Toshiba HD-A2 HD DVD player: $100, this Friday, Wal-Mart
By Ryan Block 
posted Nov 1st 2007 1:46AM
posted Nov 1st 2007 1:46AM
[Thanks to everyone who sent this in]
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Damn, I get paid Friday too! Well time to take the HD plunge, screw BluRay!!
haha, I was kind of thinking the same thing. I'm a Blu-ray fan, but HD DVD for $100 (and maybe cheaper in a few weeks from Friday)? Blu-ray for way more than that? Screw the Blu (sorry, haha). I'm thinking about buying this just to buy it, it's that cheap, unless of course the Blu drops this Thanksgiving!
Desperate times call for desperate measures!!
Toshiba knows if they don't sell big this Christmas it's pretty much over for HD-DVD.
I bet Bluray backers are already working on a cheapo Bluray player. Guaranteed.
Wow! Now that is cheap. Well nice try Toshiba but we won’t be the “fools that rush in”! Cost isn’t always the determining factor. After all there was a time when BetaMax had sub-cost sales too...
They are trying to clear out this model before black friday. That's why it's so cheap.
Worst case scenario you'll have an upconverting DVD player for $100 and that ain't bad. I'm already making my plans for getting this tomorrow morning, as I'm going to need something for the next LCD I pick up on Black Friday.
I have a PS3 and this format war is stupid, not to mention that even if every A2 Toshiba had made (read: This is a clearance sale) sold-out it still wouldn't put a dent in the total number of PS3 sales, which is always left out of the hardware equation and for whatever reason HD-DVD movies are the same price as BD's though we were all told that production costs would be cheaper.
Netflix for the win!
Careful, if you read a review of the HD-A2 you will find out it doesn't support 1080p output.....the best it does is 1080i. I guess that is good if you don't have a 1080p tv, but for us that do it is a waste of $100.
http://www.hometheaterblog.com/hometheater/2007/01/toshiba_hda2_re.html
"Talk about timing, as I was writing this review Toshiba announced a new player at their pre-CES press conference in Las Vegas. The HD-A20 adds 1080p output to the HD-A2’s feature-set and carries a suggested retail price of $599.99. I’ll leave the merits of 1080p versus 1080i out of the equation for the time being but suffice to say the capabilities of your display obviously come into play here. i.e. If your display doesn’t accept 1080p, how long will it be before you consider upgrading it? And of course the de-interlacing capabilities in your existing/future display."
FYI: I got my HD-DVD player this morning, the movies on sale were crappy but $15, and for those who Do Blu check out that link, Kmart retracted that statement.
http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Kmart/Kmart:_Were_Purple/1137
Still NetFlix FTW!!
Just grabbed mine this morning! Walmart was a madhouse and they were all gone in minutes.
There's a one per customer limit also.
The only people who this message can be good for is probably those who are in other time zones where it's not 8 a.m. yet, like Cali! =)
Just got mine too. I got the last one...
The line was not that long when I got there and they had ~20 HD-DVDs, a crap-ton of laptops and 4 plasmas.
Update: These things are selling fast lol. The WalMart I normally go to said they sold out their stock this morning. So I had to go 30 miles to the next closest Walmart to get one.
grrr, BITE YOUR TUNGUE!
Quick question, does the five free movie offer work with this player?
If so, thos will probably be the only 5 HD-DVD you own. I'm not sure why everyone is so anxious about BD & HD-DVD's, sure they pack a higher-res picture, but they cost almost 3x as much! I've had a BD-DVD player since they were released and I've only picked up one worthwhile disc, the rest are too expensive at $25+. I've never paid more than $15 for a standard DVD and usually catch the new releases on sale when they first come out.
As to which format will win out, it's readily apparent with Wal-Mart dumping Toshiba's hardware while they have the chance. If you've kept up with the whole format war, you'd know that a few more companies (and the majors for that matter) have signed on to the Blu-Ray front. If you must have an HD-DVD player, pick yourself up a hybrid or you'll be kicking yourself later. BTW go check out the current selections available for each before taking the plunge.
Okay, screw this. I'm not waiting for the format war to end. I'll get this player.
the format war just ended.
Submitted this to Digg: http://digg.com/tech_news/Toshiba_HD_A2_HD_DVD_player_100_this_Friday_Wal_Mart
Wow that is amazing....Glad I'm not an early adopter. Buy one of these, join Netflix, and be in Hi-def movie bliss!
why cant they get the LG GGC-H20L internal drive back in stock, that dual format player was going for less than 280.00 at many sites but it was sold out very quickly. cant find it anywhere now.
This is how HD-DVD is going to wind up winning the format war, much the same as VHS before it. It all boils down to price: can the average American afford it. As a general rule most people will buy what is cheapest.
I think it only supports up to 1080i ; not 1080p. Isn't that right? Also it has 1.2 HDMI instead of 1.3... Well.. I would wait another year for better with cheaper...
AS always, there is no difference between interlace and progressive on most recorded materials due to the framerate of recording (mostly for films).
As far as HDMI goes, it's a horrible stadard that will never be finalized. I wouldn't worry about the difference at this price. I can always buy a better player down the road and put this into Bedroom or Basement duty.
AS always, there is no difference between interlace and progressive on most recorded materials due to the framerate of recording (mostly for films).
As far as HDMI goes, it's a horrible stadard that will never be finalized. I wouldn't worry about the difference at this price. I can always buy a better player down the road and put this into Bedroom or Basement duty.
HD DVD supports 1080i & 1080p
If you have a decent 1080p HDTV, it'll correctly de-interlace the image for you and you'll get exactly the same 1080p experience as if the player output at 1080p natively. If your TV can't do 1080p, it doesn't matter anyway.
For those concerned about 1080i vs 1080p:
http://blog.hometheatermag.com/geoffreymorrison/0807061080iv1080p/
Dave, from your website
"The only time you would see a difference is if you have native 1080p/60 content, which at this point would only come from a PC and maybe the PS3. 1080p/60 does have more information than 1080i/30, but unless you're a gamer you will probably never see native 1080p/60 content. It is incredibly unlikely that they will ever broadcast 1080p (too much bandwidth) or that 1080p/60 content will show up on discs (too much storage space and no one is using it to record/film)."
And I imagine alot of newer 1080P HDTV's can set their own refresh now. The article was written in 2006 and my samsung purchased in 2007 can change its own rate so there is a 3:3 pulldown and I can actually see the difference between 1080i and 1080p video. Even as such this toshiba is a great deal and I would have gotten one if I wasn't convinced that the support will wane after the contracts are up? The silence from wienstein and warners recent comments http://www.highdefdigest.com/news/show/Warner/Warner_Mulls_Change_in_High-Def_Strategy/1123
Just would make me sad to fragment my movie library for no real reason.
Well, Static, you might see a difference if you can find some 1080p60 native content. Also, if your TV accepts 24p@1080, then it might be worth it to you to get a gen 3 HD DVD player. Still, most TVs--even new 1080p TVS--don't accept 24p native signals. Trust me--if you buy this player, it'll be $99 well spent.
Yep, it's 1080i only. Funny how they forget to mention that...
umm....the link isn't working, and it isn't on walmart's website??...
I cannot get excited about such a crappy player, regardless of format.
It takes 60 seconds to boot up and 30 seconds to eject a disk.
It's crap at any price.
Talk about being bitter. The HD-A2 is a great player and many people do not have 1080p televisions. Even if they do, if the tv has great interlacing, it is not much different from 1080p. It only takes 30 seconds to boot up, like many bluray players too, and eject is right away, not 30 seconds. I have both HD-A2 and HD-A20 so I know.
Well then you better not get excited about the BDP-S300 that I set up at work the other day. This was my first experience with a Blu-ray player and I hope to God it is my last. You think 60 seconds to boot up is slow? You think 30 seconds to load a disc is slow? Try nearly four minutes from start to finish for the 'new' Sony BDP-S300 to load a (supplied) Spiderman 3 Blu-ray disc. I am not lying, I used the stopwatch on my mobile phone and I swear to you it took (give or take a sec) 3:46. I couldn't believe this was normal, but it is. I was going to record it on my camera phone but it's the most boring thing to watch.
So, in comparison with the competing high definition format, if this player takes 90 seconds to start up and load a disc it's way ahead of the Sony Blu-ray player I had the displeasure of using.
I wouldn't buy that Sony BluRay player either.
I don't know where someone got the idea I'm crapping on formats. I'm crapping on slow players. that includes this one that takes 1 minute to boot up and play a movie and it certainly includes any BluRay player that would take 3 minutes to do so also.
As far as I know we have sold zero of the BluRay players at Target.
"As far as I know we have sold zero of the BluRay players at Target."
Interesting thought. Here's another, how many PS3's have been sold after the first massive price drop on the 60GB versions? In some cases, people were buying them as a cheaper alternative to getting a dedicated BluRay player. So far, I've been using mine as such since the game selection has been abysmal on the system.
As far as load times, I find the PS3 loads and plays the disc rather quickly, well withing the 30 second time frame others have been quoting here.
re: selling bluray players at target...
Well of course, they're aiming at the wrong demographic of shoppers...
For $98 I think I can wait a whole 60 seconds at home for it to boot. I haven't been in a movie watching situation yet where 60 extra seconds would spell utter ruination.
Talking about 1 minute boot up and 30 seconds to eject... You are talking about the very first Toshiba HD-DVD player released. Please study before posting "fact is" comments. The original Toshiba was twice the size as well. This is a revision. They run an OS, it boots, and you're good to go.
This will be so great for the bedroom. I wonder if they will let you order online and pick up in store for this special. I don't feel like fighting families with their 13 children running to each grab one...
How can you argue with $100?
Even if HD DVD doesn't win out you've only lost a $100 as apposed to the $500 you'll be out purchasing a Blu Ray and that technology fading.
HD-DVD players can be handed out for free on Black Friday, Xmas, etc and it still wont kill Blu-Ray. As long as there are ppl buying PS3's there will always be a demand for BD's. Same goes for HD-DVD once they start making internal HD-DVD drives a standard in all 360's.
If I had an HD screen, I'd get it...but I'm more interested in the Acer laptop for 350.....
I have this player and it was a steal at $200...$98 bucks is an absolute no-brainer. Great player and Transformers looks and sounds unbelievable on it.
Unfortunately HD can't make a bad movie good.
@ SteveJ
No problem, they have your fried green tomatoes and pretty woman on HD-DVD as well.
wow that was a massive burn...lol
Question:
If my 10 year old Onkyo amplifier is rated at 35 - 18000hz and my 10 yo Bose 901 speakers are rated 60 - 16000hz and according to my last hearing exam, while I have an above average hearing, I can hear a rage from 45 to 16000zh, how much more awesomer will the HDDVD sound on the new HDDVD Toshiba player?
not as good as your english sounds when i read it!!! HA!!
I kinda wish I had gotten this instead of the Xbox 360 one last week. Although, this would require me to shop at Wal-Mart and I refuse to do that.
That's exactly what I was thinking. Why Walmart?
All I can say is DAMN!!! I know where I'll be this Friday!! I've been dying to see Transformers in HD so this is perfect!!!!
damn and they cost an arm and a leg over here :(
Fire sale. How many are available at this price? (Very few I suspect)..
Either way, Toshiba and/or Walmart are losing a hellofa lot of money on these, and it stinks are desperation on HD DVD camps part.
Anyone notice, despire Blu-ray higher hardware prices, its still pulling away from HD DVD in media sales, by a siginificant margin.
Walmart losing money on this? Doubt it. They're too stingy to sell these at a loss.
For you to make comments like this screams of desperation. If this price doesn't matter and won't have an effect why did you feel the need to comment? Exactly.
It can't last long. Not when they are selling players for this cheap.
So by your standard, the PS3 must have been Dead On Arrival! Last I checked, Sony bleeds red on the hardware.
"...and it stinks are desperation on HD DVD camps part."
And Sony bundling it with the PS3 isn't? They, Sony, banked on previous PS2 owners buying PS3s and thus putting a lot of BluRay players in homes. That's pretty desperate if you ask me. No consumer choice or instead, that choice being if they want to spend another few hundred bucks to buy an HDDVD player when they've already got a BluRay built into thier system.
bundled bluray player in expensive game console = desperate
low priced, entry level HD-DVD player = smart competitive business move
Actually, at $198 Wal-Mart was taking a -8.59% loss....at $98 it is quite a bit more substantial....
@WhyNot
Dude, last I checked the PS3 games used the blu-ray format. It wasn't "bundled", it was REQUIRED. How many 360 games are HD-DVD format? Hmm... that sounds more desperate to me...
Walmart isn't stupid, but they'll make a profit even if they take a loss on the player. For years they sold Discman's for like $25 bucks, which was a loss, then they'd make money selling a $5 CD for $15. What they lose on the player they'll more than make up on the HD DVDs people will just have to pay to go with their new player.
Correct, that is the plan this is a loss leader....they wont necessarily make it up in just HD-DVD's...they are hoping it will get you in the store and shopping not just electronics but other areas as well...
Ummmm... if you took the time to actually READ THE AD it says right there "minimum 10 players per store".
I think that's more than the freaking Tickle Me Elmos they had at each store a couple of years back...
The format war is over.
Long live HD-DVD.
You are quite delusional.
Has anyone heard of ridiculously low pricing surfacing in Canada? AFAIK we're still paying high prices for this player?
Looks like history's repeating.
Dont forget the 5 free movies.
http://g-ecx.images-amazon.com/images/G/01/00/00/00/71/79/28/71792861._V25941811_.pdf
Oh my god... I can't believe it. I bet nobody would've thought it would get this low. I'ved heard $200 by black friday but $100 is insane. As one who already paid $200 a few months ago I thought I was getting my money's worth, but this one is a no brainer deal. Looks like HD-DVD WILL survive the war no matter what because of its unbeatable price.
All we need now is Warner and it's by, by, BLU.
Add it to the list of failed Sony products:
UMD, BetaMax, MemoryStick, MiniDisc, Blu Ray
For the love of everything holy, please let this be true.
Eh not so much. Blu-Ray, in terms of movies, may fail (As may HD-DVD), because most people still like DVDs. Yes, most consumers are pretty uninformed and think that their poor 480p movies look great. However, much like the UMD, even if that format fails in the movie biz, it's still got its advantages in the game industry when compared to DVD or DVD9...
Agreed. Blu-Ray will die with these prices! I paid 240 for my HD-DVD player with 2 HD movies & 5 free after rebate. At this price I am tempted to get another one for the sun room! I cannot believe it. It is a good player, but yes it is slower to load & actually play a movie than my standard DVD player. All, don't forget to update the firmware on the player, it will help with some issues. The Picture quality is AWESOME, & the price is perfect! Way to go Wal-Mart!!
Is there any reason to buy an HD-DVD player if you don't have an HD TV? Does it offer any features not found on DVD players aside from HD resolutions?
Actually it does. Although you will not get HD quality without HDTV, but you will still get the IME (in movie experience) such as picture in picture commentaries, interactive features, and web-enabled features. :)
If you hook it up to your network you can access special features on some discs.
the audio is better if you have a compatible reciever (Dolby Digital Plus and Dolby TrueHD )
I don't see any reason why Toshiba can't make these things at $100 and still make a profit. DVD players (even the better brands) have all dropped to around $60, and HDDVD has had well over a year to get the technology stable enough to make very cheaply.
If HDDVD manages to keep their players under $150 this holiday season, then they will have won. It's THAT simple. BD can tout all the cool specs it wants, but it's the uninformed consumer at Wally world that will look at the price and pick a winner.
Exactly. Betamax was better, spec-wise. That didn't help it much, did it? What matters is content and price, period. Winning a format war like this is trivial, just three steps:
Step 1: lower the hardware price to a point where the average paycheck-to-paycheck American (aka Wal-Mart customer) can afford it without being too late on the rent or mortgage payment
Step 2: do Step 1 in time for Christmas
Step 3: make sure there's lots of p0rn available
Format war over.
This and Transformers HD DVD = $130
Boooyaah!!!!
Anyone know much about the $348 acer they are selling this friday? specs?
intel celeron m ?GHz, 1gb Ram, 14' screen, Windows Vista Basic. Not worth it
Look for a $100 price drop out of sony on the BDP-s300 in the next few weeks. They are dropping the price down to 399.99. I still don't think it will be enough, but it's better than nothing.
And the winner is....
The Personal Computer.
A Toshiba spokesman was overheard saying:
------------
"well, we all thought dedicated CE formats were a bit long in the tooth, and convergence is a bitch, so yeh, we've decided to re-affirm our commitment to the personal computer - HD-DVD will be serving customers as a data storage format only"
A Sony spokesperson was heard saying:
---------
"freakin hell, the price on PCs is really down, boot times on those things are faster than Blu-Ray, downloads of all our HD movies are up, hard drives cost cents and Toshiba is selling herself like a cheap whore! ...and damn it, our DRM has been busted to shreds...the restrictive outputs, the multi-layer DRM...gone, all gone! We've invested too much in this. Repositioning Blu-Ray as a data storage format is the best solution. Our customers will see significant storage capacity increases over the years as we enhance Blu-Ray to be in line with customer expectations in the rapidly-growing storage marketplace"
Over the last couple of years hard drive sizes have greatly increased, while getting cheaper all the time.
It makes no sense to use either HD or BD as a data storage solution. I can take my 160g WD passport drive anywhere and use it on any PC with a USB port.
With wal-mart being the biggest retailer in the world. This could decide the war. I can't believe it, a $100 for HDDVD player. Plus Wal-Mart has a 90 day return. You can not go wrong.
jack balls, you have to be kiddin. internet gangstas trips me out. you are bad on the internet. biaaatches in reality.
ok anyone who beleives having the cheapest regardless of specs doesnt win the format war IS A FOOL.
Even if HDDVD was a lesser quality format which its NOT pushing a cheaper player compared to BluRay and makign it even with DVD format will WIN over every uninformed consumer buying this holiday season.
AND THATS A FACT.
Can someone please tell me where to go to find what stores will have this deal?? I have already got the Xbox360 Add-on, but would love to pick-up one of these units as a stand alone player for my HDTV in the bedroom!
You people are stupid.
On Friday, they'll sell about 100k HD-DVD players if they have that many.
From now until January, about 2 million PS3's will be sold.
How the fck is the "war over"? lol, dumbasses.
You're crazy in your 2,000,000 PS3 sales in 2 months. They need more than a handful of decent games to do that.
Second, they will sell more than 100K of these. Plus even if someone doesn't get the $100 player they are more than likely going to buy HD DVD now that a lot of movies will be $15. As a whole HD DVD is much more affordable, therefor more appealing to the masses.
I don't know about where you live, but it seems like where I live and at least 2 other states that I frequent you can always find the old PS3 skus in stock meanwhile the store will have few if any Xbox 360s or Wiis in stock. To say that Sony will sell that many PS3s is blind fanboyism and even if they do that doesn't garuntee sucess with the BD format.
soooo the ps2 will sell 2 million in 2 months.... right. seeing that the ps3 is barely outselling the gameboy advance in monthly sales while the 360 and wii are pushing 500k a month now. have fun with your ps3DO.
PS3*, dammit
Wow.. I wish you retards would STFU about that crappy PS3. Yeah.. I wanna be cool and watch a movie and use a gay joystick. Seriously... bring a chick into your house.. "Hold on honey.. I need to turn on the PS3 so we can watch a movie". Prepared to get laughed at you broke @$$ noobs. If you want true HD viewing.. go buy a F@#$ing stand alone HD-DVD or Blu-Ray player.
And yes.. Transformers on 56 inch Samsung 1080p DLP friggin rockzors! F@$# Blu-Ray until it drops after christmas. Pick up this stand-alone player and then get a blu-ray player when it drops.
Blah blah blah.. PS3 sales this... and PS3 sales that... I guess people want to watch blu-ray movies on it more than playing actual games. If I had to put up with a horrible game selection I'd turn the PS3 gay by watching chick flicks on it all day.
START TEH FLAME WARZ!!!
FCK ALL YALL BITC#EZ
I RUN DIZ SHT
KING KONG AINT GOT SHIT ON ME
this would be great for HD-DVD if it wasn't a discontinued model, most stores must only have like 10 in stock, altho this is a pretty vital move for toshiba in that hd-dvd is now percieved as the far cheaper format and paves the way for more price cuts
Cheapest HD-dvd players... if found.. are about 250€ over here in Europe. 300€ for the cheapest Blu-ray players. Everything still stable here eh.