Tech Shout!

What seemed like a never-ending war of the next-generation formats, has now perhaps come to an end with Blu-ray being the crowned the King of DVD formats as Toshiba has reportedly abandoned its HD DVD technology, surrendering to Sony’s technology.

According to a statement by the Tokyo-based Toshiba, the company will reduce shipments of HD DVD players and recorders, with the aim to shut shop sometime in March.

Also, a while ago we had reported that Warner Brothers were all set to exclusively back Sony’s Blu-ray DVD format. Thus, US retailers obviously wouldn’t want to sell HD DVDs any longer. Maybe this prompted Toshiba to quit early in the game.

As of now, Toshiba said that it plans to stop the volume production of HD DVD disk drives for PCs and games.

Microsoft which came out with its Xbox 360 HD DVD player a while ago, however said in a statement, “WE do not believe the recent reports about HD DVD having any material impact on the Xbox 360 platform or our position in the marketplace.”

“As we’ve stated, we believe it is games that sell consoles and the Xbox 360 continues to have the largest next-gen games library with the most exclusives and best selling games in the industry,” the statement read.

“HD DVD is one of the several ways we offer a high definition experience to consumers and we will continue to give consumers the choice to enjoy digital distribution of high definition movies and TV shows directly to their living room along with playback of the DVD movies they already own,” said Microsoft.

In fact, speculations have been rife about Microsoft coming out with a stand-alone Blu-ray player for its Xbox 360 console, possibly in May 2008. This news may anger those who bought the HD-DVD add-on for their Xbox 360.

Meanwhile, Toshiba is calculating the costs for endings its operations, said President Atsutoshi Nishida in Tokyo.