News of Blu-ray Disc Drives

Any bets as to whether they'll be able to pull this off?

http://www.news.com/8301-10784_3-978939 ... 7-1_3-0-20

Blu-ray manufacturers are going to start cutting prices and go out on a promotional binge this holiday season, Matsushita Electric Industrial's Kazuhiro Tsuga said during a briefing with reporters at Ceatec, a large tech trade show that started here Tuesday. At Matsushita, which is best known for its Panasonic brand name, Tsuga is an ...

These numbers are coming from the BDA so take them with a grand of salt.

http://www.blu-raydisc.com/assets/downl ... -13747.pdf

The Blu-ray Disc Association European Promotions Committee has released market statistics that show the format to be establishing itself in Europe more rapidly than predicted. Importantly, the latest market intelligence shows BD to be increasing in popularity relative to its rival HD DVD format in key European markets and industry sectors. ...

Good news for audiophiles.. Samsung has added support for DTS-HD Master Audio to the BD-P1400. The player doesn't decode the audio, but outputs it via HDMI so you're still going to need a compatible receiver.

firmware download

PIONEER BLU-RAY DISC DRIVE WITH MULTI-FORMAT READING AND WRITING NOW AVAILABLE TO PROFESSIONAL USERS

Bringing High-Definition Blu-ray Disc Playback to Distribution Channel

LONG BEACH ­ (September 21, 2007) ­ Pioneer Electronicnics (USA) Inc. is now shipping the BDC-202, the professional Blu-ray Disc/DVD/CD combination drive. The BDC-202 BD-ROM and DVD/CD writer offers industry-leading engineering as well as Blu-ray Disc playback, DVD authoring and is optionally packaged with Corel® media software for enhanced functionality. The BDC-202 continues ...

According to Personal Computer World, Microsoft plans to release a new HD DVD drive for the Xbox 360 in 2008. I'm not sure how they could improve it. Maybe this will use the Lite-On HD DVD drive DigiTimes keeps mentioning?

http://www.pcw.co.uk/personal-computer- ... drive-2008

Microsoft will launch an updated HD DVD drive for the Xbox 360 in 2008, it said at its 25th hardware anniversary in London today.

Anyone else see this? Besides the fact that consumers are more familiar with HD DVD, I was surprised that only 52% of those surveyed were aware that high-def players were available. Also, 73% said that their standard DVD players work fine and they aren't going to replace them.

http://cts.businesswire.com/ct/CT?id=H6 ... ewsLang=en

Among those who currently own HDTVs, half (52 percent) are familiar with the availability of high-definition DVD players, ...

I'm not sure if you guys saw the latest announcement from Pioneer and Mitsubishi Chemical, but they've developed a new organic dye for BD-R discs. These new discs will correspond to the "Low to High" (LTH) recording system so they're expected to be cheaper to produce.

http://pioneer.jp/press/release598-j.html

The big catch here is that they're not compatible with current BD drives. Right now, drives use a "High to Low" (HTL) ...

I wonder if this is related to the Blu-ray promotion that they're going to run in October. Then again, it could be due to the fact that Blu-ray titles are outselling HD DVD by more than 2 to 1.

http://www.videobusiness.com/article/CA6478217.html

Target is shifting the balance of its high-definition software merchandising toward Blu-ray Disc, now devoting twice the amount of display space to that format than it does to ...

In relation to profile 1.1 discs on 1.0 machines: http://www.listenup.com/content/partner ... aug.07.php

Ouch...Blu-Ray hardly has this war in the bag.

According to the LA Times, Warner is considering an offer to support HD DVD exclusively.

http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-d ... &cset=true

The brinkmanship is intensifying. Another major studio, Warner Bros., is being courted by both camps and believed to be mulling over a lucrative offer that could bring such popular titles as "Harry Potter and the Order of the Phoenix" into the HD DVD camp, according to Hollywood insiders who requested anonymity ...