If you are thinking about an HD DVD player or are on the fence, get to your local Wal-Mart this morning for a great buy on an entry level Toshiba HD DVD player.

 

Beginning at 8am Wal-Mart shoppers who purchase a Toshiba A2 or A3 HD DVD player will receive 12 free HD DVD titles, making the player essentially free. Two movies are packed in with the unit, five come as part of Toshiba's mail-in rebate, and Wal-Mart is ponying up and giving you five more on the spot. Wal-Mart sells the A2 for $198 and the A3 for $298.

 

It's a very good buy, and if you've been thinking about it, now's the time. Go. Now.

British loudspeaker stalwart Mission is about to take the wraps off their new 79 series of loudspeakers.

 

The 79 Series will be poised just below their high end Elegante line. The line will be wrapped in veneer as opposed to the vinyl clad their lesser lines receive. While sporting a more conventional look than the Elegante line, the 79 series does feature sleek, curved side panels on the enclosures. Also featured is Mission's trademark Inverted Driver Geometry (IDG), which places the tweeter below the midbass driver. The tweeters are mounted in a shallow waveguide, which may make for sound that is too forward for some, but likely gives the 79 Series the same prowess at home theater and harder music that it's predecessors enjoyed. The line consists of two floorstanding models, two bookshelf models, a center channel, a surround unit and a subwoofer.

 

Pricing is unknown at this time. As far as I know Mission, who is handled by IAG along with Quad and Wharfedale, does not have a distributor in the United States at this time. The 79 Series will be available in high gloss piano black and high gloss rosewood finishes.

British loudspeaker maker ProAc has revealed two additions to their Response loudspeaker line.

 

The Resonse TriTower is a slim floorstanding loudspeaker that stands 43" tall. Only 5.5" wide, the TriTower features three 4.5" aluminum woofers mated with a 4.5" midrange and 1" silk dome tweeter. ProAc claims the 4 ohm 90dB TriTower's frequency response covers 35-30,000Hz.

 

The Response D Two bookshelf model is a more conventional 8 ohm 88.5 dB design, utilizing a 6.5" woofer and a 1" silk dome tweeter. The woofer appears to be a Seas Excel unit, but with a glass fiber cone instead of aluminum. ProAc claims 30-30,000Hz response from the 17" tall bookshelf.

 

No pricing details at this time, the two models are available in standard ProAc maple, cherry, black ash and mahogany, with the Response D Two adding the options of ebony and bird's eye maple.

Salk Sound has unveiled a new floorstanding loudspeaker, the Pharos HET.

 

The obelisk-like Pharos stands 44 inches tall and sports a 12" JBL woofer mated with a 6.5" PHL midbass and Aurum Cantus G2 ribbon tweeter. The Pharos is rear ported with two 3" flared ports, and has a measured frequency response of 44-25,000Hz. The HET stands for high efficiency tower, and the Pharos boast an impressive 95dB efficiency rating, and present an 8 ohm load, making them a good choice for tube amplifiers. The tapered construction of the Pharos allows for the necessary enclosure volume, while presenting a loudspeaker that doesn't overwhelm the space it occupies.

 

Pricing on the Pharos HET is $7995/pair, and like the rest of Jim Salk's offerings, are available in just about any finish you can imagine.

The BDA is reporting that sales of Blu Ray players have topped 2.7 million units to date.

 

Figures include both stand-alone players and Playstation 3 videogame consoles. The HD DVD Promotional Group had reported last week that HD DVD player sales had hit the 750,00 mark, that figure including Xbox 360 HD DVD add-on units. On the software front, Blu Ray has sold over 4 million discs since inception through November, with HD DVD accounting for 2.5 million units in disc sales. HD DVD has enjoyed the upper hand in stand-alone player sales throughout the Format War, and with the BDA not claiming a victory in stand-alone player sales, it's safe to assume that Playstation 3 videogame consoles still account for the majority of Blu Ray hardware sales.

 

It's business as usual this week in the Format War, with both sides trying to dress up weak PR announcements as trumpets of the other side's apocalypse. Neither side has begun to act like they really want to win, and we're still stuck with a fractured HD media market.

 

In a press release issued this morning, the HD DVD Promotional Group states that HD DVD owners are utilizing HD DVD's online interactivity, and coming back for more.

 

"We've only scratched the surface in offering web-connected experiences to fans of hit movies and TV shows, so it was great to see so many connecting online for these titles," said Universal's Ken Graffeo, also co-president of the HD DVD Promotional Group.

 

"As more titles from the HD DVD studios include access to downloads, trailers and community pages, the owner of any HD DVD player can take advantage of these web-connected experiences. Seeing the fan base rally around 'Transformers', 'Heroes' and other key titles on HD DVD was validation that there's an interest in extending the movie watching experience." stated Chris Saito, Paramount Home Entertainment's vice president of worldwide HD DVD marketing. "Growing and feeding the fan communities is a critical piece to evolving home entertainment, and this is an example of where HD DVD is meeting the challenge."

 

Transformers saw 80,000 of it's purchasers check out it's online features, with nearly a third of them returning for more visits to download additional content as it was released.  Universal reports that nearly a third of consumers who purchased Heroes: Season One, Knocked Up and Evan Almighty came online to download content.