AV Review Article: HD-DVD is the Standard & it's here to stay...

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get a load of this (try not to laugh) -

http://www.avreview.co.uk/news/artic...98933344846236

Toshiba HD-DVD
By Ducan Madden


Toshiba HD-DVD player

Unsurprisingly, the prize for most talked about technology at this year's IFA technology show in Berlin was the HD-DVD versus Blu-ray debate.

After recent mini victories for both formats, the HD-DVD group stepped forth via the Toshiba press conference and presented a raft of speakers determined to convince us of the benefits of red over blue (with a none too subtle but brilliantly placed clip of Neo from the first Matrix picking the red pill over the blue to see exactly 'how deep the rabbit hole goes').

Currently claiming an impressive 70 per cent of the standalone next-gen player market (thus notably not including PS3 sales), HD-DVD is making further inroads into Blu-ray's supposed dominance. In last week's HD-DVD conference at IFA, Toshiba presented its expectations and plans for the future survival and success of its format.

With Paramount and DreamWorks now on board, over 70 new titles are to be launched before the end of the year including the likes of the Bourne Trilogy, Harry Potter films and Blade Runner, taking the total to 400 titles, while on the hardware front a Ventura branded HD-DVD player, the SHD-7000, will go on the market at a dramatically reduced price - under €300.

With two other major new HD-DVD players released by Tosh at the same show (see our IFA report), the message is loud and clear - to quote Toshiba direct 'HD-DVD is a standard' and it's here to stay.