Will disc pricing be key for Q4?

[galperi1]

As Q4 is under way I can't help but think these sales we are seeing from the BDA are genius.

Yes, HD-DVD's can be had for super cheap ($99-$199), but let's be real... someone spending that little for a player will not be purchasing $30 media at the same rate that someone spending $300+ on a player will. So while Toshiba is going the route of cheap players to attract buyers, the BDA seems to be doing the opposite but with discs.

I think this is a very calculated move and a smart one that might pay off for several reasons

1) With a bigger delta between disc costs, as you get start buying more and more, the cost savings alone in discs make it potentially cheaper to own Blu-Ray than HD-DVD in total ownership costs.

2) The more volume it sells, the more retailers will give it more space which would probably lead to less space for HD-DVD and better market penetration for Blu. We all know that retailers love anything that can sell more.

3) Similar to what we are seeing on the SAL front, the cheaper the price, the bigger audience that you will attract to your product. While I'm not advocating they sell everything this cheap all the time, but if they can do these sales every couple weeks and triple/quadruple sales, they will sell a lot more and in the end profit more on higher volume

We'll see what happens, but Q4 has started out with a bang.....

What does everyone else think?