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Toshiba has card up its sleeve to make HD-DVD very cheap
Posted on 03/11/05 10:31 by Quakester2000
DamnedIfIknow used our news submit to tell us that Toshiba has
another card up its sleeve to back its format after a number of u-turns by movie
studios against its format. Toshiba has decided to adopt a peculiar strategy of
letting Chinese competitors bring out their own DVD players based on the HD-DVD
standard. This tactic is not practiced much in
The decision by Toshiba could have ramifications for everyone in the industry. This deal could mean extremely cheap HD-DVD players compared to Blu-ray from the start of the format releases.
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But Toshiba"s decision could have significant ramifications in the race for the billions of dollars that will very likely flow from the next generation of DVD technology that promises sharper pictures, enhanced audio and more disc storage. |
This sounds like a NVIDIA vs 3DFX scenario all over again where NVIDIA let anyone build cards and 3DFX built its own. And we all know what happened to 3DFX they had to compete against other manufcaturers who were able to drop prices because of the vast competiton and 3dfx just couldnt match it. This strategy by Toshiba could make HD-DVD format extremly cheap.
Source: IHT
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Seems like a very good move by Toshiba, but the question will the average person really want to buy a HD player or stick with DVD?
Wonder what Blue-ray will now counter with . . .
even if the player is say £150 the discs are bound to be £20+. when dvds came out every dvd title in the u.k was about £20, now they are about £12 on play.com, i aint gunna fork out £20 for just an o.k movie, only a classic like "the godfather" would warrant such an expensive purchase.
I wonder whether that means crap players on launch! and flood of crap dying players to homes
Speaking of which, i'm postive paramount held back the remastered godfather on DVD (which was due for release last year) because they want it for HD-DVD/Blu-Ray.
$50 HD-DVD players and $100 HD-DVD burners. 
I still want a BluRAY burner though.
I still want a BluRAY burner though.i REALLY doubt that there will be $50 hd dvd players, when they first come out it will be ATLEAST £100 for a crappy one, burners will also be expensive, just like dvd+r dl, they are £2 now in u.k, blank 16x dvd-rs are about £0.20, 10x cheaper, they have been out for 18 months ish and still insanely expensive.
the only way for hd dvd to take off is for the xbox 360 deluxe to have it.
I love how they throw around no figures in order to back up there claim. For all we know it could just drop the price down a hundred bucks for luanch (right now they quoted that it will be 500 bucks for a reader at launch). That's still 400 bucks I would think at best launch price for a extremely cheap apex hd-dvd drive will be 200 bucks+.
i don't think there will be chinese engineered players nor burners first; chinese firms cannot compete with other known brand names at high prices, but once chinese develops inexpensive components, then cheap stuffs will come out. this might give hd dvd just right amount of momentum to push out br...just like old days of betamax vs vhs
whether hd dvd dies or not, this move will make both br & hd dvd inexpensive very soon
I would like to understand where the numbers some folks are posting above are coming from.
The materials needed to build a HD DVD player or recorder cost only marginally more than to build a current standard DVD player or recorder. Modifying existing factories in Taiwan and China to turn out new devices has a very minimal cost impact according to most sources. Thus the players and burners should not cost more than today's DVD devices unless the makers demand a higher margin - a real possibility considering the paper thin margins they work with now.
Ditto the media. Single layer HD DVD media should not cost more than single layer current standard DVD media. As the factories switch their production, there probably will be a shortage of available media indially, but once production scales up to meet demand, prices should stabalize at about what you pay for DVD media today.
True or not, this IS VHS vs BMax part II. Well done Tosh for comsumers have been the mesmerised stooges of the kleptomanic behaviour of global corporations for too long. This one is on us.
Thank goodness that rivalry and pride had seemingly had overcome the strange bedfellow bondage that greed and money usually brings. Where is satan when we need him, eh? shafting someone else, probably.
Cheap but not better, we all know what happens when you buy cheap DVD+/-R's, you go back to expensive media like TY's instead of daxton.
Whatever looks better in the end should win cost should not be a big part in this. A few extra bucks on the player but its better is worth it.
As much as I hate to say it I vote for SONY on this one.
Dont forget many of the dvd players you buy today are made in china and just rebadged to another big name make.The number for a 500 dollar hd-dvd reader was posted on here not to long ago. Yes the drives might be very simular but the video processing chip and output controlls are going to bring up the cost a lot more. Playing 1080p video is not going to happen on good old dvd hardware especially with the encryption it has. Also network port being added they are going to need a whole new chipset just to get this operational that brings up cost.
Ok, so Toshiba has won the war. We all benefit. Now all the majors adopt Toshiba's platform. Blue Ray becomes another failed product. I gues ultimately, we get a hybrid as a compreomise to avoid bloodshed, er, losses.
'Entreprenuers" and 'corporations" exists because they represent the greed and aspirations of kleptomaniacs. By instilling a sense of 'fashion" through various means but mainly through media mongering and advertisers, they prove to all concerned [and not just your typical 'blank papers"] that hynotism through the lack of self-respect works.
Those who worship 'purity", 'perfection", 'higer than fi" are truly mesmerised. Just look at those who have no self-respect, they actually think that they can worship 'fashion", however it is presented, such that they then will become part of 'royalty", whether it is clothing, high tech, drugs, etc. Can the hi-fi purist really differentiate the 'audible musicality" of some fashion junk of electro-metallic expensive madness? Sure, they have the means but only because they either semi-con their employers for more salary or steal it via advertising 'fashion" thereby making egoistic idiots out of fashion-groupies.
You can't see the difference between HD or blue-ray [just the name alone starts the chain of madness], only your ego can, and the mad ego does it by making others sacrifice their self-respect to support its chase for greed. Still can't see it, can you? Judge yourself and you gain self-respect/wisdom and the truth in all matters presented/offered but judge others, and you get sucked into their madness which is predominatly fuelled by greed through ignorance of the wider whole.
The technology behind blue-ray is NOT going to disappear because the global kleptomaniacs 'lost" this round. It only lost the opportunity, this time, to BS others that the god's gift is being missed and should we opt for it, we will pay in more ways than just money. We pay with our self-worth because fashion has won, yet again to fuel the greed of others.
This is not a greeny-looney issue nor a halleluja issue. It's a moral issue for when greed controls everything, we lose our identity but when when we control greed, it then will be a good servant. No matter how these kleptomaniacs grits their teeth to present a nice picture of themselves, like politicans, true competition keeps them 'in-check". Vote neither for HD nor Blue-ray but for sensibility. Let greed and fashion worships truth instead and not the other way round.
Anyway!!! at the end of the day, who he hell wants a format which needs an internet connection to play the movies!!!!GEEEEEEEEZE HOW TWO FACED CAN EVERYONE BE IN HERE NOT SO LONG AGO YOU ALL SAID YOU WERNT HAVING NOWT TO DO WITH EITHER CAMP BECAUSE BOTH CAMPS WOULDNT RESPECT YOU RIGHTS TO MAKE A LEGAL COPY OF AN ORIGINAL YOU HAD BOUGHT LOOK AT YOU NOW L.O.VERY.LOUD 
When it comes to blank DVD media, I don't buy the really cheap discs, but I'm sure glad they exist. Without them, the cost of TY and other quality media would be sky high.
This is interesting, because according to an unnamed Sony suit, Blu-Ray have "won" the war, remember? 
To be honest, I couldn't me more disinterested in Hollywood's 'content' if I tried. Wake me when the engineers take over management at these companies and offer me something actually worth saving MY data to - unrestricted. You know, actually making something useful instead of providing yet another playback platform for the propaganda vehicle of law-changing, politician-paying, DRM-implementing, rootkit-installing, granny-suing conglomerates eager to control and tax every aspect of our lives - oh but it's all for the artists, we swear!
Thank you.
To be honest, I couldn't me more disinterested in Hollywood's 'content' if I tried. Wake me when the engineers take over management at these companies and offer me something actually worth saving MY data to - unrestricted. You know, actually making something useful instead of providing yet another playback platform for the propaganda vehicle of law-changing, politician-paying, DRM-implementing, rootkit-installing, granny-suing conglomerates eager to control and tax every aspect of our lives - oh but it's all for the artists, we swear!
Thank you.NEW FORUM COVERING EVERYTHING !!!!!
HoloForum: News & Views on the Field of Holographic Technology
http://www.holoforum.com/
At least someone at Toshiba, has brains and finally acknowledged why DVD's became a runaway sales winner, and it was not derived from the limited initial sales of the original very expensive japanese dvd players, but rather due to bulk sales of low cost units from chinese mainland sources, to drive the market forward to it's current level we see now. For it's all about perceived choices!, as to who will win! Now, if you were given a choice, would you buy a low cost chinese multipurpose player that plays everything from audio and video cd's upwards, requiring, minimal initial home audio equipment upgrade costs. Or alternatively, would spend big dollars, upgrading and revamping, your entire home audio visual centre, to be compatable,along with one rather expensive undefined as yet Japanese sourced Blueray player. Thus, if the market is flooded with 100 hddvd players at one tenth the cost of technically superior Blueray players, which is gonna sell by the boat load! Remember also these chinese sourced players, will be designed to play everything from audio and video cd's upwards! It ain't no contest! Oh well, then again, if Paramount Accountants see they are selling 500 HDDVD disc's to 1 bluray, guess which market they will fully support and endorse, the one that generates the poorest profits, or the one that generates top dollar? Currently, it remains a chicken and egg situation, and only time will tell, if management from both products have made the right decision! The winner of this one, stands to make super $$$$ in media cross license royalty payments, from all media manufacturers and producers! This greed is the current driving force above all else especially at SONY(due to a number of problems of their own self creation), hence the current outlandish, unsubstantiated statements saying we've won, where no current product or sales market exists yet! Oh well, we live in age where hype, lies and fiction are treated as fact!
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