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TOSHIBA BROADENS DVD, DTV LINES

Expanded DVD line unveiled by Toshiba at Pasadena line show included company’s long-awaited DVD-RAM recorder with built-in hard disc personal video recorder (PVR) portable universal DVD player with 8.9” LCD screen it said was industry’s only portable with progressive scan.

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Toshiba again left little doubt of its strong support for DVD-Audio. DVD Product Management Dir. Craig Eggers conceded format wasn’t receiving quite as much support from industry overall as Toshiba would like to see. Nevertheless, he said he believed 100 or so DVD-Audio software titles now available would grow by 240 by year-end. There’s “a lot of potential in the marketplace” for DVD-Audio and “we're really behind the format,” he said. He said Toshiba still had no plans to support Super Audio CD.

SD-P2000 portable is scheduled to ship in June at $999.99. Eggers said that while DVD was fastest selling product category in CE history, it also had seen fastest price erosion. DVD Mktg. Dir. Jodi Sally said portable DVD players had started representing large slice of overall DVD sales and had seen 50% sales growth in year. While average selling price of portable DVD player overall in market now is $550, Toshiba’s prices are considerably higher in category, she said: “Toshiba has been very successful at the high end and has no plan to change its strategy at this time.” Other DVD-Audio models from Toshiba this year include SD-4800 progressive scan model at $279.99, slated to ship in July, and SD-5700, already shipping at $399.99. Also expanded by Toshiba this year is its line of DVD/VCR and DVD/TV combination units.

Company said it planned to ship RD-X2 DVD-RAM and PVR combo in fall at $1,499. Unit, which Eggers said Toshiba had been developing for more than 2-1/2 years, offered time-shifting and editing capabilities via 80-GB hard drive. While he said DVD-R functionality built into RD-X2 allowed for universal compatibility with almost every DVD-Video player ever manufactured, virtue of DVD-RAM was that it allowed record and overwrite up to 100,000 times on single disc.

As for competing high-definition DVD recordable formats, Eggers said Toshiba believed all proposals -- including Blu-Ray format that it isn’t supporting -- should be considered “within the context of the DVD Forum… Let’s just put all of the technologies up there and let’s get the best format out. And maybe there’s aspects of one format that can be integrated with other formats -- just like we did with DVD. We're interested in the very best possible format for the consumer and we're also interested in compatibility.” What is crucial, Eggers said, is that discs for one system can be played on DVD players consumers already own. Proposal selected, he said, should be one “the consumer can have confidence in.” Although 9 major companies -- including Warner, with which Toshiba has had close relationship on various initiatives -- have backed Blu-Ray, Toshiba has opted to support its own 30 GB proposal. However, that has yet to receive official backing of any other company. While Toshiba previously said it planned to present its proposal to DVD Forum, Eggers told us he wasn’t positive whether that actually had been done yet. He also said he didn’t know whether it had been demonstrated for any Hollywood studios.

Although Toshiba introduced DVD player in 2000 equipped with Nuon interactive technology enhancements by VM Labs, it put technology on back burner in 2001. Financially troubled VM Labs never managed to raise enough funds, and software support also stalled. Although VM now is under new ownership with Genesis Microchip having 15% stake, privately held company’s plans are unclear. Eggers told us Toshiba had no plans to market Nuon DVD player again at this time.

Meanwhile, despite originally announcing plans to market PVR product, Toshiba said at its line show one year ago that it was holding off until 2002. But Eggers said company still had nothing to introduce in that category.

Toshiba expanded its overall analog and digital TV lines for 2002. Cinema Series line, celebrating its 10th year, has 15 new models, including 9 HDTV-compatible and 6 widescreen. Line includes top-of-the-line 57HLX82 57W rear-projection model ($8,999.99) that Toshiba showed at CES in Jan. It uses liquid- crystal-on-silicon (LCoS) technology. Mktg. Vp Scott Ramirez, who said model was highest resolution TV ever, declined to say who was supplying Toshiba with microdisplay. One possibility might be Viewsonic, which is working with Three-Five Systems and has OEM agreement with unidentified Japanese CE manufacturer. Toshiba said it planned to announce additional LCoS models, but didn’t provide further details. Ramirez said, however, that 57W model would be only one from company this year.

Also new from Toshiba this year is Model 15DL72 15” LCD TV, due in July at $1,499.99. Ramirez told us he was hoping 20” LCD model, which company demonstrated at line show, would follow 15” by first quarter 2003 “in the $2,000 range.” While Toshiba plans to introduce additional LCD models, he said “probably nothing [will be] over 30 inches.” Company also introduced 2 widescreen plasma displays offering what it called “True HD” (720p) resolution -- 50” 50HP82 ($13,999.99) and 42” HP82 ($8,499.99), each to ship in 3rd quarter. Its overall projection TV line has 16 models ranging in size from 42” to 65”, plus 12 HDTV- compatible models and 9 widescreen sets. All feature newly designed silver cabinets, including new 65W 65HDX82 Cinema Series at $3,799.99 with new split-cabinet design Ramirez said was intended to make it easier to carry TV into house. Demonstrating model, Toshiba showed how screen easily could be lifted off entire cabinet. Underlining company’s commitment to be strong in every TV category, including analog models that it said various competitors were abandoning, Toshiba also introduced expanded line of flat-screen FST Pure Color TVs. Line offers 17 models including 6 HDTV-compatible sets, 2 new 34W types with Digital Visual Interface (DVI) and High-bandwidth Digital Copy Protection (HDCP) interface. DVD and HDCP also play key roles in DST-3100 2nd-generation DirecTV DSS receiver Toshiba plans to ship in 4th quarter at $799. It said DVI technology allowed high-quality reception of DirecTV HD services and HDCP made possible security of copyrighted high-definition programming.

Although Toshiba and Canon signed pact in 1999 to jointly develop surface-conduction electron-emitter (SCEE) displays (SEDs), no product has yet been announced for U.S. market and Ramirez told us no information had been made available even to him out of Japan as of last week about plans on that front. However, Toshiba is expected to release 1-2 models for Japanese market in 2003.