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Reuters recently interviewed the president of Sony Electronics' U.S. operations, Stan Glasgow. In the interview, Glasgow stated that Blu-ray player sales have fallen short of Sony's expectations. Along with the tough economy, player sales have been hampered by the high price of Blu-ray titles.
High definition Blu-ray disc players may be one of the holiday season's best sellers, but they will still fall short of expectations, due to the tough economy, the head of Sony's U.S. electronics unit said.
Sales of the next-generation movies players, developed by Sony and sold under brands including Panasonic and Samsung, could benefit from a late shopping spurt as budget conscious U.S. consumers find deals, Stan Glasgow told Reuters in an interview on Thursday.
But they will not meet the worldwide target of 5 million units, most of which had been expected to sell in the United States.
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Despite the recent reports of fake Blu-ray Discs, Sony Pictures is moving ahead with its plans to release movies on Blu-ray in China. According to Variety, the company will release 30 titles on Nov. 21st, including recent releases such as "Hancock," "The Water Horse" and the “Spider-Man” trilogy.
Starting Friday, Sony Pictures Home Entertainment will distribute 30 current and classic movies in the Sony-developed high-definition format for 205 yuan ($30) per disc -- a considerable sum in a low-wage country.
Pics include "Hancock," "Kung Fu Hustle," the "Spider-Man" trilogy, "Hitch," "The Pursuit of Happyness" and "Close Encounters of the Third Kind."
Warner Bros. and Disney are also looking at releasing Blu-ray titles in China. However, instead of importing the discs, they are looking to cut costs by using local manufacturers.
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Silicon Mountain sent out a press release this morning, announcing its design for a 32 and 42-inch HDTV with an integrated, full-function PC and Blu-ray player. The Allio HD TV / PC is available in six different configurations, including a flagship model that comes equipped with a 42" LCD display, combo Blu-ray/DVD player, Intel Core2Duo E8400 processor, 4GB of RAM and a 1TB hard drive.
The Allio HD TV / PC is the first product of its kind in North America, and Silicon Mountain is the first company worldwide to develop a converged HD TV / PC solution that includes Blu-ray. It is available now, in time for U.S. holiday purchases. Orders are being taken now at the Visionman website at http://www.visionman.com/.
Additional information on where to buy Allio will be announced soon.
The flagship Allio model marries a Full-HD 42" LCD display with a combo Blu-ray/DVD player, integrated digital recorder for PVR and a powerful PC, based on the Intel Core2Duo E8400 processor, 4GB of RAM from Silicon Mountain, a 1TB hard drive and the 64-bit version of Windows Vista Home Premium. In addition to the analog and digital audio-video inputs common to high-def televisions, Allio includes wireless and wired networking capabilities and several USB ports to extend the experience to other computers and peripherals in the home.
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If you've checked out the price of Blu-ray players, you've probably noticed that they've come down considerably over the last few months. According to a new report by ABI Research, the price of Blu-ray players are going to come down even more for the holiday season due to pressure from download services and speculation about the future success of the format.
The need for healthy holiday sales in a bear market, competitive pressure from movie download services, and media speculation about the future success of the Blu-ray format itself has resulted in falling Blu-ray player prices across a range of current and older models.
Tier 2 players and older models (6-9 months) are now widely available under $200. Amazon is offering a Samsung model bundled with four discs for that price. Holiday season prices may be in the $150-200 range. All of this runs counter to many of the industry’s original market forecasts and expectations.
“Blu-ray vendors and dealers are starting to realize that for Blu-ray to become the next DVD, they need to lower player prices in order to generate interest and build volumes,” comments ABI Research principal analyst Steve Wilson.
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Amazon is running a new promotion where you get a $100 discount on a participatingBlu-ray player when you buy 4 Warner Bros titles. The promotion includes the Playstation 3 (80GB), Sylvania NB500SL9, Sony BDP-S350 and Sony BDP-S550. With the discount, the Sylvania NB500SL9and Sony BDP-S350can be picked up for less than $130. The list of titles includes I Am Legend, Speed Racer, Batman Begins and Superman Returns as well as 29 others.
To take advantage of this promotion, simply add one of the participating Blu-ray players as well as f Warner movies to your cart. Enter the promotion code AMAZONBD at checkout and a $100 credit will automatically be applied to your order. The promotion runs through December 31, 2008 so there is plenty of time to get a Blu-ray player before the holidays.
Update: The Sharp BDHP50, Sharp BDHP21U, Samsung BD-P2500, Panasonic DMP-BD55K, Pioneer BDP-51FD and LG BD300 have been added to the promotion. Unfortunately, the Sony BDP-S350 and Sony BDP-S550 no longer qualify.
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Sony Music Entertainment has launched a new high quality audio CD format called the Blu-spec CD. While sticking to the red book (CDDA) standard, the Blu-spec CD uses the same polycarbonate material and Blue Laser Diode (BLD) cutting process used to manufacture Blu-ray Discs. Jitter has been further reduced by eliminating vibration during the cutting process as well as the use of fiber optics to improve the quality of the beam.
Sony plans to have 60 titles ready for launch on December 24th, including albums from popular artists like Billy Joel, Santana and Aerosmith. Most Blu-spec CD's are priced at around 2,500 Yen ($25US).
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Netflix and TiVo signed a deal this week that will give TiVo subscribers the ability to instantly watch content from Netflix on their TV. By partnering together, Netflix subscribers will be able to add movies and TV episodes to their queues and have them available to watch instantly through the TiVo service.
TiVo Inc. (Nasdaq: TIVO), the creator of and a leader in television services for digital video recorders (DVRs) and Netflix, Inc. (Nasdaq: NFLX), the world's largest online movie rental service, today announced that they are teaming up to provide Netflix and TiVo(R) Series3, TiVo HD, and TiVo HD XL subscribers with the ability to have thousands of movies and TV episodes instantly streamed from Netflix directly to their TVs.
he two companies said they are initiating a test of the new capability today in several thousand U.S. households and expect it to be broadly available in early December, in time for the holidays. The ability to instantly watch content from Netflix on the TV via TiVo DVRs will be offered at no additional charge to customers who subscribe to both services.
The agreement provides Netflix with an important new technology partner to instantly stream a growing library of more than 12,000 choices of movies and TV episodes directly from Netflix to the TV. It also solidifies TiVo's leading position for simple navigation and delivery of the best entertainment content to the TV.
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Netflix announced today that it has partnered with Samsung to offer consumers the ability to instantly stream movies and TV shows from Netflix via Samsung's new BD-P2500 and BD-P2550 Blu-ray disc players. The two companies are also working together to integrate instant streaming into a range of home entertainment products.
Netflix, Inc. (Nasdaq: NFLX), the world's largest online movie rental service, and Samsung Electronics America, a market leader and award-winning innovator in consumer electronics, today announced a broad partnership to offer consumers the ability to instantly stream movies and TV episodes from the Netflix Web site directly to their living rooms via Samsung's BD-P2500 and BD-P2550 Blu-ray disc players. The companies also said they are collaborating to enable Samsung to integrate instant streaming from Netflix into a range of home entertainment products.
The BD-P2550 and BD-P2500 are currently available at $399.99. Consumers who already own one of these Samsung players can upgrade their device at no additional cost to enable instant streaming from a growing library of more than 12,000 movies and television episodes from Netflix. The upgrade is available at http://www.samsung.com/bluraysupport.
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Broadcom announced today that LG has chosen the Broadcom BCM7440 for its new BD300 Blu-ray Disc player. This system-on-a-chip (SoC) solution is capable of playing back BD-Live enabled Blu-ray titles as well as movies and TV shows streamed directly from Netflix.
Broadcom Corporation, a global leader in semiconductors for wired and wireless communications, today announced that its highly integrated BCM7440 Blu-ray Disc® system-on-a-chip (SoC) solution has been selected by LG Electronics to power the world's first Blu-ray Disc player featuring Netflix® instant streaming. Leveraging the Broadcom® high performance Blu-ray SOC, LG's new BD300 player allows Netflix subscribers to instantly stream content over the Internet from a growing library of over 12,000 choices of movies and TV episodes directly to their TVs, at no additional charge.
Broadcom's BCM7440 SoC has become the prevalent technology for Blu-ray Disc playback, exemplifying the company's technical abilities and commitment to this market. The new SoC offers high definition video playback at 1080p resolution, picture-in-a-picture video support, high definition multi-channel audio, and world class BD-Java performance for full support of BD-Live functionality. Integrated security and streaming features have enabled manufacturers to leverage the BCM7440 built-in Ethernet port to deploy a new class of Blu-ray players that feature Internet-based streaming media playback capabilities.
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DTS, Inc. launches a variation of it’s increasingly popular surround sound technology DTS-HD Master Audio, which delivers high definition audio that is bit for bit identical to the studio master. DTS-HD Master Audio Essential provides the same quality high-end sound that consumers have come to expect from DTS-HD Master Audio. DTS-HD Master Audio Essential will be a full Master Audio feature set for Blu-ray Disc, with the exception of DTS ES Matrix and NEO 6.
Although DTS-HD Master Audio Essential does not currently support DTS | 96 /24, DTS ES, ES Matrix, and DTS NEO 6, for standard DVD discs, DTS backwards compatibility makes it possible for you to automatically enjoy your DVD entertainment experience in high quality DTS Digital Surround.
