If you haven’t already read, Toshiba, the lead company to introduce HD-DVD has announced it will cease producing HD-DVD recorders and players and all supplies will be halted from March 2008. For those of you that have bought any HD-DVD devices they will be stockpiling media so you can continue to burn to disk, however, it’s all over now bar the shouting.
Partners in grime
Toshiba was not alone in it’s battle against Blu-Ray; Microsoft, Intel, and HP had also backed the format, with Microsoft using HD-DVD as an option for its’ XBox 360. However as that unit was an add-on, Microsoft could easily swap to a Blu-Ray option if they so chose … currently not many people I know have the HD-DVD drive and it’s certainly not used for games so I think the loss is tactically not too bad….
Fly in the ointment
That being said, there is a hiccup with Blu-Ray; Unless you buy a PS3, any Blu-Ray player you buy now may not be 100% compatible with Blu-Ray movies produced after October 2008 – that’s right! Because they’re altering the format slightly, current Blu-Ray players with the exception of the PS3 will not play all the content of the Blu-Ray disks! Sony will be sending out a firmware update for PS3 owners so they can maintain compatibility, but for other devices there’s no clear upgrade path.
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