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The news continues to roll in about the fantastic, almost to the point of being ridiculous, sales of the Toshiba HD-A2 at the price point of $99 from a variety of resellers, including the 5 (or more) free HD movies, by mail.

According to the trade magazine, Video Business, last weekend saw the sale of over 90,000 of the HD-A2 players. The Toshiba executives in Japan must be wetting themselves right about now, as that figure doesn’t complete the picture.  That estimate includes none of the online offers, which apparently have exhausted (or come very close) the supply of the units in America. The problem became severe enough that Best Buy began replacing the online orders not able to be filled with the slightly more expensive, and not ready to be deeply discounted, HD-A3. While the customers are undoubtedly going to be happy, and Best Buy will get a big boost in the customer satisfaction surveys, it is not clear why the HD-A2 was not more well-supplied, as it is always clear in these pushes, how quickly the pricing will be allowed to drop, usually by the manufacturer affording the resellers some form of profit protection, to allow the frenzy to begin.

Toshiba HD-A2

Since the HD-A3 was being dropped in price so quickly, the list price has been adjusted to $199, moved down from $299. Again, those Best Buy customers are very happy right now!

just a little more slick in appearance the HD-A3, a great deal when had for $99!

All of this brouhaha comes without any news from the Blu-ray camp, who are either totally unprepared, which would be hard to fathom in this age of no real secrets, or that the Blu-ray boys are simply sitting back waiting to strike with a blow that will astonish the remaining customers on the fence. There is no way that Blu-ray will be allowed to stay at the elevated current price levels; the market simply doesn’t work that way.

Another odd thing about the process that is unfolding is how Toshiba appears to be the only purveyor of product that is seeing advertised price cuts. Obviously, other manufacturers have lowered price points, and resellers have adjusted accordingly, but seldom have I seen a situation where only one brand name ‘leads the charge’ so to speak, with not even small notices for other makers. This is perhaps the greatest mystery of this entire process.

If Sony is going to have a surviving format, it is going to have to get its partners on the stick with some players at a price point that will entice people to buy. In a recent poll, of those who knew what Blu-ray was, only 6 out of 10 knew that the Play Station 3 plays Blu-ray content, so Sony clearly is not getting the word out to the people it needs to. Also, it should probably reassess the idea of letting the PS3 lead the charge. Many people I have spoken with see no need to buy a game console to play movies, when they will never play games on it. Sony either needs to get a straight player out quickly for less money, or re-purpose the ad campaign for PS3 to target non-game buyers (that’s read adults, for the most part) as possible buyers, and speak to the possible customers about the upcoming extra features, such as DVR capability.

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the phantom Blu-ray player - keeper of the faith - where can it be?

Time will obviously tell, but Sony must remember that there was no second chance for Beta, when it was clearly superior technically both before and after it became HiFi. Clever ads managed to outflank a better product, and it met an ignominious end.

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