Sony Delays Blu-ray Players Until October

[Ilya]

Sony Delays Blu-ray Players Until October

Sony now plans to release a Blu-ray high-definition DVD player in the U.S. in October and a combination recorder-player in Japan later in the year, the company announced in Tokyo today (Tuesday). The delay will give Toshiba's rival HD-DVD player a six-month headstart over Sony. Samsung released a Blu-ray player in the U.S. in June, but few have turned up on retailers' shelves. Kiyoshi Nishitani, the Sony executive who oversees Sony's Blu-ray business, declined to state how much Sony's player will cost. The battle between Sony and Toshiba's incompatible formats is likely to keep sales for both down, analysts said. "DVD sales will go down this year because consumers know about high definition but they don't know which format to buy," Netflix Chairman Reed Hastings told today's Los Angeles Times. "The problem with picking sides is that creates consumer anxiety, and so they'll just stop buying, period, or slow down their buying."

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[T2k]

YABRD (Yet Another Blu-Ray Delay) - comedy at its best.

 

[samatha6]

Diode shortages

Yep, they are delaying (again) Europe shipments of PS3: http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/14694813/

Also they are allocating most of the diode supplies for PS3: http://www.ps3land.com/article-633.php

So on the stand alone HD DVD/Blueray market, it appears Toshiba will have more units on the shelfs. Things are not so great at Sony. Their stock recently just dropped a buck and they are laying off around 7 percent of their workforce. Some analyist suggest that many gamers are not going to very interested in PS3 for HD and that Sonys constant delays will cost them dear in market share. MS already has about 5 million Xbox 360 out with allot more titles.. Even when PS3 eventually enters the market they will not match MS titles for at least a few years.

Personally, I hope Toshiba's standard wins over being that it is easier to manufacture and that they favor using VC1 compression. Hopefully MS gets their HD DVD addon for Xbox soon. Buyers are not liking competing uncompatible formats and most retailers are expecting crappy sales until one format wins over. Like many, I don't care for Sony as a company and hope they lose this one, (again). If they keep having these constant issues with the diode production, my hopes may be a reality.. And having been working in manufacturing for a long time myself, I am sure that these continual manufacturing problems are only adding to Sonys cost to bring this new techology to market. One thing is for sure, Sony is really banking on the PS3.. They are putting more and more of their future on the console market which has seen a huge increase in competition in recent years from MS and Nintendo. I think that Sony's continual delays of PS3 to include blueray will cost them dear in market share of the console market. One way or the other, HD technolgy probably won't become mainstream until one of these formats dies. I think MS may be able to kill off blueray if they impliment HD DVD with their xbox and use some of their billions to push the format. Defintely if HD DVD wins it will probably be because MS joined that camp.