News and Reviews....

    Toshiba Up Conversion 2   August  2008

By Robert Lieto

    Toshiba launched a new up-converting DVD player some believe marks the company's latest effort to combat Blu-Ray DVD. The model XD-E500, selling for $149.99 differs from its other up converting players (priced from $79.99) by letting users manually upgrade the detail, color and contrast of their DVDs. The XD-E500 increases picture resolution from 480i/p to 1080p. The XD-E500 could be the answer to the question of "what do I do with my DVD collection". While the XD-E500 was never made to compete with Blu-Ray it will be answer to allowing existing DVD format discs to be played in HI-DEF.

Comment .....   Up conversion is a tricky process that is accomplished with hardware known as Digital Signal Processors (DSP) and software algorithms or codes that are applied to the video information through special chips known as Codecs.  Our techniques are here to bring the DVD close to Hi-DEF as we can get. We will probably know in six (6) to eight (8) months if the consumer will choose to up convert their existing collection or chose to upgrade their collection to Blu-Ray during this 2008 holiday season.

For information leading up to this article see:

    Toshiba Up converts     March 2008

    HD VMD    March 2008

    Blue-Ray Takes All   March 2008

    HD vs. Blue-Ray   April 2006

    Beyond the Blue Ray   February 2005

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