What is this I hear about the DVD eventually becoming obsolete?

Can anybody tell me what this is all about?

Just like with the change from VHS to DVD there is a change going on right now from DVD to a future format. Unfortunately, the future format has not been decided as of yet and may not be for a long time.

Similar to the VHS/Betamax battles of yesteryear the battle is currently raging between HDDVD and Blu-Ray. These next generation formats are similar in many ways but each company behind the technology does not want to throw away years of research and marketing just to end the spat. That is why we have two competing formats out right now

Blu-Ray and HDDVD basically take DVD to the HD realm. Up until this point the native resolution of a DVD was 480i. Eventually progressive scan players came out that converted the 480i DVD signal into a 480p one for a smoother picture. DVD has never been high definition however.

HDDVD and Blu-Ray expand the capacity of DVD allowing for resolutions as high as 1080p to be stored on a disc with the right compression format. Both formats are capable of storing video in 720p,1080i or 1080p. While this translates into a huge increase in resolution over DVD, many people may find this change less dramatic as the change from VHS to DVD. VHS to DVD was the transition from analog to digital formats(although there was laserdisc as well). No longer did people have to rewind or fast forward through the movie to get to a scene. With HDDVD and Blu-Ray it's all about increasing the sound and picture quality.