First HD-DVD Player Goes On Sale

An anonymous reader writes "If you live in Japan, you can get your hands on the first commercially available HD-DVD player as of today. Toshiba has launched the HD-XA1, and hopes for sales in the next year to exceed 600,000 units. The device is set to debut in the states in April. From the article: "The player will sell for 110,000 yen (US$936) in Japan. In that market there will also be a cheaper player, the HD-A1, priced at $500. Toshiba said the price in Japan is based on its expectation that video enthusiasts will be first to adopt the technology, while in the United States, the prices are aimed more at average consumers who are more price conscious." Update: 03/31 18:45 GMT by Z : Quoted article updated, quote updated to match the article.

techie

[caffeinemessiah]

even for a techie early adopter, somehow the knowledge that there's a war brewing makes these things quite undesirable. i wonder if the people who actually buy it at this point know what's coming...?

no region coding

[spazoidspam]

From TFA: The HD-XA1 has no region coding for the HD-DVD content

I guess thats a slight incentive to buy this early, but not enough to justify the rest of the horribly crippling DRM features it will have.

Re:techie

[AeroIllini]

even for a techie early adopter, somehow the knowledge that there's a war brewing makes these things quite undesirable. i wonder if the people who actually buy it at this point know what's coming...?

Especially since crippling DRM limiting the fair use rights of paying customers for the sake of stopping a phantom piracy threat are included right there in the spec.

Yeah, this should go well.

I'll pass...

[mr_burns]

...on both HD-DVD and Blu Ray. Holographic storage hits the market within a year with much greater density and throughput. Online movie distro music store style is likely to hit even before then.

So there's absolutely no point in investing a grand in a technology which will be obsoleted within a year. I'll throw a holo drive in a MythTV, get my movies online legit and tell the consumer electronics manufacturers to suck it.

Class action?

[michaelmalak]

Since Toshiba is the manufacturer of the player, has Toshiba manufactured any "HD Ready" televisions that would render HD-DVDs at a lower resolution due to DRM? If so, once the player reaches the U.S., wouldn't Toshiba be open to a class action lawsuit for false advertising? The argument would of course hinge on whether over-the-air satisfies the advertisement, or whether due to the advent of the VCR three decades ago that playback of prerecorded media is a reasonable consumer expectation.

Re:techie

[Jugalator]

Yeah, and it doesn't get any better that the competing format is the same, as for the main AACS protection [wikipedia.org]. Additionally, Blu-rays will have a disc identification layer to trace mass production piracy.

When I'll get any of these next generation formats, it will be once burners have arrived, and for data storage. I'll likely still go for it when the price and availability matures, because the storage amount is quite attractive.

Not worth it

[Brix Braxton]

Thinking about this the other day - I looked over my DVD collection and made a mental note of how many times I watched each of the movies I paid for. My logic was that I would have to watch most movies more than 4 times to really benefit from ownership (guessing I pay about $20 per DVD). In the end - my entire collection was a loss - most of my movies I haven't watched more than twice - not that I don't like them, I do - but there are so many other things to watch between the Tivo and DVD that it's not possible. Using this logic - $900 for an HDDVD player = I could watch 225 HDTV movies via PPV or On Demand before it even became a consideration - not to mention all of the content I would get on Showtime or HBO HD. I know ownershp has it's merits but I think I'm ready to kick the habit and leave the spot empty on my home theatre rack. Just my opinion.