Venturer SHD7001 goes on sale in UK for 170 pounds
Right on cue, the Venturer SHD7001 HD DVD player has gone on sale via QVC UK, and while all the specs look exactly as we predicted they would, the price is a hair lower than we expected. Pegged at £169.92 ($338) -- or available for two easy payments of £84.96 -- this 1080i player comes packaged with Troy and Hulk, an HDMI cable and eligibility for five other free flicks. Notably, this is QVC's "Special Value" of the day, so there's a good chance that the price will increase after the unit's first 24 hours on sale, but at least those interested in a cheap HD DVD player (and located across the pond) can snap it up now and save a few pounds over the alternatives.
[Via RegHardware]
[Via RegHardware]

















Boy, that must be a heavy HD-DVD player!
Damn, beat me too it.
Thats pricy, you don't they make one for about $199USD? POS Wal*Mart Special Toshiba Capable of only 720i or something like that (memory is fuzzy)
Honestly, i'll stick with the killer deal of 5 BD and a PS3 for $500, i wants me a copy of Full Metal Jacket, as should any red blooded man regardless of nationality.
Anywho, i'll wait for these players to become as ubiquitous as DVD til i bite, i'm still rocking Beta anyways (once bitten).
"Damn, beat me too it."
painful to be beat by an obvious joke 99% of us would think too lame to post.
sucks to be you
beat me to it.
@paragraph:
Unless you were joking, with this post and one you made later I enjoy how you make false claims about HD DVD to support BD. The players at Wal-Mart are perfectly capable of doing 1080i, not just 720p as you claim. Also, where do you get 720p > 1080i?
just incase anyone stoopid enough to buy something like this from QVC is here, this is completely over priced, the toshiba ep-30 a much better player with better free films is available for around £180 with a bit of detective work...
Just saw the Toshiba in Tescos last night with two films but it was £199.
If you look at QVC's site this unit is £206 + £6 postage.
£199 for toshiba
£212 for venturer
Hmm, hard choice!
Just to add the Toshiba in Tescos actually supports 1080P where as the one from this story is only 1080i (like you would actually notice any difference when sat 6 foot from the screen like normal).
HD-DVD and BluRay is a complete waste of time because as soon as these devices reach market penetration we'll be DOWNLOADING our films and not using old fashioned shiny discs to watch our films on.
That said, for this price, it looks tempting.
Ya, go right on ahead and enjoy crappy low bitrate 720P download movies while those of us with our antiquated "disc units" enjoy those movies in 1080i/p with lossless sound and a generous bitrate.
@Jason
I'll take 720p over 1080i any day. Plus, when is the last time someone used your Crappy Download as a Coaster?
Sure, discs have thier own advantages, but 720p > 1080i, and unless you can tell the differnce between CD Quality and Lossless without bieng told you arn't going to notice the sound quality drop.
@ Jason
Who said movie downloads wouldn't be HD?
Whilst you wait for your HD movie to be burnt onto an "antiquated shiny disc", I would have already legally downloaded it and watched it.
Downloading movies will be as common as downloading music is today so you're just ignoring the inevitable.
Yeah, from most of what I've seen from the downloadable movies, they have a limited time to watch, or cannot be moved to another device to be watched. That is, if you downloaded a movie to watch in the living room, you can't watch that same movie in the home office, unless you physically move that device. Besides, not everyone has broadband for movie downloads.
Anyway, about audio quality... have you ever heard for yourself, PCM uncompressed audio on a good THX system?
Ah, another knowitall that thinks that video streaming will take over the physical media market.....news flash homey, not gonna happen for a very very very long time.
Whilst I agree that you can download HD movies already the streaming comment is a no no right now. The bandwidth is just not available to do this. That is why cable companies offer HD content but you have to download it to a digital recorder first.
i bet HD really enhances the cutting edge CGI used in Hulk.
Actually Hulk is very highly rated in HD for picture quality. There is FILM used in Hulk too you might remember.
Yeah, i hear that the HD copy really captures Barry Bond's Performance as The Hulk spectacularly (zing), and all that CGI they did on Eric Bana to make him look human really pops too (ka-pow). Sadly enough the HD version does not have a better story (TAKE THAT SCHAMUS!)
But seriously though, Hulk was a great movie *snicker* and the Troy, wow, just wow (i lol'd).
.>
But on a serious note, you are correct, it looks better in HD, but it dosn't make it a better movie.
Well, duh.
The normal price is £206 if you look on QVC interactive (red button on digital satellite)
an included HDMI cable? how do the Brits rate? when I bought my Toshiba A2 it came with non-HD (yellow, white, red) composite. same for the PS3.
I guess they don't believe in nickel and diming (pence-ing?) consumers across the pond ...
you forget that most things are near twice the price hear in the UK as they are in the US
example: iphone in USA: $399
iphone in UK : £269 = $550
so and added HDMI cable makes it a little better value for us
Hulk Was a great movie
AHAHAHAHAHAHAHA! That's a good one!
What is not to like about it?
*YAWN*
This looks like the exact same Venturer HD-DVD unit I saw at my local (read: Canadian) WalMart for $199.95CDN
@jamma
Oh, no doubt you guys get hammered with lots of up front costs. but to drop $400-500 on a hi-def DVD player only to find the second-worst (after coax) quality cable in the box is just insulting.
HDMI is higher quality than composite. I'd rate it as the 3rd best connection, after DVI and component, as DVI is pretty much the same standard without the encompassing sound as well. There's a reason it's growing more popular for home theatre setups... plus it's well suited for integrated DRM, so it's being pushed for hard by "certain groups" that you can probably name.
John why do you rate composite over HDMI? Composite being analogue and HDMI being digital.
I said "3rd best" rather than "3rd best quality" because HDMI is intended to help stick DRM down our throats. I agree with you completely that HDMI, as a digital standard, produces better quality, but the I'd rather have component than let DRM get its foot through another door.
Good job I have an old 360 from before they started adding HDMI sockets to it. Have to use component or VGA cable. Sticking with component for now since old games use 50Mhz and component is only 60Mhz. Would be nice to use HDMI though as TV's wont auto detect a component device being switched on like with scart and HDMI.
CHEAP RUBBISH.
Hang on a minute, it's not even cheap.
Ive got a 360 so id rather save money and buy the HD-DVD drive.
If it was blu-ray with 5 free films, then I'd buy it (or maybe a PS3) :S
"If it was blu-ray with 5 free films, then I'd buy it"
Fail. Blu-Ray does offer 5 free movies with a purchase of a few players (including PS3). Here's a link to the movies. http://www.bluraysavings.com/bluraysavings_usa.pdf
Thats not in the UK though, I think.
Either way, a PS3 or standalone blu-ray player doesnt cost £179.
Still expensive for a crappy brand, i saw this on QVC myself. One of the older tosh hd-dvd players has just gone clearence at currys (i think it was the hde2) retailing for £149 which is even better
a 1080i player... for over $300 ?!?!
Am I missing something here, or does that deal just plain suck?