think the PS6 not having disks is pretty much a given at this point. They want people to go digital.

Comment by gnabgib 1 day ago

You think the news from Sony in July.. is a given now? Who will be mayor of New York? Will Artemis II return?

> It’s now been a month since Sony announced it is ending physical disc production for both PS5 and PS6 in 2028

https://www.vice.com/en/article/sony-responds-ps5-physical-d...

Comment by K3UL 22 hours ago

For the upgrade, it depends what you mean by small screen. For people who watch on a phone, sure. On any TV-sized screen, I think anyone can see an upgrade from streaming to a 4k bluray (or even a regular bluray), no matter if you are streaming 4k or not.

I cannot think that yet another service will be the solution, especially considering the market is already extremely fragmented and each service is getting more expensive and have tiers. Eventually, affordability might catch up with convenience (although arguably piracy might short circuit both).

Comment by ndiddy 1 day ago

> The end of Sony standalone players (in Japan) isn't necessarily the end of the bluray format. There are other manufacturers.

I think it's just Panasonic at this point?

It's strange that Sony are retiring their current player so soon after they introduced it. As the article mentions, that model was introduced last year. It's the exact same as Sony's previous model from 8 years ago except they took out the streaming functionality and raised the price. It's the sort of thing you'd expect them to do if they were going to keep the product on the market for a long time, since they wouldn't have to invest in firmware development to keep the streaming functionality working.

Comment by nphardon 1 day ago

I quit all streaming services about 6 months ago and am strictly on CD's DVD's and records. I recommend it. The library has a ton of stuff, and if enough demands comes back maybe dvd shops will open back up. Its really nice, no ads, no data mining, no supporting awful streaming services, no subs, finite choice. Again, I recommend it.

Comment by K3UL 22 hours ago

Also a big plus that does not get talked about enough is the browsing of the "collection".

Avoids the infinite scroll with the mood "ugh I have nothing to watch", and it is infinitely nicer to choose with your kid/spouse/friend/etc from a physical list of choices rather than a list of thumbnails with search bar in 3 or 4 different apps

Comment by lp92 1 day ago

So you're basically avoiding any nee movies that are streaming only?

Comment by Jhsto 1 day ago

Some of my friends insist on watching movies only in 4K, but once I secrectly played a proper 1080p BluRay copy and they would not believe it was 1080p.

Not much to do with the OP other than that it's been a long time since even the "tech-savy" have watched anything on disc. I guess 95% or more live with whatever potato bitrate they get from streaming services.

Comment by brianwawok 1 day ago

Depends on screen size and distance. Super obvious at the right combo.

Comment by jasomill 1 day ago

Also depends on the quality of the upscaling and of the Blu-ray release.

A fair number of UHD Blu-ray releases are upscaled from 2K masters, after all (presumably 4:4:4 or 4:2:2, to be fair, so chroma detail closer or equal to UHD Blu-ray).

Comment by K3UL 22 hours ago

Another considerable advantage of 4k blu-rays is that they are not region-locked, while regular ones usually are. Considering how the market is sometimes chaotic with certain releases happening only in some countries, it makes importing (although sometimes quite expensive) less problematic.

Comment by gnabgib 1 day ago

Discussion (41 points,22 hours ago, 14 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50201821

Strange media sources though:

FlatPanelsHD (5 points, 1 comment) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50199610

DarkHorizons (3 points) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50199874

PushSquare (41 points, 14 comments) https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50201821

Comment by LollipopYakuza 1 day ago

If Blu-ray is diseapearing, what's left for people who care about media quality? Last time I checked, the quality on legal streaming platform was barely comparable with Blu-ray. Did this improve?

Comment by wmf 1 day ago

Kaleidescape has the same or better quality than Blu-ray. It's DRMed and probably won't continue to work if the company goes out of business though.

Comment by K3UL 22 hours ago

Considering its price and the fact that it's not actually streaming, you are kind of making the same point that streaming services cannot compete on quality.

Comment by Retr0id 1 day ago

I'm tempted to buy one of their boxes and tell claude to make no mistakes, but if they're smart they're also using watermarking so cracking the DRM alone will not be enough.

Comment by jasomill 1 day ago

Watermarking is only a problem if you're planning to go beyond future-proofing and distribute the result.

Comment by Retr0id 1 day ago

[dead]

Comment by wmf 1 day ago

They'll definitely ban your box and account if you leak anything. If they go out of business it will become fair game.

Comment by Retr0id 1 day ago

Well, they can only do that if they're using robust watermarking. You'd need to get two accounts on two boxes on two IPs, and compare the results.

Comment by K3UL 22 hours ago

It has not, and I would argue it got worse for some cases, because it got even more expensive to get the 4K tiers.

Moreover, 4k access is not guaranteed. Recently Disney+ removed it completely here in France due to some legal thing with the HEVC codec.

Comment by Retr0id 1 day ago

As long as they keep making the disks, they'll keep making their way onto my jellyfin instance via a series of tubes.

Comment by andrepd 1 day ago

Yarrrrrrr

Comment by wmf 1 day ago

Pirated files will never be higher quality than the source. If streaming is the only thing left in the future it will be the limit of quality.

I heard the other day there are a few shows that are streaming in 4K (probably low bitrate) but the discs are only HD.

Comment by edude03 1 day ago

Although I assume the actual disks will stop being produced soon, this is a good reminder that LibreDrive[0] exists and is unfortunately still the best way to watch blu rays

0: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=41784069

Comment by WheelsAtLarge 1 day ago

I feel like we need an open source DVD and CD so that they will survive for the long term. Streaming is nice but I don't want to pay monthly fees forever just to hear the music I like.

Comment by wmf 1 day ago

DVD and CD are completely documented formats, the DRM has been cracked, and the patents are expired. Blu-ray patents are about to expire.

Comment by dijit 1 day ago

The issue with blu-ray is (and will likely always be) the decryption keys, which are copyrighted and cannot be distributed legally.

Comment by wmf 1 day ago

Encryption keys, being purely random, are not copyrightable. (In light of recent events, this raises the question of artisanal human-created keys.) Distributing keys probably violates DMCA section 1201 though.

Comment by dijit 1 day ago

BD+ and AACS are literally that though, that’s why VLC can’t play blu-rays.

> NB: Most commercial Blu-Ray are protected by AACS or BD+ technologies and this library is not enough to playback those discs.

https://www.videolan.org/developers/libbluray.html

clicking into the libaacs and libbd+ yields:

> NB: this project doesn't offer any key or certificate that could be used to decode encrypted copyrighted material.

Comment by pseudalopex 1 day ago

Key or certificate could be used to decode encrypted copyrighted material and key or certificate is copyrighted are different.

Comment by dijit 1 day ago

I don’t know how to say this softly.

Answering in this way has done nothing to further my understanding of the topic, you haven’t explained the difference or why there is a difference and you haven’t offered a counter-example.

I can only surmise that you’ve answered in order to feel superior, but that doesn’t make sense because while I have examples of behaviour that can be explained by my statements, you haven’t added anything to explain yours.

So, your statement stands alone, undefended and without context or explanation.

What were you trying to achieve? A key that is used to decrypt copyrighted material being /itself/ copyrighted means it cant be distributed which is what we see.

Comment by Retr0id 1 day ago

Spotify's offline playback DRM hinges on a HMAC key that's a human-readable phrase, based on a certain lyric. I'm curious whether it's just a fun easter egg, or if there's some kind of legal basis for the choice.

Comment by to11mtm 1 day ago

FWIW me reading the headline alone was enough to help justify a NAS purchase with my not-as-tech-inclined wife so we can just start dumping things there one way or another...

Comment by unfocso 1 day ago

You mean, a jailbroken ps3? :)

Comment by accrual 1 day ago

PS3 is a great Blu-ray player IMO. Solid console, solid controller, good laser implementation. Just pop it in and it Just Works.

Seeing a native Blu-ray (god I hate typing that out) on my then 1080p Panny Plasma was a sight to behold. The quality was fantastic, incredible detail and color in a dark room. I miss the console, the television, and the couch I sat on. All of that is gone. But I still remember the glory of seeing it for the first time.

Comment by dylan604 1 day ago

PS3 wont do 4k though will it?

Comment by satellites 1 day ago

No, but I believe there's 4k version of the PS4 that came out towards the end of that console's lifecycle. I'm satisfied with my regular 1080p PS4 though.

Comment by ndiddy 1 day ago

It won't play 4K blu-rays, only the PS5 will.

Comment by gnabgib 1 day ago

And the XBOneS (the reason I stopped using the PS)

Comment by spike021 1 day ago

if yours even works. i went through four or five with varying issues. yellow light of death, blinking red light

Comment by unfocso 19 hours ago

I have a 320GB CECH-25xxB, with evilnat it's a very usable console and can still play games online with no issues and no paid subscription. The stock player can play bdrips over upnp just fine, other than physical media such as CD, DVD, BD and also SACD!!

Comment by selectodude 1 day ago

I think at this point it’s called vinyl.

Comment by 0x457 1 day ago

Vinyl is far from open source CD due to limitations of phisical format and the fact that good vinyl contains specifically mastered for vinyl with those limitations taken into account.

You can still easily buy Bluray player and open source your discs with ARM (not CPU/SoCs, different one)

Comment by ginko 1 day ago

If you're referring to the RIAA equalization curve[1] that is completely open and well defined.

[1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/RIAA_equalization

Comment by sam1714 1 day ago

Like all analog formats, vinyl has a non-linear response. Things like total amplitude and frequency content affect noise and distortion when reproduced. Another factor is that it's a constant angular velocity medium, so the response is different at the beginning than the end. These are factors that a good mastering engineer takes into account.

This occurs in the digital world as well. When we went to DVDs, the studios had encoders/authoring engineers, who tweaked compression parameters per scene, as compression is another non-linear process. For example, they might apply a small amount of blur on a dark scene where film grain trips up the compression.

Eta: Apple provides the exact pipeline [1] they use for their services so the sound engineer can listen to the output and adjust.

[1] https://www.apple.com/apple-music/apple-digital-masters/

Comment by Avamander 1 day ago

I really hope not, there isn't a single redeeming quality to vinyls from any practical point of view.

Comment by estebank 1 day ago

The big album art?

Comment by satellites 1 day ago

Even the discs themselves can be works of art now. Even though vinyl discs are less practical than CDs they're a subjectively fun art experience.

Comment by Avamander 1 day ago

I'll give it that, though the size in general is a downside for more people than it is a benefit.

Comment by GuinansEyebrows 1 day ago

to play a record, i don't need a computer or any electronics created after, say, 1960 or so. that's a nice benefit :)

Comment by Avamander 1 day ago

CD players came out in 80s, so one could say I don't need electronics made after the 80s to play those. Do those 20 years matter that much? I doubt it.

Comment by kibwen 1 day ago

Better yet, you don't need any components in the supply chain that weren't well within the means of people 100 years ago. Vinyls and Edison cylinders will outlive every CD ever made.

Comment by Avamander 1 day ago

That's a fun statement. I think we already had vacuum tubes and other foundational components that would in theory have allowed someone to build a CD player a 100 years ago or very close to that. If they would have had the knowledge.

For starters, CDs are not very dense, you can see the data with a microscope: http://www.pmonta.com/compact-disc-microscopy.html

Comment by kibwen 1 day ago

In addition to the circuitry, I was also assuming that the laser would pose a difficulty.

Comment by Avamander 22 hours ago

It doesn't really require a coherent light source, although that does allow further miniaturization.

Comment by kibwen 17 hours ago

I think it would be fair to allow a hypothetical 1920s CD player to occupy most of a room. I'd be interested to see exactly how hard it would be to produce such a thing using the available technology of the era, though I'm still somewhat skeptical regarding the complexity and precision required of the laser motor (which unlike a vinyl needle needs to be controlled manually, rather than just following a groove mechanically) and the spindle motor (which needs to accelerate precisely depending on the laser's distance from the center, unlike a record which revolves at a constant rate).

Comment by tonymet 1 day ago

Regulars to 4k forums know that nearly all the 4k players on the market suck, with regular lock-ups. I have a high end sony 4k player , and it crashes with double-layer disks.

4k blu ray player development hasn't had any innovation for 7+ years. The new products are mostly recycling the chips & firmware from years ago. Still java-based and buggy

Comment by dylan604 1 day ago

> Still java-based and buggy

well, yeah. the Blu-ray format is based on Java. what would you expect, Rust? Go? I know it's HN, but come on already. A format does not change how it works because you don't like the language it is based on.

Comment by tonymet 1 day ago

nothing in the last 15 years was deliberately made with java. So yes, java means legacy and never revised.

Comment by b0rtb0rt 23 hours ago

is this a joke?

Comment by tonymet 21 hours ago

Prove me wrong

Comment by b0rtb0rt 20 hours ago

i work at a major cloud provider and the vast majority of the services are written in java

Comment by tonymet 14 hours ago

it's a 20 year old platform, likely an acquisition. nothing new in the past 15 years.

Comment by kolinko 1 day ago

I have a modern 4k dedicated player and I enjoy the experience once I got audio and video properly configured (which was a surprising pita).

You put in the disc, it plays, if you want subtitles you press the subtitles button, that’s it. I never had it hang or anything like that, and there is no bullshit internet connectivity/ads etc.

The only thing I’d like improved is better streaming/playing local files.

I never encountered any hangs, slowdowns or any other problem really.

Comment by dylan604 1 day ago

except you've left out very critical information like make/model of said mythical player

Comment by tonymet 1 day ago

In theory 4k blu ray has higher bit rates , especially for audio. In practice it crashes, and takes unnecessarily long to load. I have to play on Xbox because my dedicated blu ray player is garbage.

Comment by esseph 1 day ago

Claude, rewrite my disc players shitty firmware in rust, make no mistakes

Comment by Avamander 1 day ago

At this point I think with a bit of iteration the end result would quickly exceed that of an usual Blu-Ray player or TV firmware. Hardware manufacturers have shipped slop code before we called it slop code.

Comment by MT4K 1 day ago

Time to go back to DVD, now, even single-layer, capable of quality-encoded Full HD with modern codecs such as AV1. And HD DVD today with such a codec would be more than enough for 4K. Blu-ray is unneeded, especially with its reading issues.

Comment by Reason077 1 day ago

Pretty wild that even the PS5 still has a blu-ray player and that PS5 games still come on optical discs. No doubt this adds significantly to the costs of both the PS5 hardware and to the costs of game distribution.

I have a feeling the PS6 won’t have an optical drive…

Comment by cowlevel 1 day ago

Don't need to guess, they literally told us there will be no more physical media, ever.

Comment by Avamander 1 day ago

The PS5 optical drive is still incapable of handling Dolby Vision, which is a massive shame.

Comment by zerocrates 1 day ago

I think it's just that Sony doesn't want to pay to license Dolby Vision, not any actual technical reason.

Comment by Hamuko 1 day ago

Sony has already announced the end of physical games for the PS5. If the PS6 will have an optical drive, it'll be an add-on and only for backwards compatibility purposes. Any kind of a PS6 optical drive will definitely not add significantly to its retail price though.

Comment by tonymet 1 day ago

and the disks are only used for entitlements, not for the game. when you stick the disk in, the game is downloaded.

Comment by tonymet 1 day ago

Why is this downvoted it’s exactly how it works, you can see in the UI that the game is downloaded when you insert a disk, and you can’t play until the download completes.

Comment by K3UL 22 hours ago

When you insert a disk, the game gets COPIED to the hard drive, not downloaded. Some games need additional downloads or patches that they will download, but that's up to the editors. Nothing is preventing them from releasing a finished game that fits on a disc (with some exceptions for some huge AAA games that won't fit, of course)

Comment by wmf 1 day ago

If the PS5 is offline it will install the game from disc. If it's online it will auto-download patches (which may be the entire game).

Comment by Hamuko 1 day ago

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=61m1e4Jjick

Comment by maxdo 1 day ago

Agent of the future will reverse engineer blue rays for you , bingo , order laser , home robot will assemble and read the device .

Comment by cisc 1 day ago

So much for the "buy once, watch many" model.

Now it's buy continuously through a subscription, watch for as long as the deal remains in place to provide that particular movie on that particular platform, and thrill to having your individual viewing habits tracked, catalogued, and monetized.