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Blu-ray has always been fighting against the tide, struggling against high prices, general reluctance to move on from DVDs, and now the “credit crunch” as well.  In fact, many people were beginning to think that the victory against HD-DVD may have been in vain due to the apparent lack of consumers, and that the aim of 5 million units to be sold this year was laughable.  However it would appear that both parties are in the process of being proved wrong with figures released by Sony showing some interesting truths.

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Remember HD DVD, the now-dead next-gen format?  Well it turns out that Netflix is getting ready to bring those rentals to an end.  The news comes as little surprise as Netlfix announced way back in February that they decided to support the Blu-ray format. 

The original announcement was that they would phase out HD DVD rentals “by the end of 2008” and well, that time is just about here and the rentals will officially come to an end on December 15.  Which means that at that time, if you have any HD DVD titles in your queue, they will be replaced with a standard DVD.

Via [EngadgetHD]

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Black Friday, the day when consumers can generally expect to find some good deals, is thankfully just about upon us.  With a few weeks before Thanksgiving here in the US, it seems now is about the right time for the deals to begin making their way into the public eye.  Sadly, although Dell has plenty of deals listed for Black Friday, it seems that some are not as exciting as one would hope for. 

To begin with, Dell is planning to offer the Inspiron Mini 9 for $299, which offers a $50 savings from the regular $349.  The specs for that model include a 1.6GHz Atom processor, a 4GB SSD, 512MB RAM an 8.9-inch display and running Ubuntu 8.04.

Other notebooks that are on sale (and some that will offer a much greater savings) will be the Inspiron 13 for $699 (a $329 savings), the Studio 15 for $699 (a $245 savings), the Studio 17 for $799 (a $349 savings), the XPS M1330 for $1,029 (a $319 savings) and the XPS M1530 also for $1,029 (a $319 savings).  More deals after the break.

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Anybody who is fed up with new formats of media and still has only vinyl switch off your monitor now.  Boosted by their success in the High Definition DVD war with Blu-ray they have decided to expand the Blu franchise with Blu-spec CD.

Details are sketchy regarding the actual advantages due to a poorly translated Japanese press release, but what we do know is that it aims to overthrow the CD.  Unsurprisingly, they are burned using the Blu Laser Diode (hence the Blu) and even more unsurprisingly they will cost around the $20-$35 mark.  Obviously, we don’t know what you are paying for but the general consensus is that it will be significantly better sound quality. 

There’s a strange twist to the Blu-spec CD—find out after the break.

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In much the same way Blu-ray hopes to eventually ‘kill’ the inferior DVD, DVD has finally buried VHS.  “Old news!“ I hear you cry, and yes, I appreciate that the VHS has been facing this impending doom for a while, but the day has finally come where we can officially say that it is a thing of the past.

Up until now JVC, the developers of VHS, have been the only major company to still make standalone VHS players, with companies like Panasonic blaming the obviously empty market for them stopping production.  The last film to be released on VHS, “A History of Violence,“ was released in 2006, completing 30 years of VHS dominated home visual entertainment, which started with “The Young Teacher.“  Continued after the break.

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Well, we all knew Steve Jobs’ view of Blu-ray (remember when he described it as a “bag of hurt?“), but it seems he is not the only one who thinks Blu-ray just may be drawing its last dying breaths.  Robin Harris proclaims “Blu-ray is dead” and makes some points that might just make some folks sit back and say hmmmmmm.

Granted, it took a while for DVD to make it into mainstream when it was first introduced, like 5 or 6 years, or so.  You still had diehards hanging on the their VHS.  Heck, I still also own a VHS player.  It’s practically a relic.  So, you have people arguing, give Blu-Ray a break—it’s only been out a year or so.  Continued after the break.

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This is where we call out by names the actions and companies that seem odd, out of touch or just plain straight up smokin’ crack.  Technology is an odd realm where PR speak doesn’t hold a lot of water if the 1s and 0s don’t line up.  This week sees posturing, positioning and flat out insanity.  Here is what caught my eye this week:

Click “more” to see a rant on:

• The new Joost.
• No BlackBerry for you.
• Apple’s newest MacBooks.
• The entire European Union.

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A lower priced Blu-ray player is coming this November from Sherwood America for under $300.  Expect the usual BD features like 1080p video, upscales DVDs, and supports BD Profile 1.1.  With the holidays coming, expect more news like this.

I have never heard of this particular company, so I did some digging.  Don’t expect any exotic styling here.  Their other devices feature pretty conservative design.  Where can you expect to find this player?  We don’t know yet, but when we do, we’ll let you know.  More after the break.

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Vudu first teased us with the announcement a few weeks back that they would soon be offering Blu-ray quality downloadable movies.  However, at the time, the details were limited and the service was only available to a limited group of beta testers.  Well, flash forward a few weeks and Vudu has officially made the HDX service available for everyone.

The new HDX movie downloads will be the equivalent of Blu-ray quality, meaning they will come in 1080p at 24 frames per second and are optimized for those viewing on a 40-inch or larger HDTV.  Currently, Vudu has around 50 titles ready to go in the new HDX format with plans to add any new HD release in the HDX format as well. Additionally, they are also working to bring all the current HD movies into the HDX format; of course, they have not given any timeline as to when that will be completed.

Perhaps the best news is that these 1080p HDX formatted titles will retain the same pricing as the HD movies which range from $4 to $6 each. While the new HDX format sounds great, the one big drawback here is that these movies will require roughly a 4 hour download time prior to watching.  That alone could be enough to make this not worthwhile for the average movie viewer.

Continue reading to check out the full press release…

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The new BD300 Blu-ray Player from LG is more than just a device to play Blu-ray format discs, as it can do a whole lot more.  The BD300 allows for the streaming of movies, and can support many audio formats and has refresh rates of both 24Hz and 60Hz.  Additionally, the BD300 does not have to be updated manually at any time, because an on-board Ethernet connection insures regular online updates.

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