Souped-up Toshiba HD-DVD Players to Hit Europe
According to recent reports, Toshiba is planning to release two HD-DVD players in Europe that are expected to retail in the ballpark of 599 to 999 euros ($768-$1,280). Toshiba says that the dramatic price increase (one can find a Toshiba HD-DVD player in America for as low as $499) is due to the fact that these players are slimmer and have more features than do ones released to the American market last spring.
This is the most recent move in the fight to the death between the HD-DVD (cheaper) and Blu-Ray (more storage capacity) formats, as manufacturers are obviously not listening to Netflix CEO Reed Hastings’ pleas for format agnosticism. In the first six weeks after the release of the respective technologies, HD-DVD had a 33% sales advantage over Blu-Ray players (which were released by Samsung and will be released by Sony in October–see here), but the sales of both technologies have disappointed.
[Via Reuters]