The battle for High Definition images rages on! Word on the street is that Wal-Mart has a bunch of HD players being manufactured in China as we speak! We get the story from out fantastic friends at filmjunk:
There’s a big rumour going around in DVD technology circles that Wal-Mart may be gearing up to release a dirt cheap HD-DVD player by next year. They’ve apparently placed an order with a Chinese electronics manufacturer for two million units at a cost of $50 each, which would allow them to sell these players for a retail price of $299 USD or less. So is there any truth to this?
Well, the reported deal seems to be legit, but it is currently unclear whether the players are HD-DVD or Blu-ray (the original news source was in Chinese and the translations have been vague).
Wal – Mart destroys anyone’s hope of making money on hardware, and this is good news for consumers. In his article the Webmaster of Filmjunk makes a good point of reminding us that Wal-Mart sells 40% of all DVD’s and if they take a side on the HDDVD VS BLU RAY DVD it could have a significant impact on the battle. Having seen the power of HD DVD myself I am a convert and will certainly be buying a player in another year or so. I procrastinate at everything, it took me 5 years to get a damn DVD player.
I am astonished at just how cheap technology is getting. I saw a small TV for sale the other day in a flyer for under 15 bucks. A TV you can take fishing – for under 15 dollars. You can now get a no frills DVD player for under 50 and the cost of computers keeps coming down year after year. People on welfare now have luxuries that ancient kings would of plundered nations for. It is an exciting time to live, and I am interested to see what the changes in picture quality will do to filmmaking.
Ultra-cheap DVD players tend to give a mediocre viewing experience. Regular DVDs came a long way and it is normal for them to now be cheap and of pretty good quality. But when it comes to Wal-Mart I’m sure they’ll help bring the price down.
However I wonder if they’re really doing it for HD DVD, it could very well be Blu-ray considering the sales figures since the beginning of 2007.
I picked up the HD-DVD add on for the XBOX 360 for 199$. Not too shabby.
The problem is the HD-DVDs themselves. They run 25-35 bucks a movie and the quality is hit or miss. Some of the HD-DVDs aren’t that much better than the DVD version. “Serenity,” for example, only looks slightly better than the DVD and doesn’t really have any extra special features (a big dissapointment for me, a FIREFLY fan). Some HD-DVD’s don’t have special features or commentary at all.
However, some movies like “Mission Impossible: III” look incredible. The sounds and picture are light years beyond the DVD version and the thing is loaded with special features, including a Picture in Picture commentary track. makes all the money you spent on HD worth it.
Anyways, read a review of the HD-DVD version before you buy it. It might be worthwile to just stick with the DVD version sometimes.
In terms of disc sales, blu-ray is reported to be outselling hd-dvd by 70% to 30% or there-abouts. Am I right in thinking most of the studios are in the Blu-Ray Camp with universal being the only one to be solely in the HD-dvd camp? Looking at it like that it doesn’t look too good for HD-dvd. It would be interesting if in this case it was the gaming community (PS3 fanboys) that decided the format war winner and not the pr0n industry (as in the betamx-vhs war). But cheap HD-dvd’s though, could swing it. However i’m sure someone will come up with a an equivalently low-cost BluRay player to give them a run for their money (even if they drop the price of the ps3 again).
Why would you want a TV while fishing? That shit be whack.
I might actually start caring about HD-DVD sooner than i expected.
did anyone else read the story about how electronic stores are closing all over north america because of a one day sale wal-mart had on big screen TVs? here it is. http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/18274443/
this isn’t necessarily good news.
/don’t shop at wal-mart.
As pointed out elsewhere on the interweb, Costco currently has the Toshiba HD-DVD for about $350.
Pretty sure that Walmart will decimate that price. My guess is that by the time Walmart gets them in stock it’ll be more like $199-ish.