Anyone know if you can get the free HD-DVD's with this player?

Answered my own question...
http://images10.newegg.com/uploadfilesfornewegg/rebate/SH/Microsoft74-103-051Oct0107Feb2808kl09.pdf

I don't get it. Why not 1080p? Is the difference between 1080i and 1080p that great?

[1080i is an interlaced format. Basically you only get half the resolution you do with 1080p. If you ever see live action 1080i next to 1080p, you'll see the one which is visually more desirable. BTW, 1080p spews out about 250 MB/s of video and audio data, requiring big hardware, hence its expense. -Rick]

Target and Sony are gonna get creamed this Christmas season. Do you have any idea how many people are going to go to Wal*Mart to get their sub $1000 720P HDTVs???

A lot! And while there, they are gonna say: "What a great deal... for only $198 more you mean I can watch HD movies too?"

GO HDDVD... GO!

It's a surprise that it is the HD-A2, which is actually a very good player. Don't let the fanboys fool you; 1080i and 1080p on a 24-frame signal are identical unless your TV sucks.

Discs still cost too much. Not to mention all the "one-format-will-die" fearmongers and hatemongers will retard sales. Finally, would it KILL them to advertise?

I looked at the Walmart.com site and it is listed as $279.54. When is this new price effective?

Cost is still roughly 280 at the moment online...is this a "store only" cost?

Hell, I might buy one for the family room, if they are still giving away movies. I will have to do some research.

The very same rebate form is used by multiple retailers and the form itself does not exclude any retailer in the terms and conditions.

This was the sweet spot that i was waiting for. When Amazon a month ago had it for $211 with 8 free DVDs is what got me to buy. I suspect that it will be the same here.

On the assumption that this price point causes a large installed HDDVD player base, i wonder how the movie studios will react. Would more be inclined to release HDDVD movies? I hope so. With the 'Transformers' and some other exclusives, this could be a very strong turning point for the HDDVD camp.

Does this mean the M$ will lower the price of the add-on player for the xbox 360? If it dropped down to around $100-120 I might pick one up.

The Toshi A2 unit is made in China. =)

Sorry but if I'm buying a new HD player it better be putting out the highest quality HD format wich is 1080p.

First off, I own BR (PS3) and HD-DVD (Toshiba A30) so I I’m not biased. But this is another example of some desperation on Toshibas part to get players out there. This model is a cheap unit strait up (as is even my $400 Toshiba). It is ridiculous to sell an HD unit that doesn’t even support 1080p. You get what you pay for. If you want to jump into HD-DVD.. Wait until a cheap 1080p unit comes out so you can sit on it without problems for years to come. I will continue to stand firm on the fact that if you are looking for HD hardware that works well your choice is a $400 Toshiba A30 and a $400 PS3 and the choice between these 2 is simple, the PS3 clearly the best choice. The thing is the best BR player out there, highest quality device. That and to boot you get to play game some it every once in a while.

paid 150 for my old DVD player..this is appealing.

Even normal DVD's look awesome on my HD DVD player, an HD-A2 btw..They do upscaling awesome..makes all your old dvd's still good...

if you have the money for a 1080p capable TV, then I would venture to say that you dont need to be buying the bargain priced players ;)

I bought an HD-A20 last week after getting a 1080p set (JVC 47" LCD). The player has selectable output from 480p up to 1080p, the TV has upconversion for each format also. I intentionally set the TV to no upconversion and tried both 1080i and 1080p with the samemovies (Transformers, 300, MiIII.) 1080p is supposed to be the higher resolution format by far.
That is only partially true. Both formats offer 1920 x 1080 pixels. The differece is that 1080p projects all pixels in one scan. 1080i takes two passes for the same picture and interlaces them (the i means interlaced vs. p for progressive). So the real difference is in refresh rate and supposedly 1080p is better in maitaining cohesion in fast based action scenes.
My little experiment, using about a dozen friends (including 'blind' testing in which I didn't tell the audience what resolution they were watching) resulted in pretty much a tie. Now this wasn't scientific or a large statistical sample but it did show that either format is supurb. Of course I was unable to run two images side by side inthe different resolutions but most of the AV expert statements I have heardsay pretty much the same thing. So I might have "wasted" a couple of hundred extra bucks on 1080p, but I'm still happy so who cares?

Ha. The only part about 1080p that really matters is the 1080 part. Any decent tv is going to interlace signal well enough you aren't going to be able to tell. Not to mention, the vast majority of people with HDTV's have 720p sets. So this is an excellent development. Period. Oh and have a ps3 and an A20, so I could care less who 'wins' the format war. Content is king and this could tip the scales a lot more than Target selling blu-ray devices. Blu-ray needs to get their act together, 1.1 profile anyone? BD-j? There's a reason Disney hasn't released a whole lot yet, they are waiting reality to catchup on the specs.

I have a 30" SONY CRT that does 480i/480p/720p/1080i. I can barely tell the difference between 720p and 1080i, and that's largely due to comparing text. I wouldn't say one looks better...just different.

1080i looks amazing for games and HD-DVD & Blu-Ray. How much better can 1080p look? I've seen it in stores at 40 or so inches, they could probably swap the set labels and people would be none the wiser.

So, does it really matter if the HD player is outputting 1080i vs. 1080p? 1080i is just 540 lines (even alternating with odd) at 60 frames per second vs. 1080p with 1080 lines at 30 frames per second (for TV, anyway). Maybe it makes more of a (noticeable) difference for LCD's and their slower refresh rates. If your TV set is native 1080p, won't it automatically de-interlace a 1080i signal to 1080p (i.e. the final stage de-interlacing chip missing from the Toshiba A1-A2-A3 is in the television)?

Seriously... the GREAT majority of people that own HDTVs do not have ones that support 1080P. That is not the price point the mass market wants.

I for one have had a 1080i plasma display (720P native) for 2 1/2 years. I bought a cheap 42" Maxent and I have loved ever day of viewing. One day when I move it to the bedroom to make room for the 60" LCD/Plasma when the price is right.

You audio/videophiles go spend $500 to watch movies if you want.

The rest of us will buy our cheap electronics at Wal*Mart while you watch the price drop drastically on your equipment.

BTW elsewhere on Tom's there is s rumored "integrated" HD DVD model coming for xbox.
Havig said that I suspect that Blue-Ray will eventually win this war. From past experiance I hate Sony which is why I will tend to buy anyone elses first.

So does Blu ray players. Like someone mentioned, if your jumping on the HD bandwagon, learn from you past mistakes, dont compromised. If the best resolution available is 1080P, get a 1080P player. You will regret it later if you dont. I know i do with my current TV only being 1080i with DVI not HDMI.

How come there are so many unsold A2 units available?

So there is some added value because you can just as easily plug it into your PC to play the same HD movies. That way you can get more uses out of the drive other than just watching movies on your xbox.

I'm not sure what some folks are talking about with not noticing much difference between 720p and 1080i. There is, visually, a pretty significant difference especially on video games. To me 1080i is a lot more crisp, now I don't have a 1080p capable TV, but I've seen it in stores and it looks even better than my 1080i. The moral of story is if you truly want HD or next gen. go with 1080p, that way in the future when TV's get even better (OLED, or whatever) you at least have decent player to go with it.

You boys and girls keep talking about 1080p like its nothing. I project 1080p to a 10 foot wide screen (133" 16:9) and yup... it matters (vs say 1080i HD Comcast and such). So, just because it looks right on your 32" screens does not mean it’s ok. I.. more then anyone know how crappy it is being stuck with 1080i since I also have a Sony SXBR 1 60" TV that was advertised as 1080p. It’s simply a pain in the arss to have 1080p hardware and be forced to drop it all to 1080i.

So.. you should all set your PC monitor resolutions to 1080i instead of typical 1080p and sit in front of it for 10 hours and then come back with a new opinion.

The moral of the story for a lot of tech equipment is BUY CHEAP AND UPGRADE OFTEN. I do it with computers and I do it with TVs / DVD players.

No device has everything you want... why spent 2x-3x on something and have buyer's remorse. Buy a $200 HD DVD this year and upgrade next year when $100 buys you twice as much.

http://www.circuitcity.com//ss...m_ven=PAID SEARCH&cm_cat=ADVERTISING.COM&cm_pla=CATEGORY - VIDEO HDWR->CLASS - DVD PLAYERS&cm_ite=184878 PURCHASED KEYWORD-HDA2&cm_keycode=451165#promotions

I'm amazed at the lack of knowledge about this topic. One can only blame the marketing idiots at all ends of the spectrum. Every plasma and lcd tv displays a progressive signal. Whether it be 720 lines or 1080 lines. No such thing as watching a 720i 1080i picture. THEY ARE ALL PROGRESSIVE.
Your tv will scale the signal to its native resolution.
Secondly, if you have a TV that does a POS job of deinterlacing the signal from the cheap 1080i dvd player, get the one that outputs a progressive signal! On top of that if your sitting more than 5 feet away from a

"but I've seen it in stores and it looks even better than my 1080i."

This makes no sense what so ever. No such thing as a 1080i TV. You obviously have a 1280x720p television, so even if you are being fed a 1080 line signal, you're still only seeing 720 lines. The only way you are going to see 1080 vertical rez is if you have a 1920x1080 native rez tv AKA 1920x1080P AKA 1080P!

Like I said, my TV is a 30 inch SONY CRT. I keep my XBOX360 and PS3 set to 1080i, even though many "experts" have sworn up & down for the past couple years that 720p looks better and is technically a higher resolution. I've had this TV for 2 years set to 1080i -- if someone came along and switched my players to output 720p, I can't say that I would notice, for sure. As far as 1080i vs. 1080p, I think that would be even less of a perceivable difference, even though people make a big hullabaloo about it. (Different TV sizes and technologies may exacerbate the difference.) And again, a native 1080p TV should de-interlace the 1080i signal and voila, your Toshiba A1/A2/A3 plays in 1080p.

I bought my 1080i CRT in 2004. I love it and it still does the job with satelite. $200 is usualy my price point before I jump into a new format. Why do I want to pay more when a new format like media PC's could be around the corner?

Seriously... you know damn well most you guys/gals touting 1080P with any decent size screen went out and did it cheap buying a DLP projection TV.

A PROJECTION TV... it's freaking 1970's technology. What... "it's in the mirrors!!!! You say??? Big deal.

It is funny to hear you guys bitch about image quality that might be suffered with 1080i and a $198 HD DVD player.... when you dopes who bought a DLP machine have to sit precisely in the center of your screen to get a decent picture. Heaven forbid you stand up... you lose 3/4 of the image brightness. And forget about walking to the kitchen during a big play... everything fades to black.

Just go out and buy that $198 HD DVD player, sit in the exact center of your couch and watch some Transformers already!!!

Is that even possible J? a 1080i image is only 540 lines of resolution being interlaced to create the "illusion" of a 1080 resolution. The reason you can see interlace is because it has to cut refresh rates in half due to drawing two images in the same time a native 1080 image would. I guess it could buffer the image and just delay the stream, but I am not sure all native 1080p displays will upscan the image as it would be an expensive add-on.

If your screen is larger then 50" or 60"s 1080p is important. However 50" and less your not going to see a huge difference. It's hard to tell the difference on a 42" between 720p and 1080i let alone 1080p and 1080i.

For some early adopters of the FULL HD 1080 marketing spin, you may be sad to hear that even though your tv may indeed have a native 1920x1080P DISPLAY resolution, it may not ACCEPT a 1080P signal! Hello Sony! This means that even if you spend top dollar to get progressive output on an HDDVD player, your TV will internally take the p turn it into an i then back to a p! An excellent site to learn about all this stuff is hdguru.com or
http://www.hometheatermag.com/hookmeup/1106hook/

"And again, a native 1080p TV should de-interlace the 1080i signal and voila, your Toshiba A1/A2/A3 plays in 1080p."

In a perfect world that would happen. Unfortunately alot of displays, I mean alot, do not do deinterlace correctly. Your Akais, wal-mart specials, Insignias. All garbage that skimp on processing. Just got my HT Mag in the mail yesterday, and Gary Merson has done another test this year, and quite a few more models cleaned up their acts this time. That doesnt help those that already forked out cash for bs marketing info and uninformed sales staff.

Full HD is a joke. 1080p is garbage give 2160p. I won't by an HD player until the support Quad HD.

That's what some of you fools sound like with the 1080p bable.

I HAVE AN 52" XBR3 1080P, WITH DIRECTV HD/DVR AND
NOBODY
IS SENDING A 1080P SIGNAL AND DONT EVEN TELL ME THAT COMCAST IS BECAUSE THEY ARE NOT, ALSO I HAVE THE TOSHIBA XA2, AND SAMSUNG BDP-1400.

Newegg has a 42" 1080p LCD display for $999 shipping ($99). It requires a media box that is "free" in a combo (at least as of today 10/26/2007).
http://www.newegg.com/Product/...824112180

With 1080p this cheap would you spend $400 on a stand alone player? If this player did 1080p then this player would be a great deal.

No... I would never spend $400 on a stand alone player when I can get a 1080i player for $198.

I wouldn't spend $200 on "magic cables" for my system either.

I don't happen to consider myself to be one of chosen few that can hear ultra high and low frequencies that dogs can't, see artifacts and subtle shadings mere normal humans cant detect.

Just give me adequate, cheap HD and 5.1 surround.

You audio/videophiles make me sick, always have always will.

And when 2160p HDTV's are available, an even higher resolution will be in the works, call it 4320p if you want. Are you gonna hold off on 2160p then for an HDTV that will support 4320p?

I’d take the PS3 every time. HD DVD knows there in trouble that's why they have to give away there players. The Toshiba is only 1080i and the PS3 is 1080p/24/60 with HDMI ver. 1.3a and all the latest toys and gaming to boot. Easily with the $800 it used to sell for. Besides, HD DVD has only managed to sell 150,000 of players altogether world wide in over 2 years and Blu-ray has sold 7 million in less than a year with most being sold in the last 6 months as there was no stock Jan., Feb., and most of March 2007. The first week the PS3 came down in price it sold 64,000 units in Europe alone. I saw the original 60GB PS3 selling for $479.00 today at HMV in downtown Toronto. That being said I'd take the PS3 at $399.00 over any HD DVD player especially the cheep one, no contest.

Isn't it funny how it's the ones who don't have a quality 1080p 24/60fps TV with HDMI ver. 1.3a and a Blu-ray player with the same features as the TV that are making all the noise about what a waste of time these features are. Well I'll tell you why. They've been sold this BS buy a minimum wage salesmen at the Future Shop or Best Buy or something and to complete the sale they probably displayed their argument on equipment which typically is never installed properly and worse used improperly to begin with, not to mention the lighting that some of there places have. It’s like watching TV out side on the beach on a sunny day. After they made their purchase it made these people feel smart and thrifty because they didn't spend any money for nothing. And now we come along and start telling them no 1080p is better, and that’s what’s happening here. However, that being said it does change the fact that they are 100% incorrect regardless of what they think they bought or know. The fact is the latest LCD and Plasma TV’s with 1080p.24/60fps with ver. 1.3a HDMI and 10 and 15 thousand to 1 contrast ratios along with a matching Blu-ray or HD DVD player will give you a far superior picture. I wonder if that was clear enough for some. Without a doubt I've now offended someone here. The fact is selling TV's today without 1080p and HDMI ver. 1.3a is very difficult as most people won't shell out thousands of dollars for a TV with out it. So what these people that say 1080p24/60fps is a waste and 1080i is just as good are really saying were is all stupid and they are the smart ones

No one here has discussed the 1080i vs. 1080p controversy correctly and properly discussed all aspects of it.

First of all, let's be sure we understand what we're talking about. Interlaced scanning (1080i/60) shows 30 1920x1080 frames per second, each frame as two fields, updated every 1/60th of a second. This is the style of HD that is broadcast over the air, and provided to you by most cable and satellite providers. This is the signal produced by most HDTV cameras.

Most movies shot on film are not filmed like that. They are filmed an entire frame at a time, and are meant to be shown at 24 frames per second. Ideally, this would mean you would view the film at 1080p/24, which means 24 frames per second, all 1920x1080 pixels of each frame shown on the screen at once (i.e. not broken up into 2 interlaced fields).

Now, there is a standard that is supported called 1080p/60, which is 60 frames per second, each frame the full progressively-scanned 1920x1080. There is NO CONTENT filmed like this. No broadcast, satellite signal, cable signal, HD-DVD, or Blue-Ray DVD contains such a signal. So ignore its existence.

A TV that is capable of "1080p" in marketing terms just means that it can accept a 1080p/24 or 1080p/60 signal on its inputs. It says nothing about how the TV will actually display these signals or any other signals. The fact is that many current model TVs (LCD, DLP, LCOS) ALWAYS display a progressive picture, no matter if the input signal is natively progressive or natively interlaced. Only older technology TVs (rear-projection CRT, Plasma) actually display an interlaced signal using interlaced scanning.

Let's assume we're using a modern TV that always displays progressive pictures on the screen. If the input signal is an interlaced signal (1080i/60), the TV must convert this signal to progressive by a deinterlacing step. Deinterlacing involves intelligently recreating intermediate scan lines of the interlaced fields. The quality of the deinterlacer can have a huge impact on the resulting picture quality.

If the input signal is progressive (1080p/24), like we would get from a high-end HD-DVD or Blue-Ray player, the TV doesn't touch the signal, it just displays it in it's native progressive format. This is the best possible situation.

Now, let's suppose we have an HD-DVD with 1080p/24 film content on it, but are playing it on the Toshiba HD-A2, which can't output a 1080p/24 signal. What happens?

The HD-DVD player will perform a process on the film called telecine, which creates 5 interlaced frames out of 4 progressive frames. This technique has been used for years to show film-based content on NTSC televisions. The HD-DVD player now sends a 1080i/60 signal to the TV.

However, what TV manufacturers don't tell you is that most modern TVs have a circuit in them that will automatically detect if an input 1080i/60 signal contains film content. If it does, then the TV, instead of applying the generic deinterlacing algorithm, will instead perform INVERSE telecine, which will recover the 4 progressive film frames from the 5 interlaced frames, and result in a 1080p/24 signal. The TV will then display that.

A properly designed TV with a proper inverse telecine circuit will display the film on the screen in 1080p/24, and it will be IDENTICAL to the film if it was received from the DVD player in native 1080p/24 format. This is because there is no algorithm used to guess at any pixels ... All the pixels are there in the interlaced telecined signal, they're just moved around. So the TV moves them back where they belong using frame buffer memory, with a net loss of nothing.

Therefore, you do NOT ever need to worry about having a 1080p-capable DVD player until there exists 1080p/60 content. Your modern TV will give you exactly the same picture from the Toshiba HD-A2 as it will from the HD-A20.

In fact, better TVs will even detect the film content in 1080i/60 signals from over the air, cable, or satellite providers, and recover the 1080p/24 signal from them and display it.

The catch in all of this, as someone alluded to in an earlier comment, is having a good TV. Cheap HDTVs made overseas won't do any of these neat tricks, and display an inferior picture because of it.

So now you know the truth. And now you know that "1080p" is mostly marketing hype -- it is NOT synonymous with "better picture".

RockHop, so what your saying is just buy another cheep peace of crap because you already bought a crap TV. I'd be trying to improve the picture by making a better choice on a player not make it worse with a cheep player, don't you think?

Blu-ray players do an even better job at Up scaling your old DVD's. There amazing!

J, with only a standard CRT TV you probably couldn't tell the difference between standard broad cast television and 1080p movie play back as the TV isn't capable of displaying the difference anyway. Buy a new TV. I think if you had a brand new LCD or Plasma TV with 1080p/24/60fps and an HDMI 1.3 input you'd be singing a totally different tune, yah think?

What most folks here don't bother with is the fact that any interlaced signal going to the vast majority of HD tv sets is converted to progressive before it even hits the screen. Their method of display doesn't even "scan", it just shows each individual frame. So interlaced doesn't amount to a hill o' beans in the end.

Bottom line: it ain't worth any worry. Period. It's all good.

The lossless audio formats available with both formats are stunning. Try listening to a movie using the DTS-HD Master Audio codec. The sound is far better than anything you can get at a theater. Unfortunately, if your player does not output HDMI 1.3 you can not decode this sound.

When George Lucas created THX certification, he did not look at the picture, only the sound. This is because sound has far more impact on the movie experience. Sound is everything.

with SomeJoe7777, except for one thing. 3D films are/will be stored in 1080p/60 format (30 fps for each eye). These do not exist on the market yet, but I'm guessing that within 2008, we'll be seeing the first ones (probably on Blu-Ray only, since they will require nearly twice the space).

My advice would be to wait another year. Nobody needs HD films RIGHT NOW. Besides, in two years, you'll be mad at yourselves when the double-dip "remastered final cut" of every film already released comes out. So, save yourself some pain, and wait it out (both types of players WILL be < $100 eventually, and all things HD will drastically reduce in price around Feb 2009 AKA digital day, so just be patient).

To those who said 1080i looks the same as 1080p: Get real, Stop lying to yourself.

To those who said that Blu-Ray over priced: You get what you paid for, Quality or Price, Pick just one.

To those who said 200 Dollars HD-DVD will kill Blu-Ray: Stop Dreaming, HD-DVD knows that they're in freaking trouble now. what happen to Michael, you know, the Transformers director said what???? come again ?

To people like Rockhop: enjoy your cheap pathetic life. Without people like us, do you think your sorry ass will even have a chance to get your *200* dollars player? I dont think so. Kiss my ass ok ?

Modern top of the line DLP TVs do not have the viewing angle problem you describe. Any good 2007/2008 65 inch DLP will have no detectable loss of brightness at 85 degrees. You do not have problems with raster burn or reflected glare off the screen. You can even watch TV in full daylight and still have a very bright image.

Thank you SomeJoe777!

Please place this information as a comment on every article that mentions 1080i vs 1080p.

A 1080i/60 signal looks exactly the same as a 1080p/24 signal when displayed on a quality 1080p display. The display deinterlaces the signal into the exact same picture. Both HD-DVD and Blu-Ray are native 1080p/24. There simply is no difference in that regard.

Trust me. If there were, I would abandon my 'old' Toshi HD-A1 1080i player in favor of a 1080p player. I paid $500 for the HD-A1 the day they came out, and I could buy a 1080p HD-DVD player in a heartbeat if it were one tiny bit better.

It's not.

I've got a Panasonic AE-1000U true 1080p projector going to a DaLite High-Power 133" screen. The projector is about $3k-$4k, if 1080p/24 vs 1080i/60 were the least bit better, I would buy it.

It's not.

Congratz to Wal-Mart for bringing HD-DVD to the masses for under $200 (with 5 'free' HD-DVDs!).

I am just very glad to have a true HD source for my movies. We rent them constantly from Netflix and buy the ones we truly enjoy (F&F Tokyo Drift, Transformers, The Fountain, etc).

And the 'war' between HD-DVD and Blu-Ray will only drive prices down. This is a good thing, just like the AMD vs. Intel 'war'.

Please also support AMD and buy their processors whenever possible so that Intel still has some competition in the years to come! (Yes, I use an Intel Conroe based Core 2 Duo in my PC for the best performance, but for all my more 'normal' customers I buy AMD as they don't need that last 10%).

Thank you, very insightfull.

Blu-Ray is gaining the popularity in the Asia regions. Hope this is HD DVD's last strikes and the war is over for them.

Which countries outside Japan in Asia are telecasting HD programs? All I know is only Singapore and they only settle on 720P resolutions. And most of the people there bought 768P panels instead of the full 1080Ps because of the price difference and only be able to receive 720P programs from the stations. Only few HD-DVD and BD players and softwares are available in Singapore. So the battle has not even started yet. Over? nay.......

Another reason people might want to fork over the extra for a higher end player is to enjoy Dolby True HD on a receiver w/o HDMI. Lossless Audio can also be sent over the ANALOG OUTPUTS, which the entry level models don't have. My Rotel rsx-1056 does not have HDMI, and would need to use the analog channels to enjoy lossless audio.

You all may have heard about 3:2 Pulldown???? This is the process Somejoe is describing. And the fact is a huge percentage of tvs on the market do this incorrectly, LOSING up to 50% of the resolution.

Dozer, do you think posting BS is going to make you feel better about you TV. Granted 1080i looks pretty good but don't delude yourself into thinking it's just as good as 1080p. Anytime you have to code or decode using 3:2 pull down you degrade the picture. I've read many reviews that most new TV's today don't do 3:2 pull down very well and scored low in this area. I don't know how you managed to do a comparison between 24fps and 60fps when there isn't a TV in the market that can do 24fps yet. I really don't get why it’s so important to you to sell first and second generation TVs as most all TV's if not all are already 1080p. So your telling the vast majority of people that the 1080p TV they bought was a waste of money because the difference they seen in the store when they bought it wasn't real. You need help, get off the drugs. You start telling people that there 1080p TV is no better than you old fashion 1080 interlaced TV, were just going to laugh at you.

SomeJoe777, many things you wrote are incorrect and misleading. You've list a bunch of spec's here that you really don't understand and if you really want the down low on 1080p 24fsp/60fsp, do your home work. This is quite easy using Google. Just be careful of the source as one should always be. It really helps though if you understand what it all means to begin with. What Somejoe777 posted is mostly rubbish and the same gullible people who want to believe so bad that their 1080i TV is just as good as a 1080p TV are eating it up like fried chicken. Their also silly enough to think this message is for them.

It's that simple. Look at the majority of installed HD TV's. Most are not even 1080i. Most LCD displays are 1366x768, plasma's 1024x768.

So, MOST buyers aren't going to notice a bit of difference between 1080i players and 1080p players.

I have 2 LCD tvs and my trusty Mitsu 55" CRT RPTV. LCD's aren't 1080i, but the 55" is. Only my Dell 2405FPW supports 1080p, but that's my PC monitor.

Also, why does everyone think they HAVE to have HDMI for HDMI only players? If your display has DVI, you can buy an inexpensive HDMI-DVI cable for less than $20 (no you won't notice a bit of difference over those $200 cables, I've shown friends this many times). Use the new cable for video and then the L/R outputs for audio.

Being that I don't have a theater setup, I'm never going to spend more than $200 for a player. Heck, I'm not sure I'll go above $100 even. I don't have any problem with my Philips 642 right now as it is.

I just bought a new sharp 46 inch LCD TV and I sat in the store and did a comparison with a similar set and I could tell the difference. The picture was clearer, with more detail. It was kind of like looking out the window. I bought a Blu-ray player to at the same time and I tried the Toshiba A2 HD DVD as it was on sale and the salesmen said it was very good. Although it did look pretty good I felt the Blu-ray had better detail and colour representation and the panning of the camera seemed more film like and smooth. Plus it could play Games and a bunch of other stuff.

stromm, you are gravely mistaken as 1080p has been around for over 2 years now and most new TVs have been sold in the last 2 years as the price came down. 1366x768 is for computer monitors not HD TV. There are some pretty big differences between 1080p and 1080i but it's true many people won't notice right away as you have to know what you’re looking for. For that to happen you have to discover it on your own over time as you get used to 1080p and after several weeks then go back to the 1080i because at that point the differences will be quite obvious and you may not be happy or you won’t care. You can also have an experienced technician point them out to you in this case you will see right away and most likely you will go for the 1080p. Remember that a lot of people just don't care, and they will buy the cheapest thing they can find and there is nothing anybody can do to change your mind. Those are the people that are the easiest to sell the older 1080i TVs. If the store clerk wants to sell you the 1080i TV set because he's getting paid bonuses to do so, because the store wants to clear them out, and you don't know the difference, you’re an easy target. Besides sales people are lazy and most will sell you what ever it is you’re already sold on. So if you show up and are convinced that 1080i is just as good as 1080p it's much easier just to sell you a 1080i TV than to talk you out of it. Sales people are there to sell you what you want to buy, that's it. Many sales people will try to sell what ever is the easiest TV to sell, and it’s definitely easier to sell things that are cheaper. I hear a lot of talk about Xbox and PS3, HD DVD and Blu-ray bashing each other, it's a complete waste of time as the reason so many different products exist is because our wants and needs are all very diverse, so PS3 is built for people who won't by Xbox and so on. Myself I prefer 1080p HD and no matter what anybody says, for me, I can appreciate the quality and so nobody can tell me otherwise. Many of you simply don't care and are happy with their old DVDs, and VHS tapes. Some will think you’re as smart as hell because you bought the most expensive, best quality TV you can find. Other's will think your stupid for spending so much money on a TV. You can't win. So just by the one that's right for you and forget what anybody else thinks.

Ever heard of toslink or coxial audio output? All DVD has it and all mid range receiver has an input.
HDMI...so awesome, multiple channels audio to my tiny tv stereo speakers. I understand the digital connection for video to the TV but audio is plain dumb. Then to make things worst, the TV has a toslink connection out to the receiver. HAHAHA!

When they made TV with DVI input, that was a good idea. If they kept the audio part off of HDMI then that would have improvement on the design because of it's size. Signal from DVI is the same as HDMI minus the audio. When I read about people fussing over TV doesn't have DVI but have like multiple HDMI-just need a adapter 15$.

BTW why didnt they just use toslink all the way-for video and audio? What has more bandwidth than fiber optic? Fiber optic just for audio=over killed.

Hey guys, I just talked with my boss and he said they were discontinuing this model so we're trying to get rid of all of them.

Jim: Not a single thing I wrote is incorrect. It's all 100% fact. You are the one who doesn't understand and needs to get your facts straight. This is quite evident because you blanketly state that everything I've said is "rubbish", yet you post no factual evidence of your own. You just redirect people to Google. What a cop-out. Nowhere did I compare 1080i TVs vs. 1080p TVs. We are talking about 1080i DVD players vs. 1080p DVD players. Read my posts again and this time attempt to learn something. If you have a problem with a specific statement I made, explain in detail why you think it's wrong and point to some evidence backing your assertion up. Otherwise, get over to your high-end A/V store, pay several hundred dollars for whatever equipment you like, smile at the salesman who's feeding you the line of BS, and leave the technical discussions to the professionals.

Yes I have heard coax and optical but guess what? And if you've done some homework you'd know that you cant get Dolby True HD over these connections, only a re-encoded signal. Hence the reason why I mentioned analog connections for non-hdmi equipped receivers.

I purchased this player last year for $330 on amazon.
If i had to go back and do it again i would for the same price. I would have but recently i got the 1080p player to match my new 1080p tv.
Enough of this madness 1080i vs 1080p.
Im gonna say it to settle this damn argument. Yes 1080p is better (duh) but at this point its like comparing a car that has a top speed of 205mph and one that tops out at 211mph, theres not that much of a difference and both are awesome. But odds are 98% of you will never be able to tell the damn difference unless you place two identical setups right beside each other and run them simultaneously. Even then you still may not notice any differece. Its all about marketing and telling you that what you have isnt good enough...Sony's great at that (Full HD 1080P) Anyone who says otherwise most likely owns a new 1080p tv and is just offended by those types of comments. I can say this because i have both and they both display amazing pictures. Dont listen to what the tools at BB or CC tell you because (1) they dont know and (2) they dont care.
Now back on topic!!!!!!!
$200 bones for an HDDVD player is awesome. Anyone who says otherwise has most likely been brain washed by Sony (dont deny it fanboys). Transformers not only looked friggin amazing but the audio was out of this world. Crank up your sub and be amazed!!
Sorry if i seem one sided. As of right now im neutral to HDDVD and BR and the only reason i havent gone blu is because theyre so damn expensive still, and because of my Wii I have absolutely no need for a PS3. When blu drops to $300 and finalizes their OS then we'll talk turkey.

What part about,"1080 lines is 1080 friggin lines" don't you people get?

Did you ever see this crap being discussed about 720i tv's? Get your heads out of ur asses. All digital displays DISPLAY A PROGRESSIVE PICTURE, its what they do with the interlaced or non-interlaced signal they are being fed that matters!

SomeJoe at least explained what he said. All you did was say "somejoe is wrong" and expect us to believe you. If he isn't telling us where he got his info and you think he should, then you should say where you get yours if you think you know more than him. Don't be a jackass.

yes 1080p has been around for two years but it was not "standardized" and why do you ask?
Because nothing existed yet that could deliver a 1080p picture. Yes the 360 was around but tv's could not accept 1080p via component.
That being said 1080p didnt become popular until this last year as prices started to drop, and when the ads started telling people that 1080p is superior and everything else sucks.
Two years ago it was available but at the time was not worth double of what a comparable sized 1080i version would cost.
Like i said before in my last post 1080p is better but if you cant spend the big bucks you wont be sorry by getting a 1080i model instead. Both pics look amazing.
now go buy a damn HDDVD player for $198 already.

Have you guys seen the bluray demo with the man fixing the watch? It looks awesome!(nice job sony although the LCD is a little small by todays standards 32") If you then walk over to the HDDVD demo that toshiba put together a year and a half ago i would agree with my friends and say BR looks better but...
But have any of you seen movies on both?
Even more so have any of you seen the same movie on both systems on the same TV with the same HDMI cables?
I have and there isnt a thing that looks different except for the start up menus. All videophiles will agree.
Both systems are great and display equally fantastic pictures. Depending on the movie you watch you may notice a lot of noise, or a scene that appears to be out of focus. Well these things are done intentionally by the director, and the rest of done by the transfer that the studio decides on. Most if not all codecs in use today can generate phenomenal picture quality, yes even Sony's old MPEG-2 is awesome when they put their minds to it :p
Dont believe me about PQ, go watch 300 and notice all of the grain (which you'll notice on all versions), then watch superman on both versions (still noise in most scenes not containing CGI).
Sorry it bothers me when ignorance roams wild. The only advantage that BR has over HDDVD is storage capacity which to this point has not been a concern and to be perfectly honest i dont see it being a problem as long as hollywood doesnt start releasing 3 1/2 hour movies.
both systems are great and there should be no real argument until Sony can lower the prices on their equipment.
Sorry but my money is on the underdog (Toshi)

The world is gonna end on December 21 2012, I wanna get some enjoyment in before then! rofl

It is plain as day that alot of these people are completely ignorant or misinformed to the facts, as you so pointed out in your post. After all this discussion Jim either hasn't read the previous posts, or is one of the brain dead consumers out there that believes what he wants to believe, irrespective of actual technical facts.

Did you know that any TV with the exception of a certain Hitachi that has 1080 vertical lines also has 1920 horizontal lines? Have you ever seen a 1920x1080"i" tv before? I sure as hell haven't! I'm also pretty sure you are referring to a 1080i SIGNAL, which is completely different than what a tv actually DISPLAYS.

It's pretty obvious from reading all of these posts that the 1080p system owners are tricking themselves into thinking there's a difference between 1080i and 1080p. There is no difference, you just got duped into paying a lot of money for something that doesn't matter, and refuse to believe it. HAHAHAHAHAHA!!!!!

Sorry to tell you, you're wrong. S/PDIF output the raw audio(PCM raw audio). The HD DVD player process the TrueHD internally and output it in many method. Cause HDMI is the new technology, so dolby want to incorporate that feature. Toslink is always supported. The catch is...some HD DVD player will not have toslink(cut cost). But you need a A/V unit with HDMI input or both the player and the A/V has six-eight channels I/O. The latter setup is plain dumb: 6-8 RCA wires for each audio channel. TrueHD support HDMI cause its compact. It's best to have a HD DVD player with toslink or HDMI. You'll need A/V unit to have one or the other. In either case, it's still going to the receiver first. What is the point of sending eight channels audio to a TV with 2 speakers?

Like I meantion in my previous post. HDMI from the player to TV then there is a TOSLINK from the TV to the receiver if the receiver doesn't comes with a HDMI input.

Thanks

I have checked on price of hd-dvd movies as price of players drop, i have notices the price of movies going up.

Not going to fall for that trick, besides dvd is still #1 format i can buy dvd movies for 2 bucks brand new at my grocery store.

Parents wont spend 70 bucks on kid shows only to have them scratched or dog chew them up.

Does that include the people who can spell or write above a grade 7 level.

Dr HDDVD, because you don't no the difference makes you ignorant not knowledgeable. I’ve said this before and I'll say it again. The most important difference between Blu-ray and HD DVD is the storage capacity they have. The more capacity the greater the potential of the Disc. This is what allows Blu-ray disc to be less compressed even when using the same Meg 4 compression codec as HD DVD, which unlike Meg 2 and VC1 is variable to allow higher bit rates which allows for more colour representation and detail. More capacity also allows more sound tracks or Uncompressed PCM 7.1 channel Audio in French, English, German and Spanish which wouldn’t fit on a standard DVD all by them self. How about a 3 inch disc that holds 4 hours of HD Video for a camcorder or being able to back up your entire 100GB hard dive on one disc. You have to start thinking about the possibilities. I’m not trying to sell you on Blu-ray really because Bly-ray’s going to win weather you become a Blu-ray owner or not. The vast majority of people can see and take advantage of all the possibilities Blu-ray has to offer even if you can’t. I would bet Dr HDDVD would do really badly on an IQ test.

This topic is not about 720p vs 1080i vs 1080p. Its about how Walmart is going to help make HD-DVD the leader. Just as they did for Vizio with lcd's. I guess now is a good time to buy that 360 HD-DVD add on.

It is the old printer company trick. They sell low price printers and have you pay more for official cartridges/toners for that printer (making it that only the cartridges/toners that work with it come from the printer company). :)

There is no exact way to reconstruct a progressive (full frame) image from two half-images (fields) simply because the fields each belong to a different time in the film (the scene might change slightly even between the fields). If you combine two successive fields together into one image, you would see the discrepancy. You have to do some fancy filtering to compensate for this.

Anyway, the interlacing is used to reduce the bandwidth to approx. one half of what is needed for progressive content (if you consider the same field / frame rates). So in the process of deinterlacing, you reconstruct the full frames using only half the information available - and this has to have some impact on the output. You can't suck the missing picture information out of your thumb and neither the deinterlacing filter can...

I just checked at Pricegrabber.com.

If you want to wait until Black Friday, Sears will be selling a Toshiba model for $169.99.

I am guessing that Wal-Mart, Fry's or some other major player will have one cheaper than that.

Danny wrote:

"J, with only a standard CRT TV you probably couldn't tell the difference between standard broad cast television and 1080p movie play back as the TV isn't capable of displaying the difference anyway. Buy a new TV. I think if you had a brand new LCD or Plasma TV with 1080p/24/60fps and an HDMI 1.3 input you'd be singing a totally different tune, yah think?"

Come on, dude. I said it's a "CRT" not that it wasn't "HD". I know this is the internet, but give me SOME credit. Maybe I didn't explicitly state before, but I have a 30" inch SONY HD that displays/accepts 480i/480p/720p/1080i. I was waiting for SED but I'll probably buy a 50-60 inch plasma soon. I'm not sure how I feel about DLP. LCD I would go with if I just needed more TV's for the house.

J, It doen't change my opinion as I think old HD CRT TV are pretty lame compared to the NEW LCD and Plasma TV's. So I belive you when you say you can't tell the difference between Progressive and interlace being that you can't deplay a progresive picture on and interlaced CRT to being with.

It appears that the company behind the $199.00 HD DVD campaign is Toshiba not Wal-Mart as Wal-Mart appeared in a Blu-ray commercial along with Target and the entire Blu-ray association on the week end. The $199.00 cheap HD DVD players are just an inventory fire sale.

The following is a story I’m following as the moment:

Warner Bros. has been neutral in the Blu-ray-HD DVD disc war, releasing movies in both high-def formats.

However, that policy may be changing, says a top Warner executive.

Dan Silverberg, Warner's vice president of High-Definition media, hinted Monday at a Blu-ray briefing for the media that the studio might soon endorse Blu-ray.

Warner is now the only major studio that releases movies in both formats; two support HD DVD exclusively while four have endorsed Blu-ray.


Warner films like 300 could soon be Blu-ray exclusives.

But Home Media Magazine reports that Silverberg believes that Blu-ray may be winning the format war and, consequently, it may be time for the studio to pick one over the other.

“One thing that may be changing is our strategy,” he said. “When both formats launched and hardware prices were high, we made a decision to support both formats and let the consumer decide. But now that hardware pricing is affordable for both Blu-ray and HD DVD, it appears consumers no longer want to decide — so the notion of staying in two formats for the duration is something we are re-evaluating now that we are in the fourth quarter.”

The Warner executive noted that Blu-ray sales have topped HD DVD by a 2-1 margin over the last nine months.

While he didn't come out and endorse Blu-ray, it sounded like the studio had a clear favorite if it decides to endorse one format.

“We can definitely talk Blu-ray,” he said. “We are committed to the format.”

Warner's decision to support Blu-ray over HD DVD could have a major impact on the high-def disc format war. Without Warner, HD DVD's catalogue would only include titles from two studios.

Most experts & reviewers agree that HD CRT provides a much better picture than LCD or Plasma. It's only incumbered by weight issues and the difficulty in making larger flat glass tubes. That is why SED is so hyped. It is the digital evolution of CRT screen technology.

I can't say whether or not my SONY accepts multiple signals and upsamples them all to 1080i. SONY is not forthcoming with this information and it was difficult to find at the time. All I know is that progressive and interlaced signals definitely "look different" on the TV and the picture quality is amazing.

And yes, I have been to electronic stores before and I have seen 1080i (not around so much anymore) vs. 720p vs. 1080p in LCD and Plasma incarnations. Most people with HD don't own 1080p sets right now, and I think they'll live. That's why people will buy a $200 player that only does 1080i -- most people don't even have ANY HD TV set. They are watching SDTV and DVDs in 480i. 1080i is a huge leap.

Don't get me wrong -- I know that "Full HD 1080p" is largely a (SONY) marketing ploy, HOWEVER, my next set will most likely be a 1080p model (plasma, as SED is still a ways off). Yes, I'm sure it looks better, in some measure.

But the real point of the article is 1080i output vs. 1080p output of a player. The Toshiba and SONY HD players use virtually the same chipsets. It's all COTS. The differences are the 1) drives and the 2) Toshiba lowest models don't have the de-interlacing chip on the back end.

Didn't you guy's ever wonder why an HD player would output an interlaced signal (1080i) from a disc with progressive (1080p) source? It's because ALL THE PLAYERS PROCESS THE SOURCE IN FIELDS. And by "all", I mean HD-DVD and Blu-Ray. The Blu-Ray players and Toshiba non-A1/A2/A3 models have the de-interlacing chip to reassemble the signal to 1080p.

J, before I purchased my current LCD panel I owned the best 36" CRT money could buy at a cost of over $5500.00 and it wasn’t even close to being as good as a top of the line LCD. Your wrong, wrong, wrong. I have heard this bull shit time and again and it's just not true. In fact, there isn't one thing I can say was better about my CRT TV than my LCD. Not even 1. Is that clear enough for you? You are the most ill informed ignorant person posting here. Get a job and buy a new TV instead of sitting around trying to justify keeping an old CRT TV and making claims how it and a cheap HD DVD player are just as good as a 1080p/24/60 LCD TV with HDMI ver. 1,3a and a Blu-ray player. You have got to be retarded or something?

/rant
It is true, Blu-Ray is a superior technology. It simply has more storage capability then HD-DVD, making it much more versitile. BUT...

This is Sony's technology. The reason the $200 HD-DVD player has a Toshiba name plate on it is because Toshiba(along with a few lesser brand names, I don't remember them off the top of my head)has a large chunk of the R&D rights to HD-DVD, and is heading up the war on Blu-Ray(Sony).

Remember VHS vs. Betamax in the 80's? Guess what, here it is again. Betamax(another of Sony's babies) was far superior to VHS in terms of picturesound quality. Now riddle me this: where did all the Betamax players go? I know of 0 that were manufactured in the 90's, and 0 movies available on Betamax in the 90's...wow, deja vu all over again, eh?

In conclusion, F Sony. Nintendo is kicking its incisors in on the video games side, and Toshiba will kick its bicuspids in on home movie media. Apple...wanna go for the molars against the VAIO? }:) <

/end rant

Dalemite, Bata when down mainly because VHS had more storage capacity. This time around it's HD DVD that doesn't have the capacity nor the Industry support. They are all alone, just like Sony was with Bata. One company cannot go up against the entire industry; the world is just too big. Besides in over 2 years I haven't heard one thing that gave HD DVD a new advantage. Even Paramount’s leaving didn't help HD DVD at all as Paramount has only put out 2 movies since coming on board. In fact, the move has hurt Paramount’s public Image. Blu-ray has released 60 movies in the last 2 months alone. They have made huge in roads at every turn and now Warner Bothers is saying they are close to dropping HD DVD and HD DVD's price advantage is almost gone and the PS3 is now selling almost the same as Wii and twice as many as Xbox since price drop. Where are you getting your optimism as there as been no good news from HD DVD ever? Even the Wal-Mart sale of HD DVD players was a Toshiba sale as Wal-Mart came out with Target and the entire Blu-ray Association in a new TV add on the week end. At this rate HD DVD isn't going to last even until Christmas.

J, Walter is correct. Check the date on those articles you've been reading as initially CRT's were better but that time has past and the new 1080p LCD TV's are quite a bit better. The ones that are better are vary expensive but they are better just the same. Buy the way I’m an expert in engineering hardware design and we switched to LCD panels for AutoCAD in 2006.

I work at the CBC, and we recently up graded the monitors in the control rooms with LCD panels. I seen a big improvement in picture quality and I was surprised because the CRT monitors we had cost about $20,000 each for a 20". Don't believe everything you read as sometimes the articles are out dated or incorrect.

BDP9000/37B
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BDP9000/37B
Enjoy the full potential of your HDTV for an ultimate viewing experience.
Learn More
Online Price: $299.99

http://www.outlet.philips.com/b2c_redesign/b2c/productdetail.do? productguid=46A85667C7C2006900000000828BD473452DB2817C9 C010B00000000828BD4B8&productarea=46A85667C7C2006900000000828BD473&scenario=catalog&shop=OUTLET

That isn't a bad price if you don't mind re-conditioned electronics. It's made be Philips and it looks like shipping is free.

Question is why not just pay $100 more and get a PS3 that hasn't been re-furbished? Or better yet get on Craig's List and find a used PS3 for $300 so you can at least play games on the thing when they actually make a decent one.

"J, before I purchased my current LCD panel I owned the best 36" CRT money could buy at a cost of over $5500.00 and it wasn’t even close to being as good as a top of the line LCD. Your wrong, wrong, wrong. I have heard this bull shit time and again and it's just not true. In fact, there isn't one thing I can say was better about my CRT TV than my LCD. Not even 1. Is that clear enough for you? You are the most ill informed ignorant person posting here. Get a job and buy a new TV instead of sitting around trying to justify keeping an old CRT TV and making claims how it and a cheap HD DVD player are just as good as a 1080p/24/60 LCD TV with HDMI ver. 1,3a and a Blu-ray player. You have got to be retarded or something?

Dale"

...Shark? LOL.

I am sorry to tell you this, however DVI will not be supported for HD content of any format much longer. The MPAA has required that all devices capable of outputting HD content respect something called the HDCP flag. Any media or broadcast with the HDCP flag will only be playable through an HDMI connection. Non HDMI connections will be degraded to 420p at best or you will only see a red screen informing you that you are not using an HDMI cable.

A DVI/HDMI adapter will not support HDCP encryption.

Please also note that Original X-box 360 systems that do not have HDMI output will be limited to 420p display of HD-DVD movies.

I have the unfortunate pleasure/displeasure of seeing dozens of CRTs and LCDs on a daily basis. Without a doubt, high end CRTs still hold the crown. You cant get that kind of pitch on an LCD.... not yet anyway. Give it about 5 more years and CRTs will be totally 100% obsolete.

These aren't the players that we heard about 6 months ago, right? The really really cheap ones?

The only reason DVI adaptor type connections work is because current media doesn’t have the HDCP protection fully implemented. This was done to allow certain industry segments time to make the change to HDMI. With the news last week that 92% of the industry has made the transition, HD Disc duplicators are going to begin full HDCP implementation on all media soon. Current media will still work however new media will not work and an HDMI connection will be needed. Unfortunately, anyone who bought a HD DVD player for their Xbox which don’t have an HDMI connection they will no longer be able to play the new discs. No date was given.

The HD data is technically sent through a USB cable before it ever reaches the component output, and USB does not support HDCP either. But the output on the Xbox 360 uses a special kind of plug: notice its not directly out via component video?

Here is a trick: swap that component video cable for a DVI cable. The connection on the 360 is meant to output analog, but to get it over the DVI cable the signal needs amplified. People have been doing the same thing to get past HDCP with older monitors that only support DVI: just use an HDMI to DVI adapter and the signal gets amplified and HDCP fails. Viola, unencrypted signals go to your TV.

Besides, HDCP now works through DVI connections: the DX10 hardware from both Nvidia and ATI both have HDCP certified DVI connections. I believe the HDCP spec was revised to allow certain DVI connections just because its common.

Allen, read my article again. DVI will no longer pass HD Media once they fully enable HDCP on the discs. You will have to have an HDMI cable period. I'm sure the industry is away of your by pass and this move is meant to close it.

I will try to be as clear as I can. DVI currently passes the HDCP flags without any problems because the media is not yet 100% HDCP enabled as most of you must remember when HD players first arrived a lot of people complained that the players didn't allow HD content throw component and DVI connections, so the HDMI Association compromised by allowing HD to be output through component and DVI to HDMI adapters by way of allowing the HDCP flags to pass without any problems. However, this was a stop gap which was never meant to be forever. Now that the industry has made the change to HDMI the duplicators want to fully enable the HDCP protocol. This will mean that any HD player’s currently playing HD media without an HDMI cable will not be able to play new HD movies without a compliant HDMI cable with HDCP protection. Since most Xboxes don’t have an HDMI cable but instead are using component video cables, this will mean they will not be able to play any new media once the HDCP protocol is fully implemented.

This holiday season will go A LONG WAY to balancing the ratio, and shifting a few studios to fence-sitters.

1. The PS3 isn't panning out, and the studios are getting nervous, especially in light of the continual negative news on the PS3 front...now no Snake, to go along with no GTA

2. Toshiba is going to get REALLY agressive this holiday season, like this Walmart price cut. Amazon will beat it, and you can expect to see ALOT of players getting pushed.

3. ALOT of the LCD/Plasma are only 1080i...in the low-cost variety, so they can't do 1080p, so why get a 1080p player for $100 more? I know several people who bought those Vizio...low cost, but definite a massive improvement over the old TVs.

4. The Paramount/Dreamworks deal is going to catch the eye of ALOT of studios...they can make ALOT more money by going the Warner Bros way, and if Walmart is pushing HD-DVD like this...it's probably not a good idea to boycott the format. Money (more imprtantly, profit talks!) I won't be surprised to see Fox bolt camp before the years out.

I expect the ratios to shift to 50/50 this holiday season, and the battle will probably rage into 2008. The battle will come down to who can produce the cheaper disc package. HD-DVD is cheaper to produce, but Toshiba has to cut the price to the consumer, and I won't be surprised to see HD-DVD going for $21.99 this holiday season, and maybe even $19.99

I find it really surprising and quite a stark contrast between proponents on both sides of the format debate. Most BluRay supporters seem to base their support on BluRay's technical merits and little else, while HD-DVD supporters tout the economical merits of HD-DVD.

What troubles me is the amount of vitriol that HD-DVD supports sling at Sony... using that Sony-Hate as another crutch in their argument as if it lends further merit.

It seems HD-DVD supports not so much predict HD-DVD will prevail or even that they want HD-DVD to win as much as they want Sony to lose at all costs.

I don't quite understand the sour grapes. However, I do believe that all the anti-Sony ranting does more to detract from a given HD-DVD fan's argument than it adds.

Walmart, with it's gzallion stores will probably sell out of ALL $100 HD-DVD's in a matter of hours...hmmm...the first of probably many sales this season.

My Wal-Mart released them this morning, and sold out 100 units in just the first few minutes.