Toshiba permanenly lowers HD DVD price to $300

Toshiba today officially lowered the price of its HD-A2 entry level HD DVD player. The drop comes after the success of the company's recent price promo and makes permanent a price of $300, establishing the player as the least expensive that can play a native HD format. The Toshiba device reaches the cost by offering playback at 1080i and using regular HDMI rather than the deep-color HDMI 1.3 of the premium HD-XA2.

The company has yet to announce whether or not the price cut will be reflected in stores immediately but has signaled the price cut just days after Blu-Ray player designers such as Pioneer and Sony began offering five free movies with each set-top box, hoping to make up for the higher price of their players with a starter collection of titles that reduce the up-front cost. Prices for Toshiba's HD-A20 and HD-XA2 players remain unchanged at $400 and $800 each.