Why I STILL hate Toshiba

[radagast]

There are people here who don't understand the animosity some of the rest of us feel for Toshiba. Well reading statements from the CEO of Toshiba, in the Wall Street Journal, should help explain why:

WSJ: Aren't you at a disadvantage with just standard DVD players?

Mr. Nishida: What people don't realize is that Hollywood studios are going to release new titles not just for Blu-ray but for standard DVDs as well, and there are a far greater number of current-generation DVD players out there. If you watch standard DVDs on our players, the images are of very high quality because they include an "upconverting" feature. And we're going to improve this even more, so that consumers won't be able to tell the difference from HD DVD images. The players would be much cheaper than Blu-ray players too. Next-generation DVD players are in a much weaker position than when standard DVD players were first introduced."

WSJ: Will you try to play a role in the video-downloading market?

Mr. Nishida: That's what we're hoping. We've been developing technologies in this area already, but now that we don't have the HD DVD business, I want to put even more energy into that."

First of all, why are they spending R&D on TWO fronts: upconverting DVD players AND downloads? If their &*%$*(@ DVD players will be able to look as good as hd-dvd (notice he didn't say it would look as good as Blu-ray), then why promote downloads? If downloads are going to be of such high quality that they will rival Blu-ray, why invest in upconverting DVD players? If they could have come up with HD video from upconverting DVD, why did they come out with hd-dvd in the first place? Lies all lies.