High Definition Hardware

Toshiba second gen HD DVD players delayed worldwide

Not wanting Sony to hog the HD spotlight with its delays, Toshiba has pushed back the release date of its second generation HD DVD players in the US and abroad.

Despite the lack of an official statement from Toshiba US, rumors have it that due to problems with a chip from a third party supplier, the lower-end HD-A2 HD DVD player originally due out right about now will now not be available until the second week of December.

The HDMI 1.3-equipped, 1080p displaying Toshiba HD-XA2 will also be delayed in Europe where like stateside the Second Generation hardware is eagerly awaited due to issues with the existing units putting off potential buyers. Hopefully a short delay now will avoid the need to patch software later. In the meantime there's always the Xbox 360 HD DVD add-on.

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Acer Aspire 9800 - HD DVD laptop

If you’re looking for a laptop with the potential to fulfill all your multimedia needs, then look no further than the new Acer Aspire 9800.

This new Acer offers a massive 20.1 inch widescreen with a native resolution of 1,680 x 1,050 along with CrystalBrite high-contrast technology and an 8 millisecond response time. To make the most of this, Acer has chosen the popular 256 Meg version of Nvidia’s GeForce Go 7600 graphics card which should have plenty of puff for both games and multimedia tasks.

Toshiba releases new HD-XA1

Toshiba has unveiled its new HD-XA1 High Definition (HD) DVD player which promises to deliver exceptional image quality, life-like clarity and enhanced audio playback from what Toshiba (and others) hope will be the next generation movie format and replacement for the current standard DVD. Alongside the playback of pre-recorded HD DVDs, Toshiba's HD-XA1 also offers support for up-conversion of standard DVDs to a resolution of 1080i or 720p through a HDCP capable HDMI connection, meaning your current DVD collection should look even better!

High Definition Formats explained

You may or may not be aware that there are currently two major next-generation optical formats fighting to become the dominant force for storage and replace DVD as the media of choice for both movies and games.

The two formats fighting for supremacy as the next-generation videodisc format are HD-DVD (developed by Toshiba and NEC) and Blu-ray (developed by Sony). The DVD Forum supports HD-DVD, but this does not mean that HD-DVD has won the format war.

Dual format HD players?

Samsung has suggested it may be bringing out a dual HD DVD and Blu-ray player in one box if backers of the rival standards fail to agree on a unified format, a move that would certainly go a long way to averting the much reported HD format war.

Samsung's head of consumer electronics, Choi Gee-sung, told the Financial Times Deutschland: "We would welcome a unified standard but if this doesn't come, which looks likely, we'll bring a unified solution to market.

"It won't be simple but you'll see our solution in the coming year. Consumers will be too confused otherwise," he added in the interview published on Tuesday.

Samsung was initially a backer of blu-ray, which promises higher capacity than HD DVD and better interactivity and security, but a move to back both formats may be a shrewd one with many consumers sitting on the fence hoping to avoid making the wrong choice. 

Second US HD player due 18th May

It appears that the second player to hit the US after the recent release of Toshiba's HD-A1 and HD-XA1 players will be a machine from RCA. Wal-Mart's website suggests RCA's HDV500 machine will ship on 18th May.

The RCA HDV5000 was demoed at CES in January but there appears to have been a significant amount of redesign in the intervening months. The previously slim look device seen at the RCA product launch event has been replaced by a bulkier product more like Toshiba's offerings.

HD DVD hits the stores.

The first HD-DVD titles are due to go on sale in the US today and contrary to recent rumor, Toshiba’s new range of players should also be on sale in some stores by the end of the week.

   

Meanwhile, Universal Studios Home Entertainment is to release recent Sci-Fi movie “Serenity” to stores. It will join the two Warner Home Video titles "The Last Samurai" and "The Phantom of the Opera".

Fujitsu launch third HD DVD laptop

The third notebook to incorporate an HD DVD drive has been released courtesy of Fujitsu. This follows the recent lead from Toshiba and, more recently, Acer.

 

The FMV-Biblio Loox NX 95S/D - a notebook that strangely seems to share the same model number as Fujitsu's Blu-ray Disc-equipped PC-TV system is based on a 1.67GHz Intel Core Duo T2300 processor and an Intel 955PM chipset.

Toshiba launch worlds first HD DVD Laptop

The world’s first notebook offering a HD DVD-ROM has been released in Japan by Toshiba.

 

The Qosmio G30/697HS will be available to Japanese consumers in May. Along with playback of HD DVD content, the new Qosmio will also read and write to a multitude of current DVD and CD discs.

Hollywood gives second thought to HD requirements

Business Week has reported that Universal Studios Home Video has now officially spoken out against the Image Constraint Token (ICT) anti-piracy flag that it had been expected would be used on HD DVD disks.

The significance of this is that the ICT flag is the one that makes a HD DVD player downscale content if you try to watch it via an analogue output rather than an HDCP-protected digital video output such as HDMI or DVI.