Audio Video News

HD DVD launched in retail stores with something between a whimper and minor bang earlier this week. Although there were only two HD DVD titles from Warner available in most stores, <I>The Last Samurai</I> and <I>Phantom of the Opera</I>, Toshiba's initial, admittedly smallish run of players was sold out after just two days of availability.

ScreenTek, a company that sells laptop replacement screens (who knew there even was such a thing as a laptop replacement screen? I thought you were simply out of luck...), has developed a cleaning solution for LCD screens that are not in need of being replaced. Called PixelClean, the new screen cleaner was developed for high-gloss LCD screens like Sony XBRITE and Toshiba TruBrite - although the formulation is supposed to work as well on other types of flat-panel screens, such as less-advanced laptops, plasma TVs, and LCD TVs.

Before the first consumer players - that's right, players - have even hit the market, TDK has started shipping cartridgeless 25GB recordable and rewritable Blu-ray Disc (BD) discs to retailers and is thus claiming bragging rights as the first company to bring blank BD media to the market. TDK Vice President of Marketing, Bruce Youmans, went so far as to say being the first to introduce recordable BD discs "can be counted among the most significant product introductions in the company's distinguished 70 year history."

JVC announced a number of new additions to its lineup of video displays at January's CES. But the company showed at an off-site hotel and there just wasn't time to get to it. At a recent event in the Los Angeles area JVC exhibited its new models for dealers and the press.

In late March, Internet-based video-on-demand provider Akimbo Systems announced an agreement that will allow it to offer select titles from HDNet's vast library of HD content to its customers. This is Akimbo's first offering of HD content through its Akimbo Service for Windows XP Media Center Edition.

<B>Blu-ray Movies Scheduled For Release On May 23rd- Will There Be Anything To Play Them On?</B>
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Can there be a format war if neither side shows up? Samsung officially announced this week that its BD-P1000 Blu-ray Disc (BD) player will not be released in time for the currently scheduled BD software introduction on May 23rd. The company will now launch the player on June 25th, claiming the delay is necessitated by a lack of software needed for compatibility tests of the players.