FRED MANTEGHIAN BLOG

Michelle Kessler who covers technology for USA Today has a great little (short) read on price sensitivity in today's electronics marketplace. It's not how high of a mountain you shout from after all. It's how far the people listening are willing to tilt back to hear you.

For instance, Tim Bajarin, a researcher with Creative Strategies says that angle is $399.

Not $400.

So where does that put us? A few days ago Toshiba announced three new HD DVD players, two of which were at or below $399. A Chinese HD DVD player is due in stores this fall (allegedly lead-free but I wouldn't suck on the remote)

Still, rumors of Blu-rays ascendancy run rampart. A friend walked into a local dealership last week (looking for free advice no doubt, before he bought on-line) and was told by the salesman that Blu-ray was the way to go, that it was kicking HD DVD's butt. Hmmm. That's certainly what they want you to believe.

But we know that Sony blew out all the existing stock of 60 GB PS3s that were starting to cause pile-ups in the supply chain lanes when they cut the price to $499. And now rumors of a 40 GB PS3 selling for – yup - $399 surfaced today, further fueling speculation that things aren't necessarily as clear cut as that local dealer insists.

Even if that magic number is hit before the holidays, not everyone wants a video game console for their player. Especially not college professors who leave their wives to marry grad students and then want to raise their new offspring in the ivory tower environs that attaining tenure demands.

Okay, that was random.

Dedicated Blu-ray players are around $500, and nothing announced at Cedia seems to indicate that's about to change any time soon or any time soon enough. Coupled with the new incentives that will hit the HD DVD player market later this year, like getting a player with two free HD-DVD (Bourne Identity & 300) in the box and a coupon for another five free HD-DVD for around $250 is going to move a heck of a lot of boxes.

And so, the battle (en)rages.