02/17/2008, 10:05pm, EST
Sunday, February 17thToshiba officially mulls pulling HD DVD
Toshiba is reviewing whether or not it will continue the HD DVD format, the company said Monday morning in a public statement. The Japanese electronics firm neither confirmed nor denied claims by national broadcaster NHK that it would halt HD DVD production outright but has admitted that it is reconsidering its position on the HD movie disc standard. The comment is the first public acknowledgement by Toshiba that it may need to discontinue the format after a succession of key studio and retail losses.
Before Toshiba's statement, multiple claims by American publications and the Reuters news agency had suggested that Toshiba would retire its HD DVD efforts within weeks.
Doubts began to rise in earnest for HD DVD's future when Warner dropped HD DVD from its movie catalog at the start of January, explaining that it would phase out the format in favor of Blu-ray by June. This triggered a rash of moves by smaller studios and retailers who echoed Warner's position. The most damaging move since Warner's announcement was Wal-Mart's move to Blu-ray exclusivity, which effectively cut HD DVD from the largest movie sales outlet in the US.
While Toshiba is not the only firm involved in promoting HD DVD, it serves as the primary manufacturer of HD DVD hardware and would leave the format with virtually no distribution should it leave the market.
Filed under: industry
Other story tags: blu-ray, Toshiba, HD DVD, Warner, Wal-Mart
,
, 13
,
,
,
,
, 
subscribe to comments
for this article
File a class action lawsuit...
CVB
Sickening
The only thing HD-DVD had going for it was it was a little less expensive...
Didn't happen in the VHS/Betamax battle and it won't happen here either. Didn't happen in the OS wars or the PC hardware wars and won't happen in the Blu-Ray/HD/DVD struggle. Corporations don't owe consumers anything if their products don't succeed in the marketplace. Somebody will maybe try to get a class action lawsuit going but it will fail. Get over it.
Being a lot cheaper was not the only thing going for HD-DVD. They also had no Region Coding (which is what consumers should have) and finalized technical specs. Blu-ray is still sorting out players as Profile 1.0, 1.2, 2.0 and Java Interactive... Many Blu-ray players are not able to be upgraded. I’m sure some of theses “winners” will also file a class action lawsuit...
From Video Business: the following Blu-ray players are 'Profile 1.0' players, meaning they can not play PIP or web-enabled interactive features:
Sony BDP-S300 Sharp BD-HP20U Samsung BDP-1400 Pioneer BDP-95FD Philips BDP9000
The following Blu-ray players can play PIP, but not web-enabled interactive features:
LG BH200 Panasonic DMP BD300 Philips BDP7200 Samsung BD-UP5000 Samsung BD-P1500 Samsung BD-UP5500 Sharp BD-HP50U