[The News Bot]

Toshiba UK has followed in the footsteps of Toshiba US and slashed hardware prices in the UK. From today, the HD-EP30 will sell for just less than 150 pounds and the high-end HD-EP35 below 250 pounds. The strategy going forward seems to be to sell the decks as DVD upscalers with advanced hi-def playback [...]
More...

[salsatoo]

This to my mind is an interesting and more realistic approach than we have seen thus far. Tosh have recognized that perhaps HD in DVD format will never actually be a huge market. As such as an up scaler, plus, if one can beleive the figures, they sell more hardware than the BD camp whatever.
I do not have a HD DVD as yet, though I do have Sky HD and do appreciate the difference even on a 26" Sony Bravia, though I am leaning towards getting a Tosh HD 10. This is said after also buying mini-discs and still of the opinion that they were a missed opportunity, plus Sony TVs.

[Sonic67]

When the Wii came out there was a lack of content but then there was huge sales and the content followed. Were all the sales down to people wanting to wave a remote at the tv or was it because it was cheap and could be used next to an existing format?

[Jonstone]

£150 may be cheap for an hd media player, but there are plenty of upscaling dvd players already in the marketplace that are much cheaper than that so I can't see marketing them as expensive dvd upscalers as a fruitful approach

[alanksup]

just found it at crampton and moore for £142 inc delivery. Count in the 7 dvds and it aint such a bad deal.

[alanksup]

the ep-30 that is

[amardilo]

Does this offer still include the 7 free HD films?

If so then it maybe a decent gift for my parents.

[womble9]

EP35 now £219 at Amazon and they're still doing the 7 disc promotion. Hell of a deal if you ask me and sure to boost sales, nice move Toshiba

this is a last ditch attempt to get more HD-DVD film sales
that why warner jumped ship as it was selling more blu-rays than HD-DVDs
5 of the 7 major studios back blu-ray now
HD-DVD need to pull a rabbit out of the hat
anyone telling themself different is kidding themselfs

[kourosh]

Originally Posted by Jonstone

£150 may be cheap for an hd media player, but there are plenty of upscaling dvd players already in the marketplace that are much cheaper than that so I can't see marketing them as expensive dvd upscalers as a fruitful approach

spot on,i cant believe they are bigging it up as an upscaler
all people are gonna think,ive got an upscaler so ive already got a HD player
and Toshiba wonder why its falling apart

[YooEntSinMe]

This is Tosh in the death throws with their HD format.
Time Warner jumping ship has signed the death warrant of HD DVD.
Tosh has just lost the largest distributer of films.
I'm quite saddened as I've backed HD DVD.
Will eventually get a Blu-Ray player but refuse to until they finalise the Profile.
That's one of the reasons I backed HD DVD. It was a finalised format at least.

[T800]

If they want to sell it partly as an upscaler it's about time they gave us the multi-region free firmware they promised over a year ago.

[alanksup]

OK, call me daft if you wish for buying an hd dvd after warners announcement, but play.com now have the ep30 at 119.99 with the 7 free films and an extra 4% at quidco. I need a new upscaler dvd player and the fact that I get the extras swings it for me. If I get a year out of it I will be happy. Would like a region free hack tho' but you cant have everything !!!

Be safe all

found this interesting item about blu-ray sales, from Tom`s hardware UK




Hollywood (CA) - Last week, Blu-ray had its best week ever with 85% of the high-def disc market share, according to trade publication Home Media Magazine.

Since the beginning of the format war, Blu-ray has been consistently outperforming HD DVD, but never at such a large rate. The second-place format was dealt a big blow a couple weeks ago when Warner Bros announced it was dropping HD DVD support, preventing the format from gaining any momentum during the Consumer Electronics Show.

Additionally, Home Media Magazine reports that the 10 top-selling HD titles last week were all Blu-ray Discs, the first time that not one HD DVD made the list.

At the top of the list was Blu-ray’s 3:10 To Yuma, which sold 10 times as many discs as the HD DVD release of The Kingdom.

The studios ie universal and paramount will be watch the sales figures closely
if blu-ray continues to out sell HD-DVD by a wide margin then i would imagine
that the last 2 big studios will either go dual format to begin with to save face or dump HD altogether. I guess someone had to loose shame that
all the guys that paid good cash for HD-DVd will now need to stump up more for Blu-ray