The VCD industry has been a huge industry in the past 15 years, mainly dominating asia and western europe. Especially in asia, VCD piracy boosted VCD hardware sales, which in return, pushed pirated VCD sales to a even higher level. Before DVD came into play, VCD is probably the only digital medium accessable to the general public. Comparing with the quality of VHS, VCD is obviously a more attractive format for home entertainment.
But all good things come to an end. The poor quality of VHS and VCD can no longer satisfy consumer's needs when technology advances during the past years. VCD (360 x 288) is only 1/4th the resolution that of DVD (720 x 576). DVD is taking over gradually and steadily. Providing higher resolution, better compression algorithum and multichannel audio (AC3 or DTS), DVD is the next generation format for home entertainment. And with the booming industry of DVD piracy, I think it's going to be another huge market for the manufacturers and retailers just as big as it was with VCDs, if not bigger.
But technology doesn't stop here. With digital tv broadcasting already on its way reaching the general public, even DVD will become a thing of the past sooner than any of us willl realise. HDTV offers 1920 x 1080i or 1920 x 720p resolution (4 times the resolution of anologue tv and DVD), with 16:9 wide screen format and interactivity. In Australia, HDTV will start broadcasting in 2003.
Comparing with HD, VCD has only 1/16th the resolution.
All I can say is the end of VCD is near!
That's just my personal view.
