Toshiba selling $99 HD DVD player, with a catch

Toshiba is running a short, promotional sale by selling its HD A2 HD DVD player for $99 with three HD DVD movies over at the Home Media Expo in Las Vegas. You may be thinking this is great news: but wait, there's a catch. Only attendees of the show will be able to take advantage of the deal, and with ticket prices of between $100 and $500, the deal isn't as great once you get in. Toshiba, maybe you should focus on reducing the prices for general consumers rather than running these awkward "promotions." The fact that you're trying to sell players at a conference reeks of desperation, which is weird since it looks like you've got nothing to worry about.

[Thanks, Judith]

Update: Toshiba, probably inundated with requests, wanted to make sure everyone realized "The $99 player is an accommodation price only for attendees of the Home Media Expo's EMA trade show this week and is being offered by the HD DVD Promotional Group. It is not in any way connected with a broader consumer offer from Toshiba." So yeah, don't expect to snag one at your local Best Buy or anything, ok?

[sbrown @ Jul 15th 2007 7:00AM]

I was thinking you'd have to spend a night in a haunted house, or perhaps trade in one of your kidneys to get the HDDVD player for that price.

[tekdroid @ Jul 15th 2007 12:14PM]

nah, instead you got AACS and HDCP
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Advanced_Access_Content_System
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/HDCP


1) purposeful phasing out of analogue connections in the future (to strengthen hollywood, belittle you)
2) several layers of DRM, including image constraint tokens
3) encrypted video paths
4) fair-use rights abuses...

...all those bewdiful things you can look forward to once any of the new formats gains a stranglehold on the market.

I'll take the haunted house anyday.

[Ben Hobbs @ Jul 15th 2007 7:09AM]

A $199 HD-DVD player with three movies and a free visit to an expensive show isn't much of a deal?

[lp @ Jul 15th 2007 7:12AM]

Yeh, how dare they!!

This post is dumb - I own a PS3 & am pretty much sold to Blu-Ray, but I'd rather have picked up a BR player for 100 quid rather than £600

[John Doe @ Jul 15th 2007 2:41PM]

Never mind that BR's mastering quality on current movies sucks ass but hey! Who cares about video quality. BR has more storage space! Yah! Specs for the win!

[Jon @ Jul 15th 2007 8:41PM]

@Joe Doe,

Mastering quality has got nothing to do with BluRay or HD-DVD. The codecs are the same, it's just the medias are different.

If a studio is lazy in encoding their films then it won't matter if the film goes on either BluRay or HD-DVD as it will be crap either way.

[Veritas II @ Jul 15th 2007 7:19AM]

Registration is $205 if you're not an EMA member (Entertainment Merchants Association) registering after June 23rd.

[Edward Townend @ Jul 15th 2007 7:32AM]

Toshiba can't even get their grammar right: They don't need that aspostrophie.

[Tom Hellier @ Jul 15th 2007 7:57AM]

For the benefit of Edward Townend, don't correct other peoples grammar if you can't even spell.

[Tom Hellier @ Jul 15th 2007 7:57AM]

-

Apostrophe

-

[Tom Hellier @ Jul 15th 2007 7:58AM]

It's not very nice anyway.

[Tom Hellier @ Jul 15th 2007 8:00AM]

Don't I feel like a dick. *smiley face*

[Edward Townend @ Jul 15th 2007 8:06AM]

Ugh God sorry, should proofread. Still, bear in mind that Toshiba is a *big* company. They should at least get their English right in press releases even if I can't.

[ComradeZ @ Jul 15th 2007 1:01PM]

Except the thing is that the consensus is still divided in style books as to whether to use an apoostrophe in DVD's or not. It's still a matter of choice. Here's a NY Times headline:

http://www.nytimes.com/2006/05/11/technology/11pogue.html?ex=1184644800&en=9c19796ebc9443c8&ei=5070

So Toshiba's not wrong after all.

[The Aggie CEO™ @ Jul 15th 2007 8:36AM]

wow.............
ummmm yea.........

although I'm partial to blu-ray........I would get that...IF it was in STORES...you know where access is only the cost of transportation/gas........lol........only thing is its to damn bulky.......just like My PS3........I cant wait to get one of the new Samsung BD players........they are so thin compared to previous models.......lol

[silverblackvoid @ Jul 15th 2007 9:17AM]

ha ha ha... very soon hd-dvd format wil be history. this time Sony will win the battle. burn baby burn.

[John Doe @ Jul 15th 2007 2:42PM]

Yep Sony will win and video quality will take a huge step back. Joy.

[Goatee Man @ Jul 16th 2007 5:12AM]

O RLY?

[Goatee Man @ Jul 16th 2007 5:14AM]

Oops, wrong comment. Sorry.

[Jope @ Jul 15th 2007 9:24AM]

Talk about being desperate... HD-DVD is dead, let's move on...

[loci @ Jul 15th 2007 9:42AM]

the catch is, hd-dvd will soon be redundant

[Marshall @ Jul 15th 2007 10:04AM]

You would have to be a complete idiot to go to this show and not buy one, to ebay if nothing else. If they don't sell one of these t every single attendee, I don't know what's wrong.

The good news is, that maybe a bunch will pop up on ebay.

[Kirk Yuhnke @ Jul 15th 2007 11:53AM]

The prices are coming down elsewhere, which is good news. ComputerGeeks sells one for $215 and I thought I saw one on sale a while back for $150.

http://www.geeks.com/details.asp?invtid=HD-DA2-R&cpc=SCH

[Sylvain @ Jul 15th 2007 11:56AM]

Mattcav1, glad at least you also got to actually read the link they posted.

The whole dates don't make sense the way the Conrad (En Poster) put it. The show runs from the 16th to the 19th. The Toshiba ad says to be there to get *more info*, not to actually GET one.

In the link he posted, 2nd paragraph read : "I can't tell if this is an offer being made exclusively to show attendees, or if it's a consumer offer that Toshiba will announce at the Home Media Expo next week at the Venetian Resort. I suspect it's the latter..."

I don't know how one can post without at least reporting that the deal being only available to attendees is a RUMOR, then commenting this is a desperate attempt from Toshiba. I don't know if this is a lack of rigorousness or fanboyism and I don't feel like finding out, but it does seem like cheap HD-DVD players are on the way, which would be good for either BD or HD-DVD customers.

[AJ @ Jul 15th 2007 12:00PM]

Are you dense Conrad? Obviously they aren't doing this to sell more HD-DVD. Maybe, just maybe, they are using this as an incentive for people to attend the conference. You mocking this a desperate promotional sale is just cheap flamebait.

[chadow @ Jul 15th 2007 12:00PM]

I wish the Magnavox Odyssey would have included a built in Betamax player back in the day. I SO wanted that to beat VHS. Now I got all these beta movies and nothing to play them on. If only we would have known that a gaming console could and should determine a format battle.

[Sy @ Jul 15th 2007 12:11PM]

Whether its $299 or $99, its still a ticket on the Titanic.

[ComradeZ @ Jul 15th 2007 2:01PM]

Nonsense. Even if HD-DVD loses, at some point combo players will be ubiquitous and then it won't matter whether you've got HD-DVD or Blu-Ray discs. Just like today most DVD Recorders support the niche DVD-RAM format as well as DVD+/-R.

[venk @ Jul 15th 2007 12:11PM]

"Toshiba, maybe you should focus on reducing the prices for general consumers rather than running these awkward "promotions." The fact that you're trying to sell players at a conference reeks of desperation, which is weird since it looks like you've got nothing to worry about."

Desperation? How can one draw that conclusion from this article.

How is selling the players cheap at a conference a move of desperation. You do know that the people who pay to attend this conference are the retailers, vendors, and employees, etc of the industry. Getting HD DVD players into their hands seems like a pretty smart move on the part of Toshiba. It's not like they are the first or the last to try something like this.

[mattcav1 @ Jul 15th 2007 12:19PM]

The add says starting july 22 the show is from the 16th thru the 19th how is it only for people at the show? It looks like it will be for the whole world.

[sr @ Jul 15th 2007 1:19PM]

They'll be worth about $50 in about a year.

[WickyWoo @ Jul 15th 2007 2:44PM]

This show is for retailers and rental stores

They're hoping that the little guys (who are the ones who go to it a lot) will buy a player, like what they see, and then start ordering HD DVDs for their stores.

Toshiba is seriously loss leadering their players in a struggle to survive, $299? That's essentially their cost on the thing. In fact they're selling them to retailers at over $300 each, and then refunding the difference when they sell the units (did I mention that they're non-returnable? That's a big issue for the indy retailers, and did I also mention that you MUST stock HD DVD to stock Toshiba products at all?)

Yes, it is a move of desperation, since they're now essentially locked out of the biggest rental store on earth(the existing test stores will not be ordering new HD DVDs, and their mail order is a small segment of the buis), and Movie Gallery (#2) is currently in such financial straights that they're struggling for credit to purchase new DVDs, let alone expand to HD.

[trancer @ Jul 15th 2007 3:24PM]

my heart was beating really fast when i first read the title.
yeah, screw that.

[TopCop @ Jul 15th 2007 3:31PM]

I had an Tosh HD-A20, sent it back. It's a good format, but blu-ray is going to win.

[chadow @ Jul 16th 2007 12:20AM]

The only "win"ners will be the people who didn't buy either and didn't chose a 'side' yet.

[me2 @ Jul 16th 2007 1:38AM]

A little birdie told me that the porn industry will be using the HDDVD format over Blu-Ray...

Know why all those Betamax tapes are relics? Because the porn industry chose VHS.