FYI for anyone interested. I just saw Panasonic's new BDP 60 at Best Buy for $299. No sign of the 80 but I'm guessing thats on its way.
Panasonic BDP 60 Now Available
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Amazon has it listed as "click to see price". When I clicked, it came up as $299.80, a savings of $0.15
I guess it will be hot and pricey for a few weeks yet.
Being that it just came out, $299 is no surprise. I figure it will drop $25-$50 by Easter. The new Samsung came in at $299 four weeks ago and now Best Buy is giving away a free Bond Blu-Ray with purchase.
? How?
Sold it on ebay earlier this month after buying it on the amazon deals they had with all the movies (back in Nov?). The demand for those models was crazy recently (which I assume it died down now that the new line is out)
I got it through the amazon deal also. I don't think the 60 has 5.1 out, so I won't be doing a switch-a-roo. Looks like they're still selling on ebay for at least $260.
With the Japanese Yen being so strong lately it's pretty difficult for Japanese electronics companies to make serious price cuts on their products. They're already losing a lot of money on their exports. The Yen will have to weaken some -at least get back to the ¥100 = $1 level.
Back in the 1970s the exchange rate was over ¥300 to the dollar.
Later this year going into Fall, as the American economy starts to recover in the consumer sector, we could see more serious price cuts on standalone Blu-ray players. I'm still convinced we will see at least a few Blu-ray players priced under $100 on "Black Friday."
Rumors are still flying about a price cut on Playstation 3. Don't know if that will actually happen.
Aside from price cuts, succeeding generations of Blu-ray players are going to add some key features that help justify a higher price tag above DVD-only players.
None of Panasonic's BD players currently offer built in Wi-Fi. Sony has a new player (the BDP-S560) coming in May that features built in N-type Wi-Fi capability. LG and Samsung also announced Wi-Fi capable BD players at Winter CES. By fall, built in Wi-Fi should be a pretty common thing. For the longest time the PS3 was the only BD capable device with built in Wi-Fi.
BD players will need to have some "media center" capability. The PS3 already has a lot of this capability. You can have it show up on a computer network and stream audio/video files to it. I have a 1 terabyte external hard disc attached to my PS3 for playing back my entire music CD collection (with all tunes ripped to the disc as LPCM WAV files). I think standalone BD players need similar capability. I'm not sure if the ones that have USB ports will support something like the massive hard drive juke box I'm using on my PS3.
At any rate, this fall should be interesting for Blu-ray. The BD format should lift itself to a higher plateau of market penetration.
Back in the 1970s the exchange rate was over ¥300 to the dollar.
Later this year going into Fall, as the American economy starts to recover in the consumer sector, we could see more serious price cuts on standalone Blu-ray players. I'm still convinced we will see at least a few Blu-ray players priced under $100 on "Black Friday."
Rumors are still flying about a price cut on Playstation 3. Don't know if that will actually happen.
Aside from price cuts, succeeding generations of Blu-ray players are going to add some key features that help justify a higher price tag above DVD-only players.
None of Panasonic's BD players currently offer built in Wi-Fi. Sony has a new player (the BDP-S560) coming in May that features built in N-type Wi-Fi capability. LG and Samsung also announced Wi-Fi capable BD players at Winter CES. By fall, built in Wi-Fi should be a pretty common thing. For the longest time the PS3 was the only BD capable device with built in Wi-Fi.
BD players will need to have some "media center" capability. The PS3 already has a lot of this capability. You can have it show up on a computer network and stream audio/video files to it. I have a 1 terabyte external hard disc attached to my PS3 for playing back my entire music CD collection (with all tunes ripped to the disc as LPCM WAV files). I think standalone BD players need similar capability. I'm not sure if the ones that have USB ports will support something like the massive hard drive juke box I'm using on my PS3.
At any rate, this fall should be interesting for Blu-ray. The BD format should lift itself to a higher plateau of market penetration.
On the virtues of patience.
1 week later, Amazon is listing it at $267 with one associate store offering at $251. Wait a month and everyone will be below $250.
1 week later, Amazon is listing it at $267 with one associate store offering at $251. Wait a month and everyone will be below $250.
