Posted by Rich on 09/28/05 03:31

DVD format war heats up as Microsoft, Intel opt for Toshiba format

Japanese electronics maker Toshiba scored a point Tuesday over rival
Sony in a brewing war over formats of next generation DVDs after
winning the support of US technology giants Microsoft and Intel.

The two US technology titans have pledged their technical and
marketing expertise for the HD DVD format developed by a group led by
Toshiba.

The product is set to go head-to-head with Sony's Blu-ray in a replay
of the rivalry a generation ago between VHS and Sony's ill-fated
Betamax, which eventually lost out as customers opted for its rival.

"I believe that it is still an open race," said Carlos Dimas, a
consumer electronics analyst at CLSA Asia-Pacific Markets.

"We are still heading to a new format war in DVD recorders."

The stakes are high for Sony, which is struggling to revive its core
electronics business and has just forecast a loss of 10 billion
yenmillion dollars) in the financial year to March 2006.

"We are trying to gain the support of manufacturers and Hollywood
(studios) for Blu-ray," Sony President Ryoji Chubachi told reporters.

"As we previously said, there were some efforts to have a common
standard. Unfortunately we didn't reach an agreement. We do not have
any programme under which we will sit at the same table (with
Toshiba)."

Microsoft and Intel, crucial players in the stand-off as customers are
increasingly using their computers to play DVDs, had previously
refrained from backing either side as they sell software and
components to both.

"We'd been hoping the two groups would find a common format for the
sake of consumers' benefit but apparently those efforts failed," said
Masatoshi Mizuno, a spokesman for Intel in Japan.

Microsoft now plans to incorporate software supporting Toshiba's DVD
format in its next operating system, Windows Vista, said Microsoft
spokesman Kazunori Ishii.

It also raises the possibility that Microsoft may design software to
allow its new Xbox games console to play the HD DVD discs after the
product hits the market later this year, putting more pressure on
rival Sony's PlayStation.

Sony has an advantage in that its own format will reach thousands of
homes in the PlayStation3 video games console due for launch early
next year.

Hollywood studios, who could ultimately decide the fate of the two
formats, are split in their support for Toshiba or Sony.

Next-generation DVDs, expected to hit the mass market later this year,
are billed as offering cinematic quality images and opening up new
possibilities in interactive entertainment.

Sony's Blu-ray disc is expected to have a greater storage capacity
than the HD DVD but also to be more expensive to make, at least in the
short term, as the format has greater differences from
current-generation DVDs.

Supporters of the Blu-ray technology include Apple Computer, Dell,
Hewlett-Packard and Samsung Electronics.

Among Hollywood studios, Walt Disney and Sony Pictures Entertainment
back Blu-ray, while HD DVD supporters include Paramount Pictures,
Universal Pictures and Warner Brothers Studios.

"I think that ultimately the grouping that will have the deciding
power is the movie studios in the US because they've got to feel
comfortable in term of the intellectual property management of the
movies," said Dimas of CLSA.

"They've got to decide what standard is more efficient in economic
terms."

© 2005 AFP




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