Samsung Blu-ray player hits UK at over twice its US price!

The next generation format war has just hit the United Kingdom on Monday, with Samsung introducing its DMP-BD-P1000 Blu-ray disc player to the shops.  Samsung advertises this as being the world's first commercial Blu-ray disc player and expects several thousand units to be sold by Christmas.

Unfortunately, while this Samsung model has already fallen below $750 in the US at some stores, it is priced at a whopping ~£1,000 in the UK, which works out at around US$1,870 or about 2.5 times their current lowest US pricing.  Panasonic's Rival Blu-ray player, the DMP-BD10 will go on sale at around 50 "Shop @ Panasonic" stores later this week, but at a higher cost of £1,299 (~US$2,430).  Pioneer, Sony and Sharp are also expected to launch Blu-ray players early next year with pricing of around £1,000.

The rival next generation format, HD DVD seems to be more favoured when it comes to early reviews, significantly lower pricing and its range of titles available.  Toshiba expects to launch their HD DVD player next month in the UK with a significantly lower price of £450.  Unfortunately, this works out at ~$840 or around double the US pricing also.

MAKE room for yet another remote control to get lost down the side of the sofa. A new generation of higher-definition, higher-capacity and vastly more sophisticated DVD systems will hit UK shops over the next few weeks, but the fact that they are divided into two rival non-compatible systems may leave potential consumers bemused and wondering which to spend their money on, while some observers are predicting a "format war" along the lines of the Betamax versus VHS video stand-off of 30 years ago. This week Samsung introduces its DMP-BD-P1000 Blu-ray disc player to UK stores, touting it as "the world's first commercial Blu-ray disc player" and expects to sell several thousand of them in the run-up to Christmas. It will cost around £1,000. Also appearing on the UK market is another, slightly more expensive, Blu-ray system, from Samsung's rivals Panasonic. Next month, however, a rival system, HD-DVD, will be introduced by Toshiba. It will cost around half the price of the Blu-ray machines but claims equally impressive improvements in both definition and in storage capacity.

With standard DVD players already selling for under £20 in the UK, there is a good chance that only those with a high income or who really want to be one of the first will grab a Blu-ray disc player.  At the moment, it is unclear when Blu-ray disc players will become region locked.  However, if Blu-ray will lack region coding, a consumer would most likely be better off flying to the US to pick-up a Blu-ray player, as the price difference would not only cover their flight costs, but potentially also cover the costs of a short holiday also!  Unfortunately, regardless of which method the consumer chooses, if the HD DVD format wins the war like how VHS won the early tape battle, they could end up with an expensive obsolete product within the next few  years.

Source: Scotsman