Stop acting like Switzerland--get an HD DVD player for $250

(Credit: Toshiba)

Ready to take the high-def DVD plunge? I wouldn't. I think most HDTV owners are better off with a decent (and inexpensive) upconverting DVD player, which makes existing DVDs look a helluva lot better and saves you from having to choose sides in the ridiculous Blu-ray versus HD DVD war.

On the other hand, if you're tired of waiting and want to enjoy every pixel of your 1080p TV right now, consider the Toshiba HD-A20 HD DVD player. Circuit City has it on clearance for $249.99--not quite the sub-$200 price point the players need to achieve critical mass, but definitely a price break. (Most vendors are selling the same model for around $400.)

What's your take on the whole Blu-ray/HD DVD debacle? Are you going to wait it out? Wait for lower prices? Or are you already enjoying the high-def goodness?

[canespider]

I got the PS3+10 blu-ray movies deal that Walmart had on Saturday. Sony throws in 5 blu-ray movies. That's 15 blu-ray movie, Motorstorm and an 80 gb PS3 for $500. My friends won't shop at Walmart and I have mixed feelings, but that deal tipped me.

I have an Xbox360 and I think the media center extender is a great feature. For home videos, photos and music, the PS3 does a better job once networked. It just doesn't get the recorded TV shows, but we have cable on the big TV anyway.

I don't know how many units were sold during Walmart's sale on Saturday, but if that deal is repeated at Walmart and elsewhere PS3 and Blu-ray will move the ball this holiday season.

[Seaspray0]

1. They're still expensive. 2. BlueRay claims to be ahead, but I'm still concerned about what happens on revision changes (revision 1 players now not able to play revision 2 disks). 3. HDDVD seems to be becomming popular against BlueRay, but the disks are more expensive. 4. I beleive both are backward compatable with current DVD's. 5. Most important, I don't want to get stuck with a "betamax". There is no clear winner yet. What could swing my opinion? Either one becomming a clear leader or the studio's pulling together to stand behind one or the other. Until then I'll stick with a format that does have support from the studios... DVD.

[Johnny Mac 7]

Yes I am. It's been THE GOOD, THE BAD AND THE UGLY. I bought a Toshiba HD-A2 HD DVD player at the end of July 2007. THE UGLY. My tv (a 65" Mitsubishi CRT) has DVI but no HDMI. I bought a HDMI to DVI cable and hooked the two together. I was watching MI 3 HD DVD and thought it was poor quality for HD. I pressed the display button on the remote and it said the source was 480p. Was I bummed out or what? I called Toshiba and found out that I needed a firmware upgrade to get full HD through the HDMI to DVI connection. I found out I had 3 choices as how to get the upgrade: 1. Get the fw upgrade off the toshiba website and burn it to a CD, 2. Hook up an ethernet cable to the back of the HD DVD player and get it off the internet, 3. Have Toshiba send me a free upgrade disk. THE BAD. I tried getting the upgrade from the website and burning it to CD (I had done this before with a DVD recorder I have so I knew what I was doing). That didn't work. The Toshiba kept giving me an error message and I tried multiple times with no success. I wasn't anywhere near an ehternet connection so that wasn't an option. I called Toshiba (NO) customer service to order the free upgrade disk. They told me it would be seven to ten days before I would get it. Well OK. What else can you do? After two weeks I called back and was told it was on backorder and would be 8-10 weeks. Did that make my day? Here it is almost December and I still don't have the upgrade disk. Am I a fan of Toshiba or what? THE GOOD. After they told me it would be 8-10 weeks before I would get the fw upgrade I took matters into my own hands and found a solution. I went to the local surplus electronics store and found a 100 foot ethernet cable (only $16.95) that would allow me to hook into my cable modem in my computer room on one end of the house and hook into my Toshiba HD DVD player in the basement at the other end of the house. I had to go into the system menu on the HD player and setup the ethernet parameters. After that I followed the directions in the menu to acquire the upgrade and I waited, and I waited, and I waited. It took much longer than I expected and there was a warning not to disturb the process which I heeded. Finally it was finished. I turned everything off, disconnected the ethernet cable and turned the system back on. Hallelujah! Everything is fine now. The player works as it should, there is no fault with the hardware. No problem with HD DVD disks so far. This is my second Toshiba DVD player (the first was just a standard def dvd player). The products are fine the operation of the company stinks (to put it mildly). Am I happy? I'm getting there now that the crisis is over and I can enjoy the HD experience. So what about HD DVD vs BluRay? There's a lot of hype and misinformation out there. I've done extensive study on the subject and I prefer HD DVD for many reasons. But I'm not going to dis BluRay. Some movie studios are putting HD movies out on both HD formats and I hope eventually they all will. I think financially it's in there interest to do so. Some will have to swallow their pride but there not fooling anybody anyway. PS. I hear there is another firmware upgrade available. I think I'll wait awhile . . .

[cjmnews]

Upconversion is good enough until a single format is agreed upon OR there is an affordable player that handles both formats.

Don't limit yourself to a single format yet. It is too early.

[AnthonyNYC]

cjmnews, i felt just like that myself until I bought a new A-3 from amazon for $199 delivered (free shipping) with 10 free HD movies. (the movies alone are woth more than $200), I have a 1080P 52" Vizio and it upconverts the 1080i image to the native resolution of 1080P, all sets de-interlace to native resolution.
Anyway, not only is the HD picture amazing but the upscaling of regular DVD's is so much better than regular upscaling DVD players. I have 2 upscaling DVD players around the house and did side by side, and can see a better picture on the Toshiba A3. So even if you never buy an HD-DVD movie ever, the $200 for this unit just for it's superior upscaling DVD features alone is worth buying the HD Player in my opinion.
And it's only a little more than a upscaling one at that price, through in the free movies, and it comes out cheaper.
Good Luck everyone!

[Johnny Mac 7]

I didn't mean to post this 3 times. Would the person in charge delete the top 2 posts. Thank you.

[jaxrad]

Yes. I have a PS3 in the family room and a Sony Blu Ray player in my bedroom. I do not care who wins. I will purchase and HD player if they win. In the meantime I like the titles on Bluray better.

[DrtyDogg]

The more people stay neutral the bigger lead Sony gets from the PS3

[ElmoKajaky]

If you're a hardcore gamer like me, just get both an Xbox 360 with the add-on and a PS3, then rent HD movies of either format for now. No need to actually buy a ton of them at this point, but renting them's a cheap option. Just use Netflix or Blockbuster Online.

[AnthonyNYC]

I got a Toshiba A-3 for less than $200 with 10 free movies, the upscaling feature of regular DVD's on this machine is superior to two other upscaling dvd player I own.
IMHO it's worth someone purchasing this for that alone, then throw in 10 free (might be 7 now) HD-DVD movies, and it's basically like buying the movies and getting the HD Player free! Don't fall for the 1080P hype, all HD sets either de-interlace to 1080P or downscale to 720P, whichever is the internal native resolution of the tv set.
So don't spend more money than you have to, get a cheap HD-DVD player and you will be real happy with quality of existing DVD collection and get HD as an added bonus!
Good Luck Everyone!

[mattpam99]

PCRush has placed an order for 10,000 New Medium Fnterprises(NMEN) Versatile Multilayer Disc players that will play all available DVD formats in HD! These players will retail for around $200 and should be ready before Xmas. NMEN are shipping another 10.000 units for sale in central Europe for Xmas shoppers. They are already available in India and other Asian markets. I also understand Walmart will also be a major US distributer.
Matthew Gould

[mattpam99]

Sorry for the Typo in my post. should read " New Medium Enterprises" - listed on Nasdaq as NMEN. - Matthew