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Home Entertainment
Good news for those that bought an HD DVD player from Best Buy. The company announced today that it will be sending $50 gift cards to customers who purchased a Toshiba HD-DVD player or Xbox HD DVD addon from its U.S. stores.
With Blu-ray declaring victory over HD-DVD in the high definition movie format war, Best Buy, the nation’s largest consumer electronics retailer, is giving $50 gift cards to customers who purchased an HD-DVD player or HD-DVD attachment from its U.S. stores before February 23, 2008. Customers will get a gift card for each player or HD-DVD attachment that they purchased. Through this program, Best Buy will distribute more than $10 million in gift cards to customers across the country.

“The DVD format war has divided our customers in a way we haven’t seen since Betamax took on VHS more than 20 years ago,” said Brian J. Dunn, president and chief operating officer for Best Buy. “At Best Buy, we understood and shared our customers’ frustrations as they were being asked to choose one format or the other. Now that the format war is over, we hope these gift cards will reassure our customers that we will help them make a smooth transition into the right technology for their needs.”
Best Buy will be proactively sending out cards to members of the their Reward Zone program and to customers who purchased Performance Service Plans (PSPs) or who made their purchase online. Other customers will need to call (888) BEST BUY and provide a proof of purchase through a credit card or their Best Buy receipt.

If you'd like to get rid of your HD DVD player altogether, you're in luck. Best Buy is also launching a new program on March 21st where you can trade in used electronics for gift cards. Full details on this program can be found here. Add a comment

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Optical Storage
LG has officially announced its new 22x "Super-Multi" drive, the GH22. Along with support for SecurDisc and LightScribe, the drive features 22x DVD±R, 16x DVD+R DL, 12x DVD-R DL and 12x DVD-RAM writing speeds. Here are some of the GH22's specs:


Writing Speeds:

DVD+R: 22x
DVD+RW: 8x
DVD+R DL: 16x
DVD-R: 22x
DVD-RW: 6x
DVD-R DL: 12x
DVD-RAM: 12x
CD-R: 48x
CD-RW: 32x

 Read Speeds:

DVD-ROM: 16x Max
CD-ROM: 48x Max

Buffer Size: 2MB
According to LG's press release, the GH22 can burn an entire DVD±R disc in about 4 minutes and 30 seconds. This is pretty impressive.. if the drive can deliver on these claims. The GH22 is expected to ship in the second half of 2008 and will be priced at about 30,000 won (~$30US). Full details can be found here. Add a comment

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Antec P190 + 1200 Case @HardwareLogic.com
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Dell XPS M1730 Notebook @Hardware Zone
Rocketfish Universal Wireless Rear Speaker Kit @I4U
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Western Digital Caviar RE2 750GB Hard Drive @HotHardware.com
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Antec P180 Enclosure @High Tech Reviews.com
Kingston SD/2GB-U @ASE Labs
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NVIDIA nForce 790i Ultra SLI Performance @Hardware Zone
Rosewill RX81-MP-SC eSATA HDD Enclosure @TweakTown
Steelseries Ikari Laser Gaming Mouse @Tweaknews.net
Tagan BZ 900W Power Supply @Phoronix
XFX 9800 GX2 Video Card @I4U
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Software
TMPGEnc announced today that it has added MovieStyle to its software lineup. Using this new software, users can easily convert their video clips for use on popular digital devices such as the iPod/iPhone, Zune and PSP.
TMPG, Inc. (www.tmpg-inc.com), the company that makes digital video easy, has added TMPGEnc MovieStyle to its software lineup. It allows users to easily convert video clips for use on 11 popular digital devices from portables such as the iPod and PSP to full HD devices such as Sony's Playstation 3. The free trial will be available for download on March 27th at www.tmpg-inc.com. The full retail version will be available shortly thereafter at $39.95 per license.

"More and more, people are using digital devices to watch their favorite video clips, whether it's portable devices or video game consoles," remarked Kimi Matsuki, TMPG CEO. "With MovieStyle, users can easily convert video clips for these devices without any video encoding knowledge. That means users of any age, experienced or inexperienced, can use this software to convert video for portable or HD devices. We like to say, MovieStyle: your movies, your digital lifestyle."
As their press release points out, a free trial will be available on March 27th and the retail version will be available shortly thereafter for $39.95. Full details can be found here. Add a comment

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Software
Corel sent out a press release this morning, announcing the latest release of its WinDVD software. Corel WinDVD 9 Plus Blu-ray offers a number of new features including a more user intuitive interface, upscaling of standard DVD's and enhanced Blu-ray Disc playback.
Corel Corporation (NASDAQ:CREL; TSX:CRE), a leading developer of graphics, productivity and digital media software, today announced the latest release of Corel WinDVD, the world's number one DVD and video playback software on PCs. Corel WinDVD 9 Plus Blu-ray features a new, more intuitive user interface, new video technologies including advanced upscaling that enables users to create near-high-definition viewing with standard-definition DVDs, enhanced Blu-ray Disc playback, as well as the latest in high-definition surround sound for the ultimate viewing experience. With more than 200 million units shipped worldwide, WinDVD remains the industry standard for DVD, video and Blu-ray Disc playback.

"WinDVD 9 Plus Blu-ray is designed for the movie buff, frequent flyer and those who want a superior video and audio playback experience in one easy-to-use solution," said Jeff Hastings, President and General Manager, Digital Media at Corel. "More and more people are adopting the latest high-definition technologies such as Blu-ray Disc and AVCHD. With WinDVD 9 Plus Blu-ray, users will have access to the latest Blu-ray Disc playback capabilities including BonusView as well as revolutionary upscaling technology that enables users to create near-high-definition viewing with standard-definition DVDs."
WinDVD 9 Plus Blu-ray is priced at $99.99 and is available now through Corel's website. The software will also be hitting retail outlets over the coming weeks. If you'd like to read more, Corel's entire press release can be found here. Add a comment

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Home Entertainment
With the format war coming to an end, consumer interest in Blu-ray is slowly rising. Home Media Magazine has released some details from a new NPD Group study, showing that interest among standard DVD consumers increased from 9.4% to 10.8% for the week that ended Feb. 20.
Interest among standard DVD consumers likely to buy HD packaged media increased to 10.8% for the week that ended Feb. 20, compared to 9.4% for the week that ended Feb. 13 and 8.9% for the week of Feb. 6. HD DVD interest, not surprisingly, dropped to 8.8%, from 10.6% (Feb. 13) the week before and 10.9% the prior week.

Comparative percentages for Blu-ray late last year ranged from 5% to 6.8% through Christmas.
The study also found that the high cost of Blu-ray players and consumer satisfaction with standard DVD is slowing growth. If you'd like to read more, the entire article can be found here. Add a comment

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Duplicators
Aleratec has announced that it has launched a stand alone USB flash drive duplicator. The Aleratec 1:11 USB Copy Tower SA can copy, compare, or erase up to 11 flash drives at once without the need for a computer.

Aleratec Inc., leading developer and manufacturer of "Prosumers' Choice" solutions for the USB, Flash, HDD, Blu-ray, DVD/CD, duplicating, and DVD/CD publishing markets, introduces its innovative new 1:11 USB Copy Tower SA, the fast, economical way to duplicate the same information to multiple flash drives, and it's stand alone -- no computer or any other equipment is required. It will copy, compare, or erase up to 11 flash drives simultaneously and all functions are selectable via a very simple duplicator controller with a back lighted LCD display. The Aleratec 1:11 USB Copy Tower SA takes the hassle out of trying to copy USB flash drives.
The Aleratec 1:11 USB Copy Tower SA is available now for an estimated retail price of $1575. Full details can be found here. Add a comment

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Software
Roxio sent out a press release this morning, announcing the launch of Toast 9 Titanium. Toast 9 offers a number of new and improved features including HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc support, audio fingerprinting and the ability to stream video content directly to the iPhone or iPod Touch.
Sonic Solutions (NASDAQ: SNIC), the leader in digital media software, redefines Mac burning yet again with the introduction of Toast 9 Titanium. Toast 9 allows consumers to record high-definition content from high-definition (HD) camcorders and favorite HD programming from TiVo DVRs and Elgato’s EyeTV devices to Blu-ray Disc (BD). Users also have the option to burn HD video and slide shows on standard DVDs. For on-the-go entertainment, Toast 9 introduces Roxio Streamer. Streamer allows users to stream video content stored on their home Mac to a Wi-Fi connected iPhone or iPod Touch or any Internet connected Mac or PC. Already the first choice for music fans wishing to create great sounding CDs and DVDs, Toast 9 offers the ability to capture streaming audio for recording Internet radio. Another Toast innovation allows captured music tracks to be automatically tagged with song titles, artist or other related information.
Toast 9 Titanium is available directly from Roxio for $99.99 and will hit retail outlets later this month. The High Definition/Blu-ray Disc (HD/BD) plug-in, which is needed to author BD video, is sold separately for $19.99 and is available free for those who purchase Toast 9 online at roxio.com through April 13, 2008. Full details can be found here. Add a comment

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Adesso AKB-320UB Keyboard w/Trackball @BCCHardware
ASUS Xonar D2X 7.1 Channel PCI Express Sound Card @Bigbruin.com
Eagle Tech ET-CSIU2J-BK JBOD External Storage System @Bigbruin.com
FSP PSU Roundup - 500W, 700W and 1kW @BCCHardware
Kingston 8GB Hyper-X Data Traveler USB Drive @Virtual-Hideout
LiteON DH-401S BD-ROM @BHmag@fr
MemoRight GT MR25.2-064S 2.5-Inch 64GB SATA SSD @Benchmark Reviews
MSI N9600GT-T2D512-OC (GeForce 9600 GT) @Hardware Zone
OCZ ReaperX HPC 4GB PC2-6400 @Phoronix
Thermaltake M9 Mid-Tower Case @ThinkComputers.org
Western Digital Scorpio 2.5" 320GB HDD @TweakTown
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