Toshiba Delays HD DVD Players Again.
Toshiba’s HD DVD Players to Ship in April
Toshiba Corp. said on Thursday it would not release its HD DVD players to the market ahead of actual content launch, which is to be delivered on April 18, 2006, at the earliest. This is the second time when Toshiba has to delay shipments of its high definition DVD players.
“In order to maximise the launch of HD DVD, we intend to synchronise the launch of our players with HD DVD title releases. [We are] currently working with the studios as well as our retailers, to finalise the sale date of our players,” Toshiba said, according to Financial Times.
HD DVD players were originally due to be launched late last year, but were delayed because the copy protection management system called AACS (Advanced Access Content System) was not finalized at that time. Last week however, Time Warner’s Warner Home Video unit said it would not release the first titles using the HD DVD format, including The Matrix Reloaded, Harry Potter 4 and Million Dollar Baby, until April, 18. This inspired rumours about possible delay of Toshiba’s players.
Toshiba and its partners in the HD DVD camp have been working hard to deliver the HD DVD ahead of competitors headed by Sony Corp., who push Blu-ray standard. There are possibilities that the Blu-ray technology along with appropriate content will be available in May, 2006.
The first HD DVD players offered by Toshiba – HD-XA1 and HD-A1 – are capable of HD DVD, DVD and CD playback as well as hardware decoding of H.264 (MPEG4 AVC), VC-1 (a superset of Microsoft’s WMV9) and MPEG2 (standard DVD) streams using a chip from Broadcom. Additionally, the players feature four digital sound processors to process audio in Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD (2 channel), DTS and DTS-HD formats. The players can output video in 720p (1280x720) and 1080i (1920x1080) resolutions using HDMI interconnection and multi-channel audio using HDMI or S/PDIF connectors.
The construction of the HD-XA1, in addition to performance improvements, features a motorized door which conceals the disc drawer, function buttons and two front USB ports, for convenient connection of gaming controllers. The HD-XA1 also includes three different user selectable interfaces to further enhance customization and a backlit remote control that is conveniently motion activated. Furthermore, the model employs double chassis construction to add stability and strength against vibrations and the HD-XA1 adds insulated stabilizing feet to provide a steadfast foundation for the device.
The players are to be available for estimated retail price of $499 and $799 for the HD-A1 and HD-XA1 respectively