NPD Group retail sales tracking data released this week show sales of Blu-ray standalone players have decreased drastically since the beginning of the year.

Standalone Blu-ray player unit sales in the States dropped a whopping 40% from January to February and saw just a 2% increase between February and March, according to NPD.

Unsurprisingly sales of the now obsolete HD DVD standalone players sales also dropped dramatically seeing a 65% decrease.

But these Blu-ray stats are being considered surprising by some who assumed now the format war has been won, consumers would feel happier to splash the cash on a next-gen player, the price of which averages out at $400 in the US.

NPD suggests that consumers are not making the leap to Blu-ray as DVD is “good enough” for most – in the same time period that Blu-ray sales dropped, upconverting DVD players sales have actually increased 5%.

ThinkGeek recently announced their latest electronic gadget, a device that can easily convert your old Betamax Tapes to brand-spankin’-new HD-DVD discs. 

While it won’t handle transfers of DIVX, MiniDisc or SelectaVision Videodiscs, the BetaMaxHD will convert between two of the most undoubtedly out-of-fashion consumer media formats money can (or can’t) buy.

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Toshiba will take a serious but far from fatal blow to its bottom line for its decision to discontinue HD DVD, according to a report by Japan’s Nikkei Business Daily (account required). The electronics maker is predicted by the newspaper to be spending $986 million this quarter to ramp down its production of HD DVD players and discs at its factories as well as writing down the cost of unsold devices. The tally will significantly affect Toshiba’s income but should still result in a significant profit, as official company estimates would have it generating $2.9 billion in the same period.

The former HD DVD producer has declined comment on the subject, saying through a spokeswoman that it had not announced any of its finances and so couldn’t comment on Nikkei’s claims. Continue Reading…

Paramount has confirmed its last ever HD DVD releases will go on sale in the States on Tuesday, 4 March. From then on, it’s DVD and Blu-ray Disc only.And DreamWorks Animation has clearly had word from Toshiba: it’s knocking its HD DVD release schedule on the head too, including the Bee Movie disc, originally due to go on sale in the US on 11 March.

Movies schedules for HD DVD release from both companies will appear on DVD, but don’t expect Blu-ray versions until the summer, Paramount said. Neither have said what their first Blu-ray releases will be.

DreamWorks’ CEO Jeffrey Katzenberg earlier this week said he was committed to the agreement reached with Toshiba in August 2007 to release hi-def content only on HD DVD.

“We have a partnership with Toshiba and have an obligation to see this through,” he said. “It really is in [Toshiba's] court at this point to really declare what the next step will be.”Presumably, Tosh told him that it’s OK to go Blu. The Japanese consumer electronics giant’s thoughts on the matter were so important to Katzenberg and co. because, as he admitted, DreamWorks was “well-compensated” for backing HD DVD.

The only other studio that had committed itself exclusively to HD DVD was Universal, and it hopped on the Blu-ray bandwagon very quickly after Toshiba announced it would no longer manufacturer HD DVD hardware.

Play.com has seen the sale of Blu-ray players increase seven-fold since the demise of HD DVD last month, and Pricerunner says it has experienced a 132 per cent increase in the number of users looking for Blu-ray players. And it looks as if prices are starting to fall to more affordable levels.

Mattias Berg, managing director of Pricerunner UK, says: “The switch to Blu-ray is great news for the consumer as having just one format eliminates compatibility issues. My advice is simply do your research first, and make sure you know what you’re buying before you part with your cash.”

Pricerunner worked with Play.com to find the five most popular and cheapest Blu-ray players in the UK, which are as follows:

* Samsung BDP-P1400 £199.99
* Sharp BD-HP20 £220.79
* Sony BDP-S300 £241.99
* Panasonic DMP-BD10 £349
* Panasonic DMP-BD30 £349

A new survey from Dixons suggests that around half of its customers could end up disappointed, whichever way the high definition disc format war eventually goes.

When asked which format they preferred, 53% of Dixons.co.uk customers went for Blu-ray, with 47% choosing HD DVD.

Unfortunately, in interpreting the results, deVere Forster, Director of E-Commerce, appeared to show a lack of understanding, saying, “Sony may have stolen a march with Blu Ray by including it in the PS3 in an attempt to hook in the gaming generation, but X BOX (sic) users, which is HD DVD driven, would no doubt disagree.”

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Despite Paramount’s official statement that they are sticking with the flagging HD DVD format as their next-gen disc of choice, rumours still abound online that the company will go Blu-ray in the not-too-distant future.

Adding fuel to those particular flames of rumour is the recent discovery of some “coming soon” Blu-ray-flavoured Paramount discs on Amazon.co.uk.

The three releases, due on 10th March 2008, according to info on the e-tailer’s site, are “Trading Places”, “Coming To America” and “Anchorman”.

Although the two Eddie Murphy vehicles did get a US Blu-ray release before Paramount’s switch to HD DVD last summer, it seems Anchorman did not, leading to speculation that this is a slip from Amazon, rather than an admin error.

“Please take HD DVD off life support and let the HD packaged media community and market heal and grow. Please let HD DVD die.”

So ends the heartfelt plea currently live on PetitionsOnline.com, created in response to the “Save HD DVD” campaign running concurrently on the same site.

At the time of writing, the kill-it crew have notched up 4,210 signatures while the please-save-it team are stonking ahead with 11,920 virtual scrawls.

The “Save HD DVD” epetition went live on January 5th as an immediate reaction to Warner Bros’ decision to go Blu.

The petition creator states the purpose of the exercise is to “show Warner Brothers that the consumer has not ‘clearly’ chosen Blu-Ray.”

As well as reversing Warner’s decision, the hope for the petition is to show Universal and Paramount, “that HD-DVD still has supporters, thus they shouldn’t switch to Blu-Ray.”

“We have a chance to save a superior format from collapsing under the weight of the greedy Sony corporation and its inferior Blu-Ray format,” pleads the intro text. “Let’s do it!”

People power or a waste of time? You can throw your two cents into the fight now by clicking on one of the links below. Who knows what could happen if the save-it team hits the heady heights of 12,000 signees?

The move by Warner Bros. to produce only Blu-ray movies is already beginning to push HD DVD out of stores, says a report from Video Business. Several retail chain owners, including Trans World Entertainment and Video Buyers Group, have revealed that they will either emphasize or introduce Blu-ray in their stores in response to the larger library of movies that will be available for the format. Video Buyers Group in particular notes the lack of confusion makes it “safe” to bring an HD movie format to as many as 800 of its roughly 1,600 stores for the first time, according to chain president Ted Engen.

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