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HD DVD
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Written by Michael Lankton
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Tuesday, 19 February 2008 |
 While AV Enthusiast announced the death of HD DVD on January 4, 2008 the rest of the internet has just caught on and is reporting the demise of the HD optical format.
Early this morning Toshiba officially declared they were cutting their losses and discontinuing their HD DVD business. Toshiba president and CEO Atsutoshi Nishida offered “We carefully assessed the long-term impact of
continuing the so-called 'next-generation format war' and concluded
that a swift decision will best help the market develop. While we
are disappointed for the company and more importantly, for the
consumer, the real mass market opportunity for high definition content
remains untapped and Toshiba is both able and determined to use our
talent, technology and intellectual property to make digital
convergence a reality.”
While a lot of us weren't very happy about Warner Bros. abandoning HD DVD, after that we all knew this was coming sooner or later. It's official, HD DVD is now a footnote.
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Format War
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Written by Michael Lankton
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Friday, 18 January 2008 |
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Click for full size image
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HD DVD
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Written by Michael Lankton
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Monday, 14 January 2008 |
In what is either the beginning of the fire sale or the start of Toshiba's counteroffensive, Toshiba has slashed prices on their HD DVD player hardware.
Effective immediately the entry level Toshiba HD-A3 is $149.99, the Toshiba HD-A30 $199.99, and the flagship HD-A35 $299.99. The news was released this morning in a fairly lengthy press release from Toshiba that tried to put a happy face on what has certainly been a very bad two weeks for Toshiba and HD DVD by citing strong holiday season sales and good adoption rates of HD DVD hardware in 2007.
One has to wonder how much longer we'll be reporting HD DVD news after the Warner defection and with rumors regarding Universal and Paramount swirling around the net, but Toshiba is going to keep marching on. For now. |
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HD DVD
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Written by Michael Lankton
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Tuesday, 08 January 2008 |
 Yesterday the Financial Times published an article stating that Paramount was considering using a clause in their contract with Toshiba that would release them from their obligation to publish exclusively on HD DVD.
AV Enthusiast did not report that news item, as there was nothing in the article by the Financial Times to substantiate the claim, and they also gave no source. Today Paramount has responded to that story, issuing a statement via email. Paramount's Brenda Ciccone stated in the email "Paramount's current plan is to continue to support the HD
DVD format''. Paramount's contract with Toshiba is rumored to contain an opt-out clause that would release Paramount from their commitment to publish exclusively on HD DVD if Warner Bros. were to abandon support of the format.
I wouldn't expect much in the way of releases from Paramount until their inevitable departure from HD DVD, but I'm also guessing they face a stiff financial penalty for jumping ship this early in the life of the contract. |
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BluRay
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Written by Michael Lankton
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Monday, 07 January 2008 |
 Panasonic is again leading the way for Blu Ray player manufacturers, announcing their new DMP-BD50 Blu Ray player, the first player to conform to Blu Ray Profile 2.0.
Profile 2.0 introduces online connectivity, tagged by Blu Ray as BD-Live, similar to what HD DVD already offers. The Panasonic DMP-BD50 also supports all advanced audio codecs, and gives users the option to output LPCM or bitstream over HDMI. 7.1 channel analog outputs are provided for users who do not have HDMI capable processors, or who feel that the DACs in the DMP-BD50 do a better job.
Previous Panasonic Blu Ray players have been unanimously hailed as the best the Blu Ray camp had to offer, so the Panasonic DMP-BD50 is hotly anticipated. No pricing details at this time. |
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