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In this exclusive interview, Consumer Electronics Net's Charlie White speaks with Mark Knox, adviser to the HD DVD Promotion Group. In part one of this multipart interview series, Knox talks about the competition between HD DVD and Blu-ray, the resolutions and codecs used in the first disks to be shipped, and the Toshiba players which will be on the market in March of 2006. 
Mark Knox
CEN: What is your role in the HD DVD promotions group?
Knox: I'm retained by Toshiba's HD DVD promotions division, but I've been doing a lot of work generically on behalf of the format.
CEN: A lot of the readers are confused by this whole battle between HD DVD and Blu-ray. Can you give us your perspective on where it stands right now, and where you think it's going?
Knox: Sure. I know as a kid I always enjoyed watching Japanese monsters battling each other. But in this case, I don't think either one is going to get killed with electricity or lured on to the top of a rocket and shot into outer space.
CEN: So I think there's room for both?
Knox: Well, I think at this point there is going to be both. That's not to discount possibility -- in my career I've worked for several different Japanese companies -- there is no way of knowing, frankly, no matter what the service is, who's working with whom at any given time. So I'm not ready to say unequivocally that there never will be a compromise reached, because you never know what may happen, but at this stage, it certainly looks like both will be on the streets, albeit they won't both be on the streets at the same time.
CEN: Doesn't it look like HD DVD will be first to market, but Blu-ray has more people who've signed up for it?
Knox: Well there?s certainly more logos on the Blu-ray PowerPoint, that's for sure when it comes to the Blu-ray supporters. And a lot of that, frankly, is as much politics as it is technology. A good example of that is Samsung. Samsung is engaged in a joint venture with Toshiba to build HD DVD drives for notebook PCs as well as ultra-light PCs. They are incredibly engineered things that are either 12 1/2 millimeters high or 9 1/2 millimeters high, so they there pretty impressive pieces of engineering that were done by a combination of Toshiba and Samsung engineers. But, the other factor unrelated to optical disks is that Sony and Samsung have a bunch of other businesses that they're in joint ventures on, so therefore the Samsung logo is on Blu-ray PowerPoints. The other point is, I think, that many of the entities that are painted as exclusively supporting Blu-ray have absolutely never said that that support was exclusive. And so, just because the studio?s logo is on their PowerPoint does not mean that they mind might not also make HD DVDs. In each month that goes by where there are DVD players out there, and the manufacturing and authoring process is a pretty clear concept today for HD DVD, I think you're going to see a few more logos migrate, as it were. They may not switch sides and say, ?I'm abandoning and never will do Blu-ray and will only do HD DVD,? but I think you may see the point where they're saying, ?You know what, I'm not exclusive Blu-ray.? You saw that happen are ready with a company like Hewlett-Packard.
CEN: So you're saying that the reports of HD DVD's demise must be greatly exaggerated?
Knox: [Laughs] right. Yes, I think very often the expectation was that just one more logo on the PowerPoint was going to cause us to just fold up and capitulate automatically, which is highly unlikely, frankly.
CEN: What you think is the advantage of Blu-ray?
Knox: Frankly, one of the things that they appeared to be hinging a lot of value on is the PS3 [PlayStation 3], and the fact that when the PS3 launches, it will inevitably mean that a fairly large number of units are going to hit the streets fairly quickly.
CEN: And you see that happening when?
Knox: Well, that's a good question. In fact, it's probably better of you ask them, because I'm not exactly the one who's going to be getting clear answers.
CEN: That seems to be the big question of the hour, doesn't it?
Knox: It does, indeed.
CEN: And at what cost?
Knox: I'm not going to speculate. There has been no official announcement, even at the Howard Stringer keynote presentation at CES, where there had been some industry folks who were expecting there would be more specifics coming at that point.
CEN: No such luck.
Knox: Right. My guess is, we won't be getting any more details until at least the E3 show in May. I wouldn't go to Las Vegas and put money on the fact that you could buy a PS3 in May.
CEN: Then, to HD DVD's advantage, there's an HD DVD player that will be released very soon.
Knox: That's right. In March of this year, there will be two models that were announced with a lot of specifics, and then several other intentions that were announced, although the model specifics were not released at CES.
CEN: This is a crucial advantage, though, isn't it? Being the first to market?
Knox: Right, it is. One of the advantages is that there's been plenty of speculation across the world that while these two giants are battling each other, it's probably smarter for you to stay clear. On the other hand, there's a lot of consumers who have high-definition televisions who really like the way high-definition content looks on their televisions. Even though their DVDs look typically better than the standard-definition broadcast channel they get over cable, their current DVDs certainly don't look as good as the big football games they see on the weekend. And so there's a lot of consumers, where since we?re at a starting price of $499, that's not too much to ask to go out and pick up that player for 500 bucks, and know that you're going to have, right out of the chute, 40 different titles to choose from, and by the end of the year more than 200 titles that you'll be able to play in real high definition.
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