Toshiba Raises White Flag, Kills HD DVD

At last, it's official. Toshiba said today that it has given up on HD DVD, ceding the lengthy HD format war to Blu-ray.

After some last-minute hemming and hawing over the weekend, Toshiba—the prime mover behind HD DVD—finally threw in the towel, announcing that it will cease the development and sales of HD DVD players and devices, according to the AP. The move effectively ends the Blu-ray/HD DVD battle in one fell swoop.

The news leaves Blu-ray owners (including those with the Blu-ray-equipped PlayStation 3) sitting pretty with the HD disc format of the future, while those who bought HD DVD players (like your truly) have essentially been left high and dry. That said, Toshiba pledged to continue offering support for now-defunct HD DVD decks.

The HD format war has been a long, twisty tale, not only for industry observers and home video manufacturers but also for consumers, most of whom waited on the sidelines for the dust to settle before committing to one side or the other.

As it turned out, winning support from the major movie studios was a decisive factor. For many months, the balance of power shifted back and forth, with Blu-ray getting backing from the likes of Disney, Sony, Fox, and MGM, while HD DVD had the exclusive support of Universal, Paramount, and Dreamworks.

But in early January, Warner Brothers, which had supported both formats, jumped the HD DVD ship and went exclusively to Blu-ray, a development that Toshiba execs admit was the beginning of the end.

"That had tremendous impact," said Toshiba President Atsutoshi Nishiba during a press conference. "If we had continued, that would have created problems for consumers, and we simply had no chance to win."

Indeed, once Warners went Blu-ray-only, others began to follow suit. Netflix announced last week that it would phase out HD DVD rentals by the end of the year, and Wal-mart announced Friday that it would stop stocking HD DVD players.

For those of us left with HD DVD players, now what?

On the (small) plus side, expect more HD DVD disc fire sales like the one now at Amazon, except with even steeper discounts. Unfortunately, unloading your HD DVD player at anything more than at a fraction of the price will be next to impossible. It might be time to consider recycling—or stick it in the closet, wait 20 years, and sell it as a collectors' item.

Meanwhile, is it finally time to go Blu-ray? I'll be weighing in on that topic soon. Stay tuned.

Related:
Toshiba quits HD DVD business [AP, via Yahoo! News]