Wal-Mart Goes Blue
By Sagittarius, 16 February 2008 - 02:14 39 comments
In another loss for the HD-DVD camp, US retailer Wal-Mart today announced that its 4,000 stores (including Sam's Clubs) will move forward this year with one hi-definition movie and hardware format: Blu-ray. The change will take place quickly over the next several months whereby the retailer will phase out HD DVD offerings and reorganize shelf space. By June, Wal-Mart stores, Sam’s Clubs, www.walmart.com and www.samsclub.com will offer only Blu-ray movies and hardware machines, as well as standard definition movies and DVD players, and up converts.
Wal-Mart will continue to sell through remaining HD DVD product, but in less than 30 days customers will see a more predominant move toward Blu-ray in stores, clubs and online. As the nation’s largest retailer, Wal-Mart thoughtfully reviewed all areas and impact in making its decision, and is excited to move forward with one format and share its future plans with customers.
"We’ve listened to our customers, who are showing a clear preference toward Blu-ray products and movies with their purchases," said Gary Severson, senior vice president of Home Entertainment. "With the customers best interest in all we do, we wanted to share our decision and timeline with them as soon as possible, knowing it will help simplify their purchase decision, increase selection, and increase adoption long term. We anticipate enhancing our selection with continued great values in hi-definition Blu-ray products, so our customers can further enhance their entertainment experience at home."
Comments (39)
+warwagon - 16 February 2008 - 02:15
All I can say is if Toshiba does kill off the HD DVD player because it lost the war, they better release a firmware update for Divx support for all of use that own a player so we can get something remotely useful out of it.
WolfDV - 16 February 2008 - 04:13
you so know that these players are excellent at upscaling regular dvds, actually they are considered some of the best on the market for that purpose. Plus they will still play all the hd-dvd's that you have in your collection.
.. i wonder if walmart will have a fire sale on all existing hd-dvd's soon? I would love buy more for my collection.
Octol - 16 February 2008 - 15:15
I don't know [or care] about about Walmart, but you should probably keep checking Pricegrabber Electronics for price drops. Soon enough they'll be selling at fire sale prices!
+warwagon - 16 February 2008 - 23:44
I don't care about upscaling dvd's I want Divx / Xvid support
WolfDV - 17 February 2008 - 06:45
then buy an xbox for the cheap, simple softmod, and install XBMC (probably one of the best players for xvid/divx and other file types on the market)
.. and then you could just connect it to your network and play files without burning discs every time (eww). XBMC looks great at 1080i/720p, and will upscale your vids accodingly. (although that doesn't mean it will play 1080p/720p .mkv files .. a bit to resource intensive for the old xbox, and most standalone players on the market)
I suppose you could use a 360 aswell (they recently added xvid/divx support), but the interface is still no comparison to using XBMC.
i highly doubt they will add divx/xvid support to the toshiba players .. and even if they did there are much better solutions on the market.
+warwagon - 17 February 2008 - 16:21
I already have one of those
HalcyonX12 - 17 February 2008 - 18:15
I suppose you could use a 360 aswell (they recently added xvid/divx support), but the interface is still no comparison to using XBMC.
Not to mention that the 360 is horrible at upscaling and de-interlacing: http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/home-entertainm...-bad-233490.php
PatrynXX - 17 February 2008 - 21:54
I don't know [or care] about about Walmart, but you should probably keep checking Pricegrabber Electronics for price drops. Soon enough they'll be selling at fire sale prices!
Better yet, Ebay. Like buying $20 laserdisc players :P . CED Players are a bit higher priced though.
Killa Aaron - 16 February 2008 - 02:46
well i wonder what microsoft is going to do with the 360 now, i hope to see a 360 ultimate with Blu-Ray or something like that.
Since the 360 doesn't have a built in drive (good idea when you look at it now) all they have to do is release a new add-on... not that hard for MS at all... you'll probably never see a 360 with an internal drive that is not dvd... maybe the next xbox will have an internal drive
QuarterSwede - 16 February 2008 - 12:42
I believe someone at Microsoft said they would release a BD player for the 360 if it won out.
rpgfan - 16 February 2008 - 03:09
+1 Blu-Ray
I really do wonder if any of this will help the PS3 gain some market share...
American Ninja - 16 February 2008 - 03:27
Nice!
Mean Mr Mustard - 16 February 2008 - 06:52
How relevant.
X'tyfe - 16 February 2008 - 04:53
its hard to say that it hasent won now
Avgrog - 16 February 2008 - 05:37
Thats easy to understand thats the only way they can sell the only BD player they have on the self. Sony BD300 that doesn't support HDMI 1.3 only 1.2 and it not upgradable. Wall Mart and Sony don't mind selling junk. I have a Blu Ray and a HD DVD player the HD DVD works everytime the Blu Ray won't even play a movie even after updates.
+kraized - 16 February 2008 - 08:30
Should have bought a PS3 which has upgradeable firmware. Sell the BD300 and buy a PS3.
bits - 16 February 2008 - 13:37
Actually the movie of even 2.0 discs will play on 1.0 players.
randomnut - 16 February 2008 - 14:01
Should have bought a PS3 which has upgradeable firmware. Sell the BD300 and buy a PS3.
The thing is that they get around it by gloating that players like the s300 "do have upgradeable firmware" but it means downloading and burning the firmware etc. The BD group could have done with sitting down and hashing out a complete spec beforehand, instead of a crappy spec then seeing what the competition has, copying it and implementing it badly, and releasing it as incompatible profiles for older players. A big mistake was not having mandatory network ports on every player, this will bite BD in the ass later on.
+Northgrove - 16 February 2008 - 18:52
I'm not sure why you're against progress in technology? Do you complain as much if a company release software upgrades to improve it and give it more features?
I would understand you better if this was about firmware fixing bugs existing in former profile versions, and they weren't upgradable. That would suck, because you'd be stuck with bugs. But this is about more features, not bugs. Extra stuff for fun and entertainment. If the Blu-ray format keeps improving to give you more and more benefits compared to HD-DVD, what's your problem? Heck, even if you need to buy a new player to get all the bells and whistles, still, what's your problem? This is extremely common in technology. If you buy a new plasma TV today, it'll be much more powerful than one a few years ago, and let's not even talk of graphics cards or computers in general. Does that make me feel bad for purchasing a plasma TV, knowing this? Yeah, a little maybe, but that's facts I had to take about 20 years ago when I got involved with technology. And it's a beautiful thing to watch, in another sense.
And if you don't care for, say, Internet connectivity as part of whatever profile version it was, you don't even need these upgrades? They're just extra bells and whistles if you want to do more than watching the movie. :-p
Personally, I'm happy a format can keep improving beyond just giving us the movie watching experience and classic DVD "extras".