NO JOKE, I've read that a lot of hollywood is waiting to see which format the porn industry supports seeing as they release more movies than anyone else and has the clout to sway the industry one way or another.
As for the "speed comparison" saying DVDs have a transfer rate of 11.08MB/s is completely bogus.
That is the transfer rate PER SPEED.
so a SINGLE SPEED DVD drive has a transfer rate of 11.08MB/s
meaning that the 4x dvd drive in the current gen Xbox is around 44MB/s!!!! Wow that's already faster than the first gen HD-DVD discs... Not to mention that due to the fragility of the BRD Sony hasn't yet been able to achieve 1X speeds.
The only reason the "transfer rate" per speed is different is because it's directly related to the disc's data resolution. 1X means the disc is spinning at 500RPM at its fastest (this is on the inside of the disc, the outside spins at about 350RPM for 1x) so if the disc holds 1.32MB of data in a single pass on the inside you'll end up with an "estimated transfer rate" of 11.08MB/s per speed.
So IF the BRD could spin at 500RPM they would be able to collect at a rate of 54MB/s unfortunately they can't get them to spin that fast... not to mention if they try to increase the speed they'll begin to run into bandwidth limitations with the actual hardware. Considering HD-DVD is physically constructed in a similar way to current DVDs... they'll have far less problems getting 2X 4X etc. drives out
For comparison the 360 will have a 12x DVD drive meaning the transfer speed will be 133MB/s... compare that to the 1X BRD @ 54MB/s that will be included with the PS3 and ask yourself which format has the better/more reliable data rates.
As for storage space saying the HD-DVD has a max capacity of 30GB is not longer true... Toshiba found a way to use multi-layer (read: three or more layer) storage meaning that they can increase the capacity to the same levels that the BRDs are achieving with their multi-layer versions... So the two new formats are on level playing fields in that respect... go back and consider the other advantages/disadvantages.
---not trying to attack anyone just clearing up a lot of misnomers about the number people keep throwing around.