HiDef DVD News VII - News Only : AND WE MEAN IT: NEWS ONLY - Page 119

Paramount Blu-ray movies spotted on Amazon.co.uk
"Coming soon" titles of wrong colour fuel format switch rumours
by Amy-Mae Elliott
22 January 2008 10:45 GMT - Despite Paramount's official statement that they are sticking with the flagging HD DVD format as their next-gen disc of choice, rumours still abound online that the company will go Blu-ray in the not-too-distant future.

Adding fuel to those particular flames of rumour is the recent discovery of some "coming soon" Blu-ray-flavoured Paramount discs on Amazon.co.uk.

The three releases, due on 10th March 2008, according to info on the e-tailer's site, are "Trading Places", "Coming To America" and "Anchorman".

Although the two Eddie Murphy vehicles did get a US Blu-ray release before Paramount's switch to HD DVD last summer, it seems Anchorman did not, leading to speculation that this is a slip from Amazon, rather than an admin error.

Paramount Germany said that these announcements are untrue. The Amazon-listings are utterly wrong. There is no declaration of intent from their holding company, to release henceforth on Blu-ray.

Burbank (CA) - Warner Home Video announced this week that it will continue to release titles on HD DVD for three weeks longer than it originally anticipated.

Earlier this month, Warner said that it is going to stop supporting HD DVD in May. However, it has now decided to push that deadline back a few weeks to be able to release more of its upcoming titles on both formats.

Despite Warner's Blu-ray exclusivity announcement, over a dozen Warner titles are still slated for release on HD DVD over the next four months. The extension of HD DVD support confirms that Twister and Bonnie & Clyde will come out on both formats instead of being Blu-ray exclusives.

Some other notable Warner titles that will still be released on both formats include Justice League: The New Frontier, I Am Legend, and August Rush

As has become quite the norm for Amazon, it seems that the trio of flicks it proudly listed as Blu-ray titles just two days back were in fact listed erroneously. A new report over at Heise -- and a quick click back over to the exact same Amazon links -- shows that the films are indeed HD DVDs. So yeah, we wouldn't take any of Amazon's listings from here on out as a sign of the format war getting even crazier, but who knows, try clicking back tomorrow and see if they're scheduled to debut on HD VMD.

Blu-ray's hardware market share jumped to a record 93% of players sold for the week ending Jan 12. That's up from 51% in the week prior. Industry observers attribute the jump to Warner's announcement on January 4th that it would exclusively back the Blu-ray format beginning this June.

While we've become accustomed to Blu-ray players being released every six months, it's a little ridiculous when we're forced to wait for a new player longer than it's on the market. Eventually we expect the cycle to slow down -- like when BD Live players are out for example -- and many believed that the Samsung BD-UP5000 could be one of those players based on promises when announced. Once you have an Ethernet port for internet content, REON video processing, internal decoding and bitstream support for every codec, discrete analog output, as well as HDMI 1.3, what else could possibly warrant a mid year revamp? We suspect the problem is that the player isn't delivering, and on top of that, we don't think it's Samsung's fault. You see, just like the LG BH200, the BD-UP5000 is based on Broadcom's Reference design BCM97440, and the word on the street is that it isn't ever going to deliver. So it'd make sense that Sammy would change the platform for one that's actually able to get the job done. So yeah, this Broadcom bit is just speculation, but we did contact the outfit to figure out what the deal was, and while it was very responsive at first, as soon as we asked about the troubles with the BCM97400, it must'a lost our email address (or maybe its servers have been down for a week). The good news is that Samsung doesn't see the BD-UP5500 as a replacement, and promises a suitable replacement for the high-end dual-format customer in the second half of '08.

**Update** Samsung says that the date it'll be discontinued is subject to change.

The Bottom Line: The Samsung BP-U5500 follows up their BP-U5000 which just started to roll to stores recently. The fuctionality remains similar: Blu-ray and HD DVD playback along with CD and DVD support in a single box. The news is the $599 MSRP which might even break the $500 barrier once discounted.
The Catch: The BP-5000 is having some issues with audio format support, that Sammy hopes to fix by software soon. Hope this set ships cleaner.

Originally Posted by Adam_G

From Greg Tarr of TWICE:
http://www.twice.com/article/CA65249...?desc=topstory

NPD attributed the results largely to promotions run by several Blu-ray supporting manufacturers, and said they were not necessarily the result of reaction to the news that Warner Bros. would be dropping support of HD DVD to go exclusively with HD DVD in May.

“We’ve been doing weekly data for a long time, and we often times will see big shifts in sales for one week that doesn’t necessarily determine a trend,” said Stephen Baker, NPD Group industry analysis VP, told TWICE. “There were some promotions in the marketplace during that week with Sharp and Sony bundling Blu-ray players with televisions — it seems to me unlikely that consumers would have made that kind of a choice that quickly based on new reports of Warner Bros. shifting from Blu-ray and HD DVD to Blu-ray exclusively.”

Typically, Baker emphasized, big swings in market share are the result of major promotions.

Originally Posted by BetaNews

NPD: Free Blu-ray player deals led to boosted sales this month

By Nate Mook, BetaNews
January 24, 2008, 2:46 PM

A report from NPD Group claimed Blu-ray standalone player sales accounted for 93 percent of the high-def market for the week ending January 12, but NPD itself won't stand behind the numbers, saying they were leaked and that weekly sales data is not a long-term indicator.

According to Stephen Baker, vice president of industry analysis for NPD, the data "came from an NPD subscriber" and "wasn't approved for release from NPD." He added that the firm typically sees big fluctuations in sales volumes each week, and never makes long-term judgements based on weekly data.


"It reflects what was going on during that week," Baker said, adding that it wasn't smart to "extrapolate that out for six months."

So what went on the week ending January 12 that led to such high numbers in Blu-ray standalone player sales? Bundling deals with HDTVs, explained Baker. Sharp Blu-ray players accounted for over 30% of sales, as they were offered free to buyers of the company's LCD televisions.

Sony -- also accounting for one-third of sales -- had a similar $400-off deal for Blu-ray players when buying a Sony HDTV.

Panasonic, like Sharp, offered a free Blu-ray player and made up for the remaining third of units sold. Samsung Blu-ray sales were almost non-existent, as the company did not offer any special deals to TV buyers.

The NPD figures did not include Sony's PlayStation 3 or Microsoft's HD DVD add-on for the Xbox 360 -- only standalone players.

Baker wouldn't get specific -- since NPD normally never even comments on weekly sales data -- but said there was some drop in HD DVD player sales. For its part, the HD DVD Promotional Group told BetaNews the weekly sales data was from before the HD DVD player price drop Toshiba announced last week.

Baker did provide BetaNews some insight as to how NPD counts sales. It receives its data from point-of-sale systems from a number of retail outlets across the United States. He would not say how many retailers send data to NPD, but said it was "double digits."

NPD's numbers do not include online sales from the likes of Amazon, where Toshiba's HD-A3 HD DVD player is the number one seller in the DVD player category and number 14 in all of electronics. By contrast, standalone Blu-ray players do not make the

Sony has announced the development of a new Blu-ray reader / writer module that is not only smaller than previous components, but promises to be cheaper as well due to a simplified manufacturing process. The new laser housing is less than three millimeters thick, according to the Japanese manufacturer and co-developer Nichia Corporation, enabling it to be incorporated into smaller devices such as portable players. Sony predicts that we'll first start seeing 9.5-millimeter laptop BD drives which employ the module later this year.

Originally Posted by BenDover

Sony announces new Blu-ray module, should drive down costs
Posted Jan 25th 2008 12:05PM by Evan Blass

Woolworths backs Blu-ray format over HD-DVD

Monday, 28 January 2008

Woolworths, one of the biggest retailers of DVDs in the UK, has become the first major retailer to solely back one of the new high definition DVD formats.

The high street firm has announced that it will only stock Blu-Ray high definition DVDs from March, with HD-DVDs being dropped from stores to be sold online.

The move comes after Blu-Ray DVDs outsold HD-DVDs by ten-to-one in Woolies stores over Christmas.

From March Woolworths stores will have a Blu-Ray DVD chart in all 820 stores and a Blu-Ray DVD back catalogue section in larger stores.

Since launching high definition DVDs in October last year, Woolworths has become the biggest retailer of the new DVD format in the UK. Sales are growing fast, typically rising by over 40 per cent a month. This compares to a relatively flat DVD market.

“Sales figures clearly show that the market is moving towards one format of high definition DVD,” says Woolworths DVD buyer Steven McGunigel. “The main reason is the success of Sony’s PlayStation 3 machine. Because it plays Blu-Ray discs, there are over ¾ million homes in the UK that can view the new high definition format. There is no where near that number of HD-DVD players around.”

“Switching to Blu-Ray only will provide one clear offer to customers in the format they want to watch high definition movies in.”

Disney’s Ratatouille is expected to be the first Woolworths Blu-Ray DVD chart topper. Other big release films coming in the Spring on Blu-Ray DVD are I Am Legend and Sweeney Todd.

Blu-Ray, backed by Sony, versus HD-DVD, backed by Toshiba, has been likened by commentators to the battle between Toshiba’s VHS and Sony’s Beta-Max in the 1980s.

The new format war has split the electronics and entertainment industries. Blu-Ray has been backed by Samsung, Sony, Warner, Dell, Apple, Disney and 20th Century Fox. HD-DVD has been backed by NEC, Microsoft and Universal.

The real winner will, of course, be decided at the tills with Blu-Ray already streets ahead according to Woolworths.

Both Blu-Ray and HD-DVDs offer much better quality audio and video than DVD and the additional storage means that more time and extras can be packed into one disc.

The HD DVD camp does not have it easy these days. Saturn, one of the largest consumer electronics chains in Germany now offers a 150 Euro rebate (~$221) when you bring your old HD DVD player and buy a new Sony Blu-ray player.

So for instance if you buy the Sony BDP-S300 you pay 349 Euro instead of 499 Euro. If you compare prices you can get the BDP-S300 already for 380 Euro on German Internet shops, but Saturn also throws in 8 Blu-ray movies. This deal is nice, but of course more importantly is really bad PR for HD DVD.
From the exchange program only Xbox 360 HD DVD drives and PC HD DVD drives are excluded.

Originally Posted by DrDon

Sales figures articles, opinion pieces and pricing articles are not news. Those posts have been removed. We have special threads for sales figures discussions and special deals.

Indie distributor Surround Records has announced it will begin rolling out Blu-ray editions of its previously-issued HD DVD titles this Spring.

The previously HD DVD-exclusive label has issued a half a dozen multichannel audio releases since making its high-def debut this past summer with 'Uncommon Bach.' It now says it will expand its high-def disc support to include Blu-ray in addition to HD DVD.

Though multichannel audio releases (sans any significant video material) are fairly common on standard-def DVD, Surround Records is currently the only label actively releasing titles on the two next-gen disc formats.

As press time there was no word on which of Surround's titles would be first to hit Blu-ray, nor had an exact timeframe for the Blu-ray releases been set.

TAIPEI, Taiwan--(BUSINESS WIRE)--CyberLink Corp. (5203.TW) today announced it is participating in the formation of a joint HD DVD patent license based on its ownership of a patent determined to be essential to the HD DVD standard.

CyberLink's patent relates to the specifications for interactive content over a network for prerecorded HD-DVD Discs, for playback according to the DVD Specifications for High Definition VIDEO (HD DVD-Video).

Innovation is the key to CyberLink delivering leading products to our customers as well as sustaining long-term business success, said Alice H. Chang, CEO of CyberLink. We're extremely proud be a part of a group of essential HD DVD patent owners who have come together voluntarily for the purpose of forming a joint license, as this is testament to the strength of our core technology.

Essential HD DVD patent owners that include CyberLink participate in an effort to form a joint patent license facilitated by MPEG LA LLC.

More information about CyberLink's support for the HD DVD format, and the complete range of CyberLink software, is available at www.cyberlink.com.

Being Bonus View (or Profile 1.1 like we used to call it back in the old days) enabled has gone from theoretical to actual for users of Cyberlink's PowerDVD Ultra. Also enhancing BD-J compatibility with certain movies, the 71.8mb download brings users to build 3730 and should provide the seamless PiP quality observed at CES -- if your PC can handle it of course. No charge for supporting more of Blu-ray's features, so get to downloading.

Feb. 1 (Bloomberg) -- Singulus Technologies AG, the German maker of machines that replicate compact discs and DVDs, jumped in German trading after agreeing to buy the Blu-ray DVD business from OC Oerlikon Corp.

Singulus shares rose as much as 1.37 euros, or 16 percent, to 10 euros and traded at 9.85 euros as of 10:07 a.m. in Frankfurt.

Oerlikon, the world's biggest maker of spinning machines for textiles, will sell the business to focus on other units. Financial details weren't disclosed. Singulus shares rose the most in almost seven years on Jan. 7 after Time Warner Inc., the world's largest publisher of DVD titles, abandoned the HD DVD format to adopt Blu-ray technology. Singulus's machines produce discs in both formats.

``This step is surely positive'' for Singulus as it will help the company to increase market share for Blu-ray, said Malte Schaumann, an analyst at SES Research in Hamburg. Schaumann rates the stock ``hold.''