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Blu-Ray in Colombia?

I don't recall seeing any blu-ray discs anywhere in Bogota, but then I wasn't exactly looking. There still seem to be a significant number of colombians that are still using VHS! (including myself when I was there). So I am assuming that bringing any kind of hidef player/drive with me to colombia would be pretty useless unless I am willing to have the discs shipped from another country (like the US). Anyone think hidef movie discs are going to pick up in the next year or two in Colombia? I guess even in countries like the US most people are still using regular DVDs. Even many people who have HDTVs.

I guess if I can buy at least 10 - 15 discs at one time it might justify the international shipping cost, although even then it would probably double the cost per disc. I do find the difference in video quality to be huge. Very noticeable at least on a computer monitor. So it is difficult for me to justify buying standard def DVDs anymore. Even when hidef discs are horrifyingly re-compressed down to the size of a DVD-9 (dual layer) to the point of having some visible compression artifacts, they still look *much* better than standard def DVDs.

By pariahdog on Mar 16, 2008, 02:07 in Friendly Talkzone.

Lostgringo says on Mar 16, 2008, 09:51:

it's funny because I was just talking about this with two friends of mine that are returning to Colombia next month. I am in the Philippines now but am making a trip to Thailand in the next few weeks. I am going to look really hard for some of these dvds. How I get them back to Colombia is another story. If the price is right I may pick up a few hundred. the big thing I guess is getting them through customs. Getting them into Manila is a joke. I gave the customs guy $5 US coming through and he took it saying oh is that my Christmas Bonus? I am really looking forward to returning to Colombia. Any suggestions on what kind of player I should buy? I was thinking of buying a hd television and using that for my monitor and run it off my laptop. I have done this before and it works great.

Your Home Away from Home www.welovebogota.com and www.apartmentinbogota.com "Luxury apartments and rooms Cheap" Only 2 blocks from the American Embassy! 24/7 hour security.

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Lostgringo says on Mar 16, 2008, 09:56:

I am really happy I came across this post tonight. I went to ebay Thailand and here is what I found and what I am going to get......

http://cgi.ebay.com/17-1-2GB-250GB-Core-2-Duo-DVD-RW-DL-Acer-AS7720-La...

Your Home Away from Home www.welovebogota.com and www.apartmentinbogota.com "Luxury apartments and rooms Cheap" Only 2 blocks from the American Embassy! 24/7 hour security.

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poco says on Mar 16, 2008, 10:11:

That is good deal, especially 2GB memory and 17 inch screen, 100% seller and low shipping. I wonder how the key board would holdup.

Another auction for what looks to be the same item;
http://www.ubid.com/ACER_AS7720-6395_Laptop_1.5GHz_2GB_250GB_DL_DVDRW_...
Geeeez, $275 with no reserve. Didn't look at the details.
Oh, oh, no operating system and it only accepts Vista.

"When you men get home and face an anti-war protester, look him in the eyes and shake his hand. Then, wink at his girlfriend, because she knows she's dating a pussy." Quote - General Tommy Franks

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Lostgringo says on Mar 16, 2008, 16:13:

poco I never use the keyboard on my laptop. I use a microsoft natural keyboard hooked up to the laptop and also a wireless mouse. My keyboard is virgin lol.

Your Home Away from Home www.welovebogota.com and www.apartmentinbogota.com "Luxury apartments and rooms Cheap" Only 2 blocks from the American Embassy! 24/7 hour security.

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Robert Jorge says on Mar 16, 2008, 22:17:

If Playstation 3s take off in Colombia, so will blu rays: Obviously, because Playstation 3s are one of the best ways to play a blu ray movie. However, it seems Xbox is way more popular in Colombia. I don't know if that has changed in the last year and a half since I lived there.

Even though Colombians are very fond of the latest electronic gadgets, I don't think blu ray will take off in Colombia until they find a way to pirate the disks. Not to many Colombians would be in the market for 75.000 peso movies. 5000 ..... yep.

BEWARE of gold diggers.

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pariahdog says on Mar 17, 2008, 02:02:

You laptop people amaze me. I really don't like those things. Instead I would recommend something like this: http://www.newegg.com/Product/Product.aspx?Item=N82E16827106227. Except newegg doesn't ship internationally. So you would have to find it someplace else. It's too bad the broadband internet in the Philippines sucks so utterly. Otherwise I might recommend just downloading the recompressed hidef files from The Pirate Bay.

I suppose that is the strategy I will try to use myself if I can manage to get a decent broadband connection in Bogota. Otherwise I might consider ordering a drive like the one above along with a whole bunch of blu-ray discs.

And as for the Colombians waiting for the Chinese pirated versions of hi-def discs, that would be an interesting development. I wonder if I would actually be better off with one of those $50 xbox drives in that case because it seems like China is hoping to have their own standard based on HD-DVD. I may have to pick one of those up due to this possibility. Basically whatever the Chinese decide to do about hi-def format copying is what the entire third world is going to be following. So it would be like Blu-Ray in the first world and HD-DVD in the third. I guess the chinese professional pirates would have to re-encode the original blu-ray discs to HD-DVD first though, since all the major studios are of course going with Blu-Ray.

The problem is that those chinese pirate discs are utter rubbish. Even on the rare occasion that they play all the way to the end, the quality is so low. I've seen VHS tapes that looked better. (The ones that are labeled "DVD-9" are always good for a laugh as well.) And I'm not even talking about the bootleg cinema recordings (which actually seem sickeningly popular in Manila). I would like to think that they would improve their QC if they went with blu-ray, but I wouldn't hold my breath.

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Robert Jorge says on Mar 17, 2008, 09:16:

HD-DVD went the way of the passenger pigeon last month. Retailers recently have sent their HD-DVD players back to the manufacturer, because the format has stopped being produced. Blu ray is taking off in the US, largely because of the popularity of the PS3. Also, because blu ray disks are so superior to the HD disks in picture quality and sound quality.

BEWARE of gold diggers.

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Simon says on Mar 17, 2008, 09:54:

Blockbuster and Wal-Mart both said they were only going to carry blu-ray movies, so it's official, blu-ray won the market war.

"Tu vas a ver, llegaras a mi edad y veras que Colombia seguira igual"-----Simon Sr.

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morphus says on Mar 17, 2008, 10:13:

That was after Sony got Toshiba to stop making HD DVD players. Blu-Ray disks hold way more data anyway. HD DVDs barely fit a 2 hour movie so it was cutting it close. The only problem now is price. The technology is'nt so much more advanced that it should cost more than regular DVD. Prices should start dropping by next year.

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ColombianoGringo says on Mar 17, 2008, 10:29:

I hope so. $30 for a DVD is a bit steep. Luckily, Netflix has been renting Blu-Ray discs for a while at the no additional cost. I can't imagine that Blockbuster is renting Blu-Ray in Colombia yet, but it will come in time.

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Lostgringo says on Mar 18, 2008, 17:14:

I went out yesterday to see if I could buy some blue-ray movies on the streets in the Philippines. Nobody knew what I was talking about. They kept saying I don't the blue ray movie..no sir, sorry lol.

Your Home Away from Home www.welovebogota.com and www.apartmentinbogota.com "Luxury apartments and rooms Cheap" Only 2 blocks from the American Embassy! 24/7 hour security.

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Juanes says on Mar 21, 2008, 05:52:

never mind blue ray, im more concerned about bumping into sting rays or manta rays or ray from england who doesnt speak castellano so i have to spend all the time transalting for him on the jungle trip in letitica

http://www.travelblog.org/Bloggers/Juanes/

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