Quote:
Originally Posted by thunderhawk
Yup it does in the EU. HD DVD hasn't released any movies beyond the UK in the European Union so BD is the de facto leader right now over here.  |
Even here in the UK the only player available to consumers is the X360 add-on, not the best solution for HT enthusiasts, The HD-E1 still is not out in any B&M store, online it has a 6 week delivery date, and the XE1 has not even got a release date attached to it.
BD otoh has the Samsung, Panasonic already out, the Sony scheduled this month, and Pioneer in Feb. Then in March we (might) get the PS3 and G2 Samsung and apparently LG still have their BD standalone scheduled for March even with the Combo player. HMV (the biggest B&M DVD retailer) have said that they will get BD setups from Sony delivered in the next few weeks, so people can see the daylight difference between BD and DVD, they have no such setup for HD DVD planned.
I think that at the moment the biggest HD DVD buyers are importers from the USA, and this does not bode well as once film are released day and date in EU and NA the market for this will die. BD is building a userbase from the ground up and sales are slowly increasing, bigger HMVs and Virgin Megastores in London (where I live) have started to stock BDs, but no HD DVDs as of yet. I think that the mentality in the EU is to wait for the best possible technology and then buy (PS3, it would explain the low sales of X360 in EU), this is why HDTV broadcasts are in AVC, and HDTVs only started selling in earnest when screen sizes were bigger than 40" and now that 1080p is standard on large screens it will really start to ramp up.