Category: Price War

$199 Blu-Ray Drive Announced

The format wars have really been heating up in the pricing side of things. The $99 sale of the HD-A2 was just the beginning. But, now you will be able to get yourself a $199 Blu-Ray drive for your PC, it is still far from a stand-alone player but is a step in the right direction for the Blu-Ray side of things.

The name of the drive is the PLDS DH-4O1S, it just goes to show you that the naming conventions in most places are just terrible.

The drive ships with Cyberlink PowerDVD.

If I was building a HTPC this drive would be on my parts list. I have always like the idea of using a single computer to do all of the work that in most houses is done by many different set top boxes.

Read more about the drive, including detailed specs at Gearlog.

Xbox 360 Price Cut On all Versions

According to Joystiq, the Xbox 360 will have a price cut. The price cut will affect all models, $20 off the Core system, $50 off the Premium system, and $30 off the Elite system. They are citing Wal-Mart, Toys-R-Us, and Circuit City flyers.

This comes right on the heels of the Playstation 3 dropping in price and then the 60GB version getting discontinued. I’m hoping that this will start a fun little price war between Microsoft and Sony where the only winner is the customers.

Along with this, if you buy the Premium version of the Xbox 360 at Circuit City you can get a free Table Tennis game.

Free Treo 680 More Expensive then iPhone Over 2 Years

PalmAddicts did a wonderful comparison of the prices of the iPhone against the Treo 680 over the course of 2 years.

It turns out that because the service plan of the Treo 680 is about $20 more expensive per month then the iPhone is for the same service the iPhone is cheaper, even though the Treo 680 is free!

The Treo 680 with a 4GB SDHC card will cost $1,980 over two years while the iPhone will only cost $1,940. Now the difference isn’t that big and if you look at the 8GB iPhone compared to a Treo 680 with an 8GB SDHC card it will be more expensive for the iPhone. If you look at the pricing over 3 years the iPhone is cheaper across the board.

Check out PalmAddicts full rundown of the numbers over here.

AMD Cuts CPU Prices

A few days ago AMD cut prices again on their desktop processors. According to Cnet all of AMD’s Dual Core X2 desktop processors are now under $200, with the highest end X2 the Athlon 64 X2 6000+ at just under $200. The 3600+ and 3800+ X2 processors have been cut from the line up leaving the X2 4000+ at $73 as the newest entry level CPU.

The FX-72 and 74 are both priced at $599 (weird).

AMD has been cutting prices left and right because of pressure from Intel. AMD has really dropped the ball when it comes to performance in the desktop CPU market. I’m hoping that with the introduction of Barcelona in the next month or so it will help them bring back the crown.

AMD cuts prices on its desktop CPUs

Sony Launching a 80GB PS3 for $599

Not only is the 60GB version of the Playstation 3 getting a $100 price drop but also in August Sony will begin selling an 80GB version of the Playstation 3 for $599.

The 80GB Playstation 3 has been available in Korea for a little while now but will be hitting the streets next month. Not only are you getting an extra 20GB for $100 but Sony is also throwing in a copy of Motorstorm along with it.

This is making the Playstation 3 look a little bit more price competitive with the Xbox 360. Competition is great and hopefully this will push all the console makers to lower prices (even $250 for the Nintendo Wii is a bit too expensive).

Engadget’s Story

Playstation 3 Taking $100 Price Cut -Updatex2

According GameDaily BIZ the Playstation 3’s price will be dropped $100 on July 12th. Sony has not confirmed this but they have gotten many reports from retailers that the price will be dropping.

The price drop could be caused by the recent drop in prices of the Blue-laser pick-up heads that are being used in the Playstation 3, read about that here.

This puts the Playstation 3 only $20 more expensive then the XBox 360 Elite. The Playstation 3 has always seemed really expensive but with this $100 price drop it won’t seem so expensive compared to the XBox 360. Let’s face it if you are going to buy an XBox 360 you should buy the Elite because of the larger hard drive, but after you purchase the HD-DVD player add-on, you are now $180 up on the Playstation 3. This means that for the $180 you can get a game or two and an extra controller.

Sounds like Sony is trying catch up with the XBox 360 a bit and dropping the price is the first thing to do, now all you have to do is get a few more good games for the console.

GameDaily BIZ: Report: PS3 $499 on July 12

Playstaion 3

Update: Sony may not have plans to drop the price of the Playstation 3 – Reuters

Update: It has been confirmed

Toshiba Cuts Price of HD-DVD Player to $299

Well DigiTimes was wrong and I was wrong to rebroadcast their information. Toshiba has announced that their HD-A2 HD-DVD player will be priced at $299.

This is a big step in the format wars. The prices have been going down since the initial debut of these players but I believe that the $300 mark is where it is at. I believe that once the players hit that price point you will really start to see some adoption of the formats.

I have always been a Blu-ray fan but disliked its high price tag. The real reason I like Blu-ray is because of it’s scratch resistant coating on discs and which studios have signed on. HD-DVD however I have began to grow fond of because of it being the cheapest way to get truly good looking video into your living room for an extremely low price.

Toshiba HD-A2

[via TG Daily]

Blockbuster Favors Blu-Ray

According to Pittsburghlive.com, Blockbuster will lay its trust in the hands of Blu-ray over the hi-def war. 1,450 stores will begin stocking Blu-ray discs, not HD-DVD discs.

“This could be the end for HD-DVD” is what many in the blogosphere are saying. Let’s look at it this way, Blockbuster is a huge company but I’m not sure if they have the weight that many people think that they do. Most stores selling movies are selling both, Netflix has both, and most people just want to buy the cheaper player. I am usually on the side of Blu-ray in most of these discussions because I love to play the devils advocate. But, HD-DVD isn’t exactly going to see too many hits from this, there have been many companies who have publicly sided with either HD-DVD or Blu-ray and later on decided to either change their mind or become neutral signing deals with both formats.

People love to have headlines like “Blockbuster sides with Blu-ray, the end for HD-DVD?” but the problem is it is just way too soon to tell which format will end up winning, the thing is, both formats could still “win.” There are plenty of consumers out there to go around and it seems like just as many movies. A dual-format player for $500 or the ability for the consumers to buy and HD-DVD player for $250 and a Blu-ray player for $250 could make this format war mean nothing anymore.

Let’s just all take a deep breath look at what movies you want and the price of the players/discs and just buy something already. I’m tired of everyone getting upset over this. Just buy a player and some movies, without customers neither one will win, do your part by purchasing something and making your “vote” count in this format war.

$299 HD-DVD Players Unlikely to Happen this Year

DigiTimes is claiming that because of Blue-laser diodes yields being so low. They said that any HD-DVD player being sold at that price would be being sold at less than production cost.

The thing is the makers of the diodes including Sony and Matsushita (Panasonic) have assigned their production capacities for own use first. If this is true then if Sony could just get things together they could be the first to have a low cost next-gen DVD player.

This also means that for some time the cheapest way to get High definition content into your home theater is the XBox360 HD-DVD drive or the Playstation 3.

DigiTimes

$299 Blu-Ray Player in June

Pioneer will be the first to sell consumers a cheap next generation DVD drive, that is if no one beats them to the market. They are set to release there Blu-Ray player in the United States come June. The BDC-2202 can read BD-R discs at up to 5x and dual-layer discs at up to 2x. The greatest thing, is its price. It will be $299.

This will be the cheapest next generation DVD Drive but even if Toshiba or another company comes out with a HD-DVD drive that will be at the same price point. That means that the next gen dvd wars will be about what it has always needed to be about, not price, content.

Press Release [via CrunchGear]

Dramatic AMD Price Cuts

AMD has yet again slashed prices to compete with Intel cutting prices on its entire line of processors. The highest end AM2 processor now tops out at $241. Even the Quad-FX processors have been cut in price the highest end being priced at $799/pair.

On the low end you will be able to pick up a Athlon 64 3200+ for $58 and a Athlon 64 X2 3600+ for $73. This is exactly what AMD needs to do until they can get Barcelona out, just keep working on Barcelona to make it as fast as possible all the while cutting prices to keep up with Intel.

AMD isn’t really hurt by not having the fastest processor. That is not where the mass market is, home users anyway, it is at the lower end where you see the most movement of processors. I think this price drop will help them tremendously. Even though Intel clearly has the best architecture AMD will soon roll out Barcelona, the only problem is it is only a matter of time before Intels next processors come out and blow Barcelona out of the water.

AMD get on the ball, I love your processors but your not quite up to speed with Intel. We all need you for lower prices, competition is great for consumers.

AMD Processors Pricing

[via TG Daily]

Lower Prices for AMD chips today

AMD should be rolling out price cuts for its processors today after finally getting all the kinks out of its 65nm chips. The company will be cutting up to 35 percent on some high end chips.

The price cut is primarily due to Intels price cuts in the recent months. AMD and Intel have been in a pricing war for the past year or so now and have been undercutting each other left and right. AMD having disapointing 4th quarter results in the server market I’m sure they are glad that they got the 65nm manufacturing process going now. The 65nm process allows them to make more chips per wafer which allows them to produce more then previous 90nm process.

Intel however has been making 65nm chips for over a year now and may decide to either cut prices too or decide to leave them as they are seeing as they have much faster processors then AMD does right now.

AMD’s new price list can be found on their website here and is listed as price for OEM’s in 1,000 chip quantities.