I just won a BluRay player. What do I really have here?

Does your TV have HDMI inputs? or at least pro scan component inputs? You'll need either one to see HD. Any HDMI cable will work, don't get scammed into the expensive ones.

Yes is will play DVDs

The picture will blow away DVD if your TV is a high quality one, and it can resolve all the extra detail.

Blu ray is going to be around for a long time. since all the HD on cable, SAT and downloadable version are so compressed, blu ray will be the king of picture quality until someone figures out how to increase the bandwidth of the other HD delivery methods.

Blu ray discs can be expensive, it depends on the title. And by the way, there's no such thing as a blu ray DVD. It's blu ray disc. Wal mart usually has a dozen or so 10 buck blu rays, and a good selection at around 15 bucks. New titles can be 17-20 bucks if you buy them the week they come out. Some new titles run 24-30 bucks.

You can rent blu ray discs from just about anywhere you rent DVD. I rented blu rays from Netflix for about a year, now I rent blu ray from blockbuster online. People say all kinds of things are going to die, and they usually don't go super fast, things tend to fade away.

The CD will be 30 years old next year, sales are in a slump, but they still sell a lot of CDs every year. DVD players hit in limited numbers in 1997 and just about everywhere in 1998, and DVD will go away, but slowly. I never invested big money in DVD players or discs for a very simple reason. HDTVs starting coming out in 1998 and the prices came down from outer space by 2000 for HD projection TVs anyway. I knew there would be some kind of HD format, just didn't know what it would be.

The first blu ray prototype and talk was in 2002. Then blu ray came along around in final form around 2005/2006. HD DVD came a few months before. I would imagine that DVD is in so many homes it could take years for the discs to fade because there are so many players.

But I would make sense that DVD players themselves would fade in the next year or two tops since all blu ray players can play DVD, and you can find blu ray players for 99 bucks, things should just slowly fade from DVD to blu ray players in a short amount of time.

* Can I play regular DVD's on this thing?

Yes

* Will the picture be even better?

For BD Discs, yes

* Will a regular HDMI cable be okay or do I need something special?

Yes, it will be OK

* Is this BluRay stuff gonna be around for a while or is there something else coming along soon?

Yes, it will be around.

* I heard the BluRay DVD's are very expensive. True? Or are they expected to get cheaper or.. maybe, fade away (just another techno-fad)?

You can always rent them

* Should I keep the BluRay for BluRay DVDs and the HD for old DVDs?

Unless you have HD-DVDs, you don't need an HD-DVD player.

incredibly there is an decision even if if it incredibly relies upon on how desperate you like a jukebox form bluray participant. Ripping bluray to iso format or compressing it to the element that it will nonetheless be HD compromising the different function that a disc provides. After conversion (which will take a super form of time), keep the archives on a hardpersistent and connect it to a HDD media participant (aka media tank) then to the HDTV. keep as much as you may counting on the capacity of the hardpersistent.some new form flat exhibit screen television has it incredibly is equipped-in media participant which could be related in the present day to a hardpersistent.it is cool for private use. the different purpose ought to have criminal copyright matters.

BluRray players should play all formats without a problem

Your regular HDMI cable will be fine. BluRay will be around for a while yet, and yes they are more expensive, but shop online they tend to be cheaper and costs will fall as they become more popular