Section: Video, DVD Players/DVRs, HDTV
In a move to help those upset customers who purchased an HD DVD player, Best Buy has announced they will begin offering $50 gift cards for those who made their purchase before February 23, 2008. Considering the HD DVD players will still function and work fairly nice as an up-converting DVD player this $50 gift card offer sounds nice, but just in case you absolutely want it gone, there is also a trade-in program to consider.
The $50 gift card offer requires the HD DVD player have been purchased at Best Buy, however, and this is where some good news comes in. The Trade-In Center Program will allow anyone to trade in their ‘old’ HD DVD player and also their HD DVD movies whether purchased at Best Buy or not. This program will begin on March 21, 2008 and you can visit BestBuyTradeIn.com to get an “instant estimate of the value of your HD DVD player and movies.”
We have also seen a similar return policy from other big-box retailers Circuit City and Future Shop, I wonder who will be next.
Read [Best Buy]
Full Story » | Written by Robert Nelson for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Written by Robert Nelson on March 19th, 2008 with comments disabled.
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Section: Video, DVD Players/DVRs, HDTV
Following the decision to stop the production of its HD DVD product line, Toshiba is about to declare a $986 million loss (100 billion yen). Declaring the said amount as loss will pull down the company’s full-year operating profit to $2.43 billion (250 billion yen) which is short of its projected profit for this year.
When Toshiba decided to pull the plug on its HD DVD production, the company was not expecting that it would be force to implement changes in its production line. Neither did the company expect that it would incur other charges that would multiply the $486 million (50 billion yen) that it previously expected to lose.
Despite this projected loss, Toshiba is still confident that it could earn an operating profit of $2.82 billion (290 billion yen) for this year until March of 2009. However, some company executives admitted that this might not be possible as the company may further be affected by falling prices of microchips and LCD’s.
Aside from losing substantial amount in its operating profit, Toshiba may also face some problems from HD DVD agreements that the company has entered into with companies such as Universal Studios, Paramount Pictures and Dreamworks Animation.
If Toshiba still wants to achieve its targeted operating profit, it must get up on its feet as early as now. The earlier decision is beginning to take its toll on the company as trading prices of its Shares are going down to as high as 1.5%.
Read [Reuters]
Full Story » | Written by Arnold Zafra for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Written by Arnold Zafra on March 13th, 2008 with comments disabled.
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Section: Video, DVD Players/DVRs, HDTV
Fresh off the format war win, Sony has announced two new Blu-ray players. The BDP-S350 and BDP-S550 players both offer compatibility with formats to include BD-R/RE, DVD+R/+RW, DVD-R/-RW, CD, CD-R/RW and JPEG on DVD or CD recordable media. In addition to the wide variety of format support the players will also feature BonusView (Profile v1.1), BD-Live (Profile v2.0) and offer 1080p24/60 output via HDMI. Both players also have an Ethernet port and can handle up to 7.1 channels decoding for Dolby TrueHD and DD+ along with 7.1 channels bitstream audio output including DTS-MA.
Above the BDP-S350, the BDP-S550 will include 1GB of persistent storage along with up to 7.1 channel decoding for DTS-HD MA and up to 7.1 channel analog output.
The BDP-S350 will be available this Summer and retail for $400, the BDP-S550 will be available in the Fall and retail for $500.
Via [SlashGear]
Full Story » | Written by Robert Nelson for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Written by Robert Nelson on February 27th, 2008 with no comments.
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Section: Video, DVD Players/DVRs, HDTV
TiVo currently has a new special going for the TiVo HD DVR. For a limited time you can now get a refurbished model for just $199.99. That price does require a one year service obligation which will run you an additional $12.95 a month or $129 for the full year. As we mentioned this is just for a limited time and the offer will end on April 2.
Read [TiVo] Via [Boy Genius Report]
Full Story » | Written by Robert Nelson for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Written by Robert Nelson on February 24th, 2008 with no comments.
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Section: Video, DVD Players/DVRs, HDTV
TiVo currently has a new special going for the TiVo HD DVR. For a limited time you can now get a refurbished model for just $199.99. That price does require a one year service obligation which will run you an additional $12.95 a month or $129 for the full year. As we mentioned this is just for a limited time and the offer will end on April 2.
Read [TiVo] Via [Boy Genius Report]
Full Story » | Written by Robert Nelson for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Written by Robert Nelson on February 24th, 2008 with no comments.
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Section: Video, DVD Players/DVRs, HDTV
I’m glad the format war has ended. It means a slight return to sanity for consumers wondering how to spend their dollars at the check out counter. It certainly goes a long way toward the everyday consumer adopting an HD disc-based format. According to an analyst at ABI research the end of the format war was not the true measure of consumer demand when it came to the choice of HD format. The true decision was made by Warner brothers decision to jump ship to Blu-ray. The decision to switch may have been principally decided not by which format the consumers of Warner’s preferred, but by a nearly $120 million payoff from Sony. That payoff created a signal that retailers like Wal-Mart and rental companies like Netflix followed. Consumer sales did not overwhelm one side or the other. Consumers didn’t receive a benefit or feature that made one format superior to another. A simple back room corporate deal seems to have ended the war. This is not how a consumer demand driven marketplace should work.
“Consumers spent [only] about $170 million on high-def DVD in 2007 and Fox, for one, is hoping that jumps to $10 billion in 2008,” noted ABI Principal Analyst Steve Wilson.
It seems very unlikely to all concerned that a jump in sales will equal $10 billion in that short period of time.
“Consumer spending on DVD sales and rentals was pretty flat in 2005 and 2006 at about $22 billion. It dropped last year for the first time, by about 3 percent,” Wilson said today. The studios really need the new high-def format to catch on so they can drive revenues back up,” said WIlson.
That may be what the end to the war may really be all about. Movie studios saw the general interest in DVD began to wain and concern over what impact a format war would have made them eager to end it quickly. It seems they have a winner now and this may or may not be the choice the consumer wanted.
Read [Beta News]
Full Story » | Written by Ed Arnold for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Written by Ed Arnold on February 23rd, 2008 with no comments.
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Section: Video, DVD Players/DVRs, HDTV
The latest HD DVD deal is courtesy of CompUSA and for just $89.99 you can grab a Toshiba HD-A3 player along with 7 movies. While CompUSA seems nice enough to let customers know that these players are basically a dead format I can imagine that other retailers will not be quite as nice.
Sadly these HD DVD sales will most likely continue to occur until these stores run out of inventory, hopefully they will not attract any customers thinking they are actually getting a deal. I could see the not so informed shopper think they are getting a great deal on a “next-generation” player when they are actually buying a dead format, these sales should all have to come with warnings.
Its nice to see an honest move from CompUSA, and this actually would make a nice up-converting player, if you were in the market for such a player.
Keep reading for the full ‘warning’ letter from CompUSA…
Via [CrunchGear]
Folks,
Toshiba lost the war… but their pain is your gain!
We have an incredible deal for you. Did you know this HD-DVD player is also an incredible up-convert DVD player? This will usually run you around $79.99, but we’re giving you an HD-DVD player for $89.99 with 7-FREE HD-DVD movies (2 in the box, and 5 by mail) a $140.00 value, FREE! This offer ends Feb 28th, so don’t delay!
How did we get such a low price?
Sony and Toshiba have been battling over two high-definition formats. Blu-Ray (from Sony) and HD-DVD (from Toshiba). This week Toshiba announced they will stop producing the HD-DVD format and will work on the next generation device. As soon as we heard, we fought hard to get a new low price for you. We succeeded: You get the HD-DVD player, 7 Free HD-DVD Movies (worth $140), and the up-convert capability for just $89.99.
Look, all of us have traditional standard format DVD movies. This HD-DVD player not only plays HD-DVD movies, but it also upconverts standard DVD movies to the HD signal. What does upconvert mean? It takes the standard definition signal and converts it into a high definition signal. While it’s no comparison for a true HD-DVD, the upconversion process dramatically increases the quality of your old standard definition movies.
NOTE: Upconverting DVD players sell for around $79. I’m offering you an HD-DVD player, with built-in upconversion, and 7 FREE* movies (worth $140) for just $89. Heck, it’s like paying nearly 50% for the movies and getting a free HD-DVD player.
Look, Toshiba has discontinued this item and will not make any more. Once we sellout of these, they’re gone. This is a once in a decade event that just occurred. If you’ve been shopping for and HD-DVD player or an upconverting DVD player, this is the deal to get. But only if you hurry.
Regards,
CompUSA.com
Full Story » | Written by Robert Nelson for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Written by Robert Nelson on February 22nd, 2008 with no comments.
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Section: Video, DVD Players/DVRs, HDTV
The latest HD DVD deal is courtesy of CompUSA and for just $89.99 you can grab a Toshiba HD-A3 player along with 7 movies. While CompUSA seems nice enough to let customers know that these players are basically a dead format I can imagine that other retailers will not be quite as nice.
Sadly these HD DVD sales will most likely continue to occur until these stores run out of inventory, hopefully they will not attract any customers thinking they are actually getting a deal. I could see the not so informed shopper think they are getting a great deal on a “next-generation” player when they are actually buying a dead format, these sales should all have to come with warnings.
Its nice to see an honest move from CompUSA, and this actually would make a nice up-converting player, if you were in the market for such a player.
Keep reading for the full ‘warning’ letter from CompUSA…
Via [CrunchGear]
Folks,
Toshiba lost the war… but their pain is your gain!
We have an incredible deal for you. Did you know this HD-DVD player is also an incredible up-convert DVD player? This will usually run you around $79.99, but we’re giving you an HD-DVD player for $89.99 with 7-FREE HD-DVD movies (2 in the box, and 5 by mail) a $140.00 value, FREE! This offer ends Feb 28th, so don’t delay!
How did we get such a low price?
Sony and Toshiba have been battling over two high-definition formats. Blu-Ray (from Sony) and HD-DVD (from Toshiba). This week Toshiba announced they will stop producing the HD-DVD format and will work on the next generation device. As soon as we heard, we fought hard to get a new low price for you. We succeeded: You get the HD-DVD player, 7 Free HD-DVD Movies (worth $140), and the up-convert capability for just $89.99.
Look, all of us have traditional standard format DVD movies. This HD-DVD player not only plays HD-DVD movies, but it also upconverts standard DVD movies to the HD signal. What does upconvert mean? It takes the standard definition signal and converts it into a high definition signal. While it’s no comparison for a true HD-DVD, the upconversion process dramatically increases the quality of your old standard definition movies.
NOTE: Upconverting DVD players sell for around $79. I’m offering you an HD-DVD player, with built-in upconversion, and 7 FREE* movies (worth $140) for just $89. Heck, it’s like paying nearly 50% for the movies and getting a free HD-DVD player.
Look, Toshiba has discontinued this item and will not make any more. Once we sellout of these, they’re gone. This is a once in a decade event that just occurred. If you’ve been shopping for and HD-DVD player or an upconverting DVD player, this is the deal to get. But only if you hurry.
Regards,
CompUSA.com
Full Story » | Written by Robert Nelson for Gadgetell. | Comment on this Article »
Written by Robert Nelson on February 22nd, 2008 with no comments.
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