The battle for High Definition images rages on! Word on the street is that Wal-Mart has a bunch of HD players being manufactured in China as we speak! We get the story from out fantastic friends at filmjunk:
There’s a big rumour going around in DVD technology circles that Wal-Mart may be gearing up to release a dirt cheap HD-DVD player by next year. They’ve apparently placed an order with a Chinese electronics manufacturer for two million units at a cost of $50 each, which would allow them to sell these players for a retail price of $299 USD or less. So is there any truth to this?
Well, the reported deal seems to be legit, but it is currently unclear whether the players are HD-DVD or Blu-ray (the original news source was in Chinese and the translations have been vague).
Wal – Mart destroys anyone’s hope of making money on hardware, and this is good news for consumers. In his article the Webmaster of Filmjunk makes a good point of reminding us that Wal-Mart sells 40% of all DVD’s and if they take a side on the HDDVD VS BLU RAY DVD it could have a significant impact on the battle. Having seen the power of HD DVD myself I am a convert and will certainly be buying a player in another year or so. I procrastinate at everything, it took me 5 years to get a damn DVD player.
I am astonished at just how cheap technology is getting. I saw a small TV for sale the other day in a flyer for under 15 bucks. A TV you can take fishing – for under 15 dollars. You can now get a no frills DVD player for under 50 and the cost of computers keeps coming down year after year. People on welfare now have luxuries that ancient kings would of plundered nations for. It is an exciting time to live, and I am interested to see what the changes in picture quality will do to filmmaking.
