Last month, Toshiba ceased production of its
HD-DVD products after major studios and leading US retailers such as Warner Bros., Wal-Mart and Best Buy favoured Blu-Ray Discs as the standard for next-generation DVD formats.
The announcement by Wal-Mart is the latest in a string of setbacks for Toshiba's
HD-DVD format, which now has only one major studio--Dreamworks--supporting its technology.
Then, on Tuesday, electronics giant Toshiba, the driving force behind
HD-DVD, said it would cease production of players and recorders in the format.
Horizon's Hz7220 HD-DVD/Blu-Ray SoC supports wide range of features and capabilities including conformance to leading video compression standards such as high-definition 1080/60p profiles of AVC/H.264, VC-1, MPEG-2 and DV/HDV, leading audio compression standards such as DTS-HD, Dolby Digital Plus and Dolby TrueHD, as well as supporting
HD-DVD and Blu-Ray HDi and BD-J (BD-Java) interactive technologies.
Filmed in 1080i high definition with 5.1 surround sound, and available in both DVD and
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Samsung and Panasonic make Blu-ray players while Toshiba has backed the
HD-DVD format.
The two competing types of HD players have their supporters: the Blu-ray (backed by Samsung, Sony, Apple, Philips, Panasonic, Sharp, Pioneer, and Dell) and the
HD-DVD (backed by Toshiba, Microsoft, Sanyo, and NEC).
One bright spot at CES was the announcement of a high-definition video and audio decoder chip that supports both formats, suggesting the possibility that future DVD players might handle both Blu-Ray and
HD-DVD disks.
The price tag is considerably higher than prices planned for DVD players compatible with the rival
HD-DVD format.
New molds for higher-performance optical disc formats such as
HD-DVD and Blu-ray have been developed by Axxicon Molds Los Angeles Inc.
The Swedish companies Alpha Sweden and M2 Engineering that make machines for DVD production are dependent on the outcome of the competition between the
HD-dvd and Blue-Ray formats.
As with first-generation DVD products, the blue laser class is evolving with two main competing formats: Blu-ray Disc and
HD-DVD. Two other high capacity formats (Enhanced Versatile Disc and Forward Versatile Disc) have been developed by government-related research projects in China and Taiwan, respectively, for those domestic markets.