Holiday Sales Frenzy: HD-DVD Players as low as $99

[Gasman]

and good looks

 

[tn001d]

No realy difference between the A2 and A3 right? Besides styling .

 

[aarond]

Sony and Samsung will not slash prices on Bluray, on an interview given to Twice and Dealerscope, the top execs said they will not compete with HD DVD slash and burn pricing, this is is their logic: "The target audience for high-definiton DVD is still the early adopter or cinephile who is willing to pay a premium for the experience. What we're not going to do is chase a Black Friday price that's going to last seven or eight hours." That statement came from Samsung's Tim Baxter, executive vp of sales and marketing CE division. The lowest you can expect any BR product this year is $399.00

As for Baxter's remark? Well it's hard sometimes to believe these people actually studied marketing.

are there really any "cinephiles" who are dumb enough to pay a "premium" for the samsung or sony name?

 

[owasse]

Just My Luck!

I heard about the Wally World promotion too late! I went there this morning and the sale ended yesterday. They had two players left and they wouldn't honor the price even though they still had the sale price marked on them.
Oh well - there's always "Black Friday."

 

[annunaki]

I think this will do a great deal for HD-DVD. The quicker they make these players affordable to the average consumer the faster they are likely to adopt a format. If Blu-Ray does not play along, I feel they will be on the losing end of this skirmish. My brother went out and purchased a player at Wal-Mart on Saturday morning. He lives near a small town (pop. 7,800). He is not the type to get an HD player but he did anyway because of the price.

 

[GlocksRock]

I wouldn't have gotten one if it hadn't been for WalMart selling them for under $100, especially since I had a PS3 on the way. But it can't hurt to have a player for each format if the price is right.

 

[Kevin T]

I figure that even if Blu-Ray eventually wins the format war, there will likely be fallout in the form of dirt cheap movies in HD-DVD format. With the five free HD-DVD rebate, the player has pretty much paid for itself—assuming I can find five freebies from the list that I want.

Since I needed to buy a DVD player for my wife’s sewing room anyway, this was an easy decision to make. She can have the Panny SD player that's currently sitting in the AV rack, which will be replaced by the HD-A2.

The funny thing was that when I arrived at the Wasilla, Alaska “Super” WalMart on the day of the “unadvertised” sale I learned that they had not received their stock of HD-A2s. They took my name down on a waiting list, but I figured I’d never hear from them again. I was shocked yesterday they called to let me know my player had arrived and I should come get it.

I just wish I’d thought to sign up for more than one. They would have made good stocking stuffers…