Quoting Calidain:

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Quoting stefc:

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Weekend Toshiba HD DVD Player Sales Top 90,000

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Video Business is reporting record-breaking sales numbers for Toshiba's HD-A2 player following last Friday's price drops at Wal-Mart and Best Buy.

As we've previously reported, both big box retailers offered the entry-level 1080i HD DVD player at the record-low price of $99 late last week.

Quoting sources close to the retailers, VB estimates that 90,000 units were sold at top outlets, including Wal-Mart, Best Buy and Circuit City. According to the trade paper, that's nearly as many sales as the best-selling stand-alone Blu-ray Disc player (Sony's the $499 BDP-S300) has sold since its launch.

OK SONY fanboys...feel free to cue up your Lame "this is a serious act of desparation by HD-DVD" replies!!!  Honestly all I hear when the fanboys say that is..."no FAIR they used a better supply and demand tactic then we did, how dare they truly understand what the consumer TRULY wants... "

That's what it is.  That's what almost ALL situations like this has been labeled as.  That's why respected CE companies aren't willing to touch HD DVD with a 10ft. pole.  They could just go back to making DVD players only, if they are going to have any profits.

I guess HD DVD supporters are expecting a huge change in numbers because of the $98 HD DVD players sold.  Well, that would sound JUST LIKE HD DVD supporters sounded earlier this year.  READ THIS from post #15.

Deja Vu, huh?

Quoting Unicus69:

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Quoting Ascended_Saiyan:

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Guess what the NEW CEO (Bewkes) said about the format war...

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Meanwhile, Sony's camp received help winning over one influential studio from an unlikely source. Raider Carl C. Icahn, one of Time Warner's largest shareholders, began pressuring the studio to find ways to boost its stock price earlier this year. Despite Time Warner's long alliance with Toshiba, CEO Richard Parsons asked Jeff Bewkes, chairman of the company's entertainment unit, to reconsider the best way to recharge DVD sales. Bewkes decided that the studio should forget appearances and back Blu-ray if it was the format most likely to win consumers' hearts. "Blu-ray's potential for more capacity started looking better and better," said one Hollywood executive.

Humm... 

I see exactly what he said.  He said they should "back Blu-ray IF it was the format most likely to win consumers' hearts."  That is a big 'if'. 

In case you don't know, Blu-ray is winning 9:1 in Japan, 4:1 in Europe, almost non-existent in Australia, and 2:1 in the US.  I think they are consumers, but what do you think? 

Quoting Unicus69:

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Quoting Ascended_Saiyan:

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In case you don't know, Blu-ray is winning 9:1 in Japan, 4:1 in Europe, almost non-existent in Australia, and 2:1 in the US.  I think they are consumers, but what do you think? 

I think you are doing your usual spin.  We all know that Warner isn't talking about the global market.  If you don't know that, well, I will be polite and end it there. 

That is not spin.  So, are you claiming that Warner does not sell worldwide?  That is an accurate assessment of the situation.  Blu-ray is LEADING on EVERY continent in the world that sells it.  That is a fact.  Saying something other than that is spin.

Quoting Ascended_Saiyan:

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Quoting Ascended_Saiyan:

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Quoting stefc:

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Quoting Ascended_Saiyan:

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It looks like I'm still holding around 90% accuracy with my predictions, so far. 

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March 16, 2007: The standalone Sony BDP-S300 Blu-ray player is looking to be around $300 by Black Friday (November)

March 19, 2007 : IMO, around December this year will be the end of Universal's exclusive HD DVD support and HD DVD (accept(sic) for the people that already have a HD DVD player). When Universal goes neutral, there will be no need to seek out a combo HD players.  Every major studio would be on Blu-ray.

March 22, 2007 : (The Matirx Trilogy) will be on Blu-ray this year.

April 13, 2007 : And, no, Blu-ray never offered 5 free movies with a player.  IMO, when you keep offering more free movies with a player, that tells me that what you offered the first time isn't working (3 free movies with every player).  That's just usually how things go in the business world, so I don't expect it to be any different this time.

After the first 18 pages of your illiterate drivel in this thread I finally found one prediction that you got right:

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April 17, 2007 : Does anyone think Toshiba will start making Blu-ray players?

When Sony sold off their PS3 semi conductor factories to Toshiba due to financial difficulty and huge losses, your prediction kinda came true!! 

March 16, 2007  -  Is it Black Friday, yet?  I'm glad you mention this one.  Now, I don't have to go that far back to find it for Black Friday.

ANOTHER prediction of mine comes true.  Previous $299 Samsung Blu-ray player now down to $249!

I should be past 90% accuracy on my predictions, now.

ONE Store, ONE location ONLY ... Oh Yeah, BIG Woop  BFD!

Quoting Ascended_Saiyan:

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Quoting Battling Butler:

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Quoting Patsa:

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Warner Says Blu-ray Comments "Misquoted and Misconstrued"

listen up A_S, they're talkn' to y o u 

"Following several days of breathless speculation from fans and industry insiders alike, Warner is now breaking its silence on the matter, referring to Silverberg's remarks as having been "misquoted and misconstrued."

How can it be a misquote when then have a whole BIG chunk of what the guy said as a DIRECT quote?  It wasn't like it was a bunch of one liners strung together to make it sound like something was said that wasn't.  It just sounds like damage control with Toshiba to me (since there are business ties there).

What I find interesting is the following:

This is the 2nd person with a known HD DVD bias leaving the Warner camp.

Steve Nickerson (Warner Bros.) gone and now Richard Parsons (Time Warner CEO).

Guess what the NEW CEO (Bewkes) said about the format war...

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Meanwhile, Sony's camp received help winning over one influential studio from an unlikely source. Raider Carl C. Icahn, one of Time Warner's largest shareholders, began pressuring the studio to find ways to boost its stock price earlier this year. Despite Time Warner's long alliance with Toshiba, CEO Richard Parsons asked Jeff Bewkes, chairman of the company's entertainment unit, to reconsider the best way to recharge DVD sales. Bewkes decided that the studio should forget appearances and back Blu-ray if it was the format most likely to win consumers' hearts. "Blu-ray's potential for more capacity started looking better and better," said one Hollywood executive.

Humm... 

Right A_S, so the consumers wishes no longer matter,  the damn STOCK HOLDERS have spoken!
Who cares about the product,  I WANT MORE F'ING PROFITS  WHAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAAA!

More crap straight from the mouth of A_S

Microsoft Responds to Blu-ray Attack


Microsoft Exec Says Company Isn't Trying to Fuel HD Format War
Author: JOHN GAUDIOSI
homemediamagazine@questex.com

Posted: November 2, 2007


In response to this week’s Blu-ray Disc Festival in Los Angeles, Kevin Collins, director in the Microsoft Consumer Media Technology Group, defended the company’s backing of the next-generation HD DVD format.

“The [Blu-ray] camp’s claims about Microsoft’s desire to have a format war are baseless,” Collins said. ”Microsoft has over 100 people working on HD DVD interactivity and we believe that HD DVD is the next-generation optical format.”

During a presentation to journalists and home theater enthusiasts at the Blu-ray Festival earlier in the week, 20th Century Fox Home Entertainment worldwide president Mike Dunn intimated that the format war is being perpetuated by Microsoft in the hopes of confusing consumers so much they don’t support either format and ultimately buy their entertainment online. He didn’t mention the computer giant by name, but blasted “the orchestrated campaigns of confusion and anti-consumerism fueled by an 800-pound gorilla that would prefer to force us all into the practice of paying tolls for the right to exchange information and enjoy entertainment.”

Collins said Microsoft decided to join the HD DVD format two CES shows ago because the format’s replication costs were and still are the cheapest.

He said there are only three plants in the world that can produce BD-50 discs, and those are all owned by Sony.

He added that Microsoft’s predictions around costs and availability almost three years ago still hold true today.

Another feature that Microsoft liked was mandatory managed copy, which mandated that content authors allow customers to make legal copies of their HD DVD. At the time, Blu-Ray refused to do this, but has since changed their stance.

“AACS today is rapidly approaching the ‘final agreement’ that will start to make this available for customers, though I do not have a firm timeline on this,” Collins said. “The key fact is that Microsoft believed that a next-generation format should be ‘consumer friendly’ and at the time of the decision, only HD DVD supported this.”

Collins also said the interactive nature of HD DVD would play a big role in the format, since just having high-definition video was not going to be enough to convince customers to upgrade from DVD.

“HD DVD offers compelling features by mandating that there are three key hardware components (secondary video decoder, memory and networking),” Collins said. “These offer a lowest common denominator that allows studios like Warner Bros. to produce a title like 300 that has features that are not in the Blu-ray version.”

300 HD DVD exclusives include a strategy game, the ability to view and choose from the wallpapers and ring tones via the cell phone, picture-in-picture for the duration of the movie and the ability to have a community experience where users can share their favorite clips with other 300 HD DVD owners and rate those scenes.

Collins said Microsoft did not and will not bundle the HD DVD drive in Xbox 360 because the company believes that gamers are first and foremost gamers.

“If you look historically at the attach rates (i.e. the number of DVDs purchased per DVD player) you will see that game consoles have a single-digit attach rate, while dedicated DVD players have an attach rate in the mid-20s,” said Collins. ”Microsoft knew if we put in an HD DVD drive that we would have to raise costs and disenfranchise our customers (that are primarily gamers) as the unit would become too expensive.”

Collins said price has proven out in the game console business, as Wii is outselling both Xbox 360 and PS3, primarily due to price.

“The PS3 has yet to even come close to the sales estimates that Sony was telling everyone last year at this time,” said Collins. “If bundling an HD optical drive in a game console is such a smart idea, then why is the PS3 so far behind on sales targets?

“Another fact to look at is the amount of Xbox 360 HD DVD drives sold, compared to all Blu-Ray dedicated players. As of the latest NPD data, the Xbox HD DVD drive has outsold all combind Blu-Ray dedicated players by a substantial factor. While the Xbox 360 HD DVD drive is the best selling accessory over $100 for ALL game consoles, it only represents as single digit attach rate to Xbox 360.

“This proves the initial point that primarily, gamers are gamers, while there is a small percentage that also want to watch movies on it like they would a dedicated player.”

Microsoft Xbox research has shown that Xbox gamers spend more than 200 hours playing a game versus less than eight hours watching a movie on their consoles. Since customers can only do one thing on a game console at a time, they are either playing games or potentially watching movies.

“If you look at the introduction of the PSP, what was the biggest software sales for the PSP when it launched? It was UMD,” said Collins. “Who sells UMD discs today? Sony. Why? Because once there was compelling games for the PSP, consumers spent their time playing games on the device, the primary reason it was purchased in the first place.

“We believe that the PS3 will follow the same course and that this holiday, when compelling games come out, PS3 customers will be drawn to be playing more games. In fact, if you look at the recent press releases, execs in Hollywood have attributed the declining box office revenues to the “Halo effect,” where customers are staying at home playing Halo 3 instead of coming to the movie theater.

“Another proof point in this is the attach rate for Blu-Ray versus HD DVD. Including the PS3, Blu-ray has an attach rate slightly above one-to-one whereas HD DVD has an attach rate just below four-to-one. We believe that will improve for HD DVD with cheaper price points (such as the $169 HD DVD player at Sears for Black Friday) and more compelling games coming out for PS3 this holiday.”

Ah, the spin-doctor has deemed the rest of our arguments to be not worth his time!!! 

Quoting Ascended_Saiyan:

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Quoting twojayz:

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Speaking of the Asc...I have a couple questions for you, just humor me...

1) When, if at all,  does 720p excel over 1080i?
2) Which of these two specs is better:
    a) A seven channel receiver with a total power output listed at 840 watts OR
    b) A seven channel receiver with a listed power output of 120 watts per channel
3) What advantage does a person with a 42 inch plasma display get from having 1080p?
4) Which of these two displays would you choose, all things being equal except this:
    Display A has a contrast ratio of 10,000:1 measured full on/off
    Display B has a contrast ratio of 3,000:1 using a typical checkerboard pattern measurement.
5) What color portion of a video signal (any source) carries the vast majority of the image detail?

Actually, anyone can answer the questions but I'm particularly interested in anyone here (Asc) who is a spec freak...

1. Things with a lot of motion
2. It depends on how they calculated their wattage rating
3. over 2 million pixels on the screen
4. Display B
5. can't remember of hand, but I can always look it up

There.  I have humored you.  Do you have a point to all of this?

Yup, you humored me. Thanks. There was a point. You like to brag about specs and vast intelligence and all that so I wanted overall measurement of your knowledge of home theater equipment. To say I was surprised by your answers is an understatement. I was actually a little impressed, you got more than one right...

1. You got it! 
2. Not so fast...120 listed power rating per channel will typically be more accurate AND better than anything labeled with 840 total watts. Why? Because it's normally not equal power to all channels. 
3. Absolutely WRONG. There is no advantage of having 1080p on any 42 inch display. They gain no visual benefits from it whatsoever. 
4. You got it! 
5. Well, you didn't answer so it's wrong.  Very sorry sir. The correct answer is black and white. Which technically speaking isn't even black and white although visually that's what it appears to be.

So, on this little quiz you scored a perfectly good 40%. Wait, isn't that failing?