Studios join DVD format battle.Consumers looking to upgrade to high-definition DVD See high-def DVD formats and HD DVD. players are now faced with two warring formats. As early as this month, major retailers will begin stocking both HD DVD and Blu-ray format players and movies. Japan-based Toshiba, a chief backer of the HD DVD technology, announced before January's Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas that its HD DVD player would carry a suggested retail price of U.S.$499. French-owned (but U.S.-based) Thomson announced that its RCA See RCA connector and video/TV history. brand HD DVD player will also cost $499. Reportedly, nearly 200 movies and TV shows from Paramount, Universal, Warner Bros BROS Brothers BROS Benefits and Retirement Operations Section (King County, Washington) BROS Barnes and Richmond Operatic Society (London, UK) ., and the Weinstein Company will be available on this format. Analysts expect a 15-25 percent mark-up in these new-fangled DVDs. Microsoft has also showed its commitment to HD DVD, announcing plans to add an external HD DVD drive to its Xbox 360 videogame console. Among other benefits, the HD DVD player will allow users to make copies of games onto a media center hard drive or Windows-powered portable video player A handheld device that plays videos. The term may refer to lightweight flash-based or hard disk-based MP4 players that download video content from a computer or to heavier, but still very portable, devices that play DVDs. See portable DVD player, Portable Media Center and portable media player. . On the other hand, the new Blu-ray Disc players are set to debut for U.S.$1,000-$1,800, with broader software support than their rival. Among the electronics companies supporting this technology are Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Sony and Samsung. Studios including Buena Vista, Lionsgate, Paramount, Sony, Twentieth Century Fox and Warner Bros. will offer DVD DVD: see digital versatile disc. DVD in full digital video disc or digital versatile disc Type of optical disc. The DVD represents the second generation of compact-disc (CD) technology. titles that use the Blu-ray system. Even though the opening price of Blu-ray devices is significantly higher, experts speculate that the two devices will have similar prices by year's end. STUDIOS COMPLYING WITH BLU-RAY TECH ONLY * Buena Vista Home Ent. * Lionsgate * Sony BMG Music Ent. * Sony Pictures Home Ent. (including MGM MGM in full Metro-Goldwyn-Mayer, Inc. U.S. corporation and film studio. It was formed when the film distributor Marcus Loew, who bought Metro Pictures in 1920, merged it with the Goldwyn production company in 1924 and with Louis B. Mayer Pictures in 1925. ) * Twentieth Century Fox STUDIOS COMPLYING WITH HD DVD TECH ONLY * Studio Canal * Universal Pictures * The Weinstein Company STUDIOS COMPLYING WITH BOTH TECHS * Paramount Home Ent. * Warner Home Video Warner Home Video is the home video unit of Warner Bros. Home Entertainment Group, a division of Warner Bros. Entertainment, Inc. It was founded in 1978 as WCI Home Video (for Warner Communications, Inc.). It was re-named Warner Home Video in 1980. |
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