Xbox 360 HD player cut to $179

again, the early adopter (me) gets screwed.... awesome

Seabiscuit and Sky Captain deserve to be games. ;)

animeluvrboi "Apparently, people complain about Sony copying others and yet MS does the same thing yet worse. WTH?" The only difference is that all you have to do is buy the hd dvd player for xbox360 ($179) and get five free movies. the playstation offer is that you have to buy a console ($500) and they you get five free movies. so I would thing even though both movie line suck, I still think it makes sense to go with the hd dvd side.

Having consoles that play HD movies is a good thing.

People seem to forget that the Wii doesn't even play DVD movies. Hasn't affected its sales one bit. So why do folks jump all over the PS3 BD/360 HD-DVD argument? Does anyone really care about the format wars? Until a standard is reached, I refuse to back either one. And yes, that means I won't be buying a PS3 until it drops waaaaaaay down in price because the inclusion of BD is meaningless to me.

hd dvd's can play in dvd players too if the disc is in both high def and standard u just wont get the high def

Wow...a lot of not so great movies as well...however 300 for download is cool =)

Yea Sony deal isn't any better. From that list i would get Chicken Little (for my daughter), Devil's Rejects (which is not crap imo), and the Corpse Bride. Then with my last two choices, i would do the same trade-in process as the HD-DVD movies. yea.

Right now both Blue-ray and HD-DVD are completely useless to me. DVD is the only truly dependable format available. Besides, the longer everyone just keeps their money away from all the HD-DVD v. Blue-ray drama the quicker the prices will keep dropping.

animeluvrboi, the Sony five disc deal was just as bad, if not worse. I can't pick out a single BD off this list worth getting...for free. Remember this? All crap. Babel Black Rain Blazing Saddles Chicken Little The Corpse Bride The Devil's Rejects The Guardian Hart's War Invincible The Italian Job Kiss of the Dragon The Last Waltz The Omen [2006] Pearl Harbor The Phantom of the Opera Resident Evil: Apocalypse Species Stealth Stir of Echoes The Transporter 2 Underworld: Evolution

Welcome back to the VHS vs. Betamax days. Does a format war benefit any of these companies seeing how it's going to take years for one to nudge ahead?

Apparently, people complain about Sony copying others and yet MS does the same thing yet worse. WTH?

I figured they wouldn't actually let you choose from their entire selection. From what they are offering i would keep: The Chronicles of Riddick, Constantine, & Sky Captain. Then i would check how much credit i get for the rest from Gamespot and choose according to trade-in credit. Theni would trade-in Sky Captain after watching it a few times. yea.

I don't need HD-DVD. And I don't need Blu-ray. That's why I didn't buy a PS3 or the HD-DVD add-on for my 360. I'll let the fanboy brats argue this one out while I'm busy PLAYING GAMES.

Who picks these movies? With the exception of a few most of these movies are garbage and don't make me want to go out and scoop up an HD DVD drive even if it were only $100.00 especially since I've already seen and/or own 90% of them already.

For those of us who are movie buffs. There is ONE solution that will be hard to fathom and that is to just ..... WAIT.

Microsoft should have the price at $100,or have it included in 360's.

I think I will have to buy an HD DVD player now but I still don't have an HD TV yet.

Why is there any competition? Did DVD have any competition when it came out? If so, it was locked away only to be remembered by the biggest video nerds. Anyway, I seriously hope these two formats join forces and stop with this competition. It's rediculous. You didn't see people thinking about which version of a movie to get when they are the exact same thing. My solution: Whichever one's cheaper.

None of those movies spark my interests.

Go HD-DVD!!

After all the money they invested in R&D, the HD-DVD consortium should have provided the players for free to be built into all Xbox 360s and share the costs among themselves. Today they'd have an installed customer base of over 10 millions players out there and HD-DVD would have had a chance. Their lack of vision and marketing savvy means that Sony's Blu-Ray format is on the verge of becoming the new standard because it was included in the PS3s and the millions invested in the development of HD-DVD will be for nothing.

Microdoft is to cheap to include any extra's in their console. Then they shove expensive add-ons down their userbase's throat. Then it's sad how Microcrap says We here at microcrap give our consumers's a choice in the format war, unlike Sony. Well Sony owns Blu-Ray so duh, how stupid can they get. And if they offer a choice then where is the Xbox 360 Blu-Ray addon.

If you guys think MS is including a $50 HDMI cable your nuts. MS is including a cheap (read - sub $15) HDMI cable you can buy off the Internet just as easily for the PS3.

I'd like to see this format war come to a screeching halt as soon as possible. I've got the HD-DVD for the 360 and I really enjoy it. It stinks to see movies like Casino Royale on Blu-Ray and know I'll have to buy a player or PS3 to watch it. If more less-expensive versions of the players that play both HD and Blu-Ray were out there, I'd be a happy camper.

cool, Rattle and Hum for free!

Wow, so now Microsoft has to offer Sony's Blu-Ray deal to sell the HD-DVDs...Goes to show you that DVDs work just fine these days.

The HD-DVD movie library is horrible, how are they trying to attrack more users?

I hate the movie format war. Video game format war creates competition which in turn creates new innovations in gaming technology and thats a good thing. But movie format wars don't have the same effect.Blu-Ray and HD-DVD are not worth it right now. Most of the HD videos available are bare bone releases so studios can rerelease them 2 years from now as a special HD edition and they're expensive.

adamska_br Xbox Elite + HD-DVD playa = 479 + 179= US$658,00 PS3(80GB) = US$599,00 Simple mathematics. ---------------------------------------------------------------------------------- Umm, you forgot the fact that PS3 still needs the $50 HDMI cable, making the 360 $8.99 for 40 more gigs of space. That's the difference. And don't throw out that WiFi crap unless the new PS3 uses WiFi-N since I would never play any fast pace games with a B or G standard. I don't think the $20 cut + 5 movies is a bad deal at all. That $20 is almost enough for me to get 300, which is better on HD DVD anyways.

Who cares, HD-DVD will be dead in a year.

Does anyone care?

Why would anyone want HD-DVD bundled with the 360, do you want to pay $499 and $599 for your 360? Yeah I thought not. High definition DVD is still a waste of money. It would be wise just to wait to current DVD gets discontinued because you're not going to notice any huge leaps with high def DVD unless you've watching your DVDs from a SDTV.

Hmm. That's actually kind of tempting. The list of freebies is kind of lame (like most of the HD-DVD and Blu-ray library), but if I bought one I'd get The Rundown, Constantine, Tomb Raider, Chronicals of Riddick, and Sky Captain. To be honest, I'm tempted to get an HD player (HD-DVD or Blu-ray) just for Heroes.

i was waiting 4 a 50 dollar price drop

hmmmm.......hard to pick 5 when they ALL suck (save for Blazing Saddles, its a classic, but seeing a classic in HD isnt THAT big a deal)

I love the Sony guys claiming a drop in price of the HD-DVD player means both the 360 and the HD-DVD are "losing" this round. Did the PS3's "bait and switch" temporary price drop a few weeks ago also signal the Blue-Ray's death? Yeah, I didn't think so. This is a price drop and that's damn good for consumers no matter how you look at it. Maybe this will motivate Sony to actually ask a reasonable price for their next-generation paper weight.

amazon rankings aren't a great way to see if something is popular. Since we don't know how they calculate their rankings (though here's a story about how to cook the rankings in your favor) << LINK REMOVED >> it makes it difficult to know how this particular hd-dvd player is doing (which might just be marginally better than the blu-ray player listed at #16). Seeing it on sale by $90 (a 30% discount) might explain something... especially if their "best-selling" figures are updated hourly as they mention. It's still not selling like hot cakes... it's ranked 97th/100 for the top 100 electronics. It would be better if they showed how MANY have been sold. If they sold 2 today vs. 1 of every other dvd player, does that mean it is king?

I think it's funny that everybody is acting as if the future of the Xbox 360 is at stake over this. If HD-DVD doesn't win the format war, it won't affect the 360 whatsoever.

The HD DVD format is losing the war, but the addon is still neat. It's better then most $500 HD Players and even though Blu-Ray is winning, the HD format still has it own great exclusives.

Microsoft should try to bundle the HD-DVD player with the console at a reduced price, or possibly make a promo where if you buy any of the XB360 sku's along with the HD-DVD player, you could save $100, (get the player for $99.99 with a system purchase). The PS3 is Blu-Ray's trojan horse right now and making the player a more attractive offer to the consumer could give HD-DVD a shot in the arm. HD content is still years away from being the new standard, just as many people still set a VCR to record their shows instead of a TiVo or DVR. For every early adopter out there for new technology, there are about 1,000 others who are about 10 years behind the times. I just think it's going to take more than a $20 price cut and a restricted selection of titles to get XB360 HD-DVD players flying off of shelves. Don't get me wrong.... I'd love to have one, but until the library of titles starts chugging along, I'll just stick with my DVD's and my 1080i upconverting Onkyo DVD player.

wow, a 20$ price drop. This should've been included w/ xbox 360's in the 1st place, even if it were to mean to raise the price by like 50 canadian dollars.

I have the HD attachment and it is my feeling the HD is going to lose this battle. However, it does upconvert your current DVD's to near HD quality if you are using the VGA cable or have the elite running HDMI.

Sweet I'm getting one for sure now. I just got an HD TV two days ago so this is perfect. Oh yeah and U2 FTW!!!!

On July 31st, I'll enjoy HD 300 on blu-ray thanks to my PS3 with surround sound and I'll wet my pants again (from spilling coke since the movie is just awesome and makes me jump ; )

I'll just download the movies in HD on my Elite. XBL FTW!!!

Not to insult my fellow overseas gamers, but the HD-DVD vs BR war will not be decided anywhere else but in North America. This is where the studios are and this is where the major distribution deals come from. Oversea deals are strange I have to admit. A fox film might be distributed by Universal and a Universal film by Paramount (just as an example). The format winner here will ultimatly spreadout elsewhere in the world as, North American films are released here first. This anti-trust deal going on in Europe is simply another futile attempt from the HD-DVD camp to delay the inevitable. The reasons they did it in Europe was because HD-DVD until, recently, had an edge in market share, and now that is threatened as well.

adamska_br, your math is not so good. You were showing if you bought the top of the line PS3 or 360. $500 for the PS3, $300 for the 360, plus $179 for the HD player. $500 for the ps3 (which has no games) vs $479 for the 360 with HD player (many good games). Also, you miss the point that if you have the right drivers, you can use the HD DVD player on the pc, therefor making it only $179, much cheaper than your $600 waste of money!

yaya its going down 20 bucks!!!! lol thats all you can do microsoft? greedy bastardos that would pit your 360 at around 500 bucks better off getting a ps3 and GETTING A LOT MORE FOR YOUR MONEY especially a good high definition player, not a wannabe add on attachment that has been proven to be sub par quality