It’s certainly a possibility. According to a thread over at the AVS forums, Wal-Mart recently placed an order for blue laser HD-DVD cores from a Chinese company worth close to $100 million dollars. With Wal-Mart buying 20 million of these cores that certainly have something in mind.

Running the Chinese websites through various translators people seem to be guessing at a $299 price point. We’re getting there but it’s still a little too pricey for the average consumer. It may not end the format war but like it or not Wal-Mart has the ability to tip the scales one way or the other all on it’s own.

[AVS]

Hooray for continuing to format war! Just as we began to see one format (Blu-ray) begin to show signs of pulling ahead we get the news that another set-top player manufacturer is preparing to make a dual format player. Samsung has now decided the time is right to help keep 2 formats in the marketplace. Time will tell if it plays both formats natively or in some weird emulated way like the last dual-format player.

Samsung says they’ll have the player ready for the holidays, but no word yet on features or price.

It’s not the 1st time we’ve seen the prices on the HD-DVD players drop. This time, they’re calling it a “strategic reduction” but we the consumers can think of it as “an increasingly better deal.” Looking to stave off the PS3 Blu-ray player, Toshiba is slashing the prices on all of their HD-DVD players. This means you can pick up their base model (the HD-A2) for $399 and their high-end model (the HD-A20) for $499.

Of course this still makes the HD-DVD add-on for the Xbox 360 the best deal if you’ve already bought the console and you’re looking to make the jump into HD.

[gamesindustry.biz]

I’ve seen alot of Bluetooth apps in my day, but this one is a complete first for me. Someone actually took the time and energy to build a program for a cellphone to be able to drive a full size car. Sadly the source site is in a language other than the one I’m able to (barely) speak, so search-me on how they managed to pull it off.
Amazing? yes. Useful? Probably not unless you’re a secret agent.

Don’t believe it? Check out the video.

[Slashphone]

News moves fast it seems. Between writing a story and publishing a story about possible DRM-free music coming to the iTunes music store, it seems like it’s actually going to happen. EMI has announced that it’s entire catalog of music will be available on the iTunes store without DRM restrictions. Chalk one up for the consumers. This move marks the 1st true step to a record company embracing digital downloads (welcome to 1999 guys).

But here’s the rub, the DRM-free songs will cost $1.29, 30 cents more than the till now standard $.99. Talk about a crap bait and switch tactic. We’ve known that the labels haven’t been too pleased with the .99 cent price tag, and they found a way to sneak in a .30 increase.
[EMI Group]

They’ve been a long time coming, but we finally have a company getting ready to release some Media Center PCs that are CableCARD-ready. Up until now there hasn’t been an easy way to get HD television into a PC if you were getting the signal from a cable company. They all make you use their own decoder (crap-tastic) boxes.

Luckily for all of us the gov’t forced the cable companies to offer an alternative to the boxes, and the CableCARD was the solution. It’s the way TiVo can offer an HD box (I had to get 2 cableCARDs from my cable provider for it to work). And now you’ll be able to do the same with this PC, thanks to its inclusion of AMD’s TV Wonder Digital Cable Tuner.

“The TV Wonder DCT is the first of its kind, giving PCs the ability to tune NTSC, ATSC over-the-air, QAM encrypted ATSC and CableCARD support.”

[DailyTech]

Just download the little app onto your (hopefully) supported Verizon phone and you’ll be able to look for programs and schedule recordings right from your phone.

Using menus that all TiVo members will recognize, you’ll be able to:

• Browse youy TV listings
• Get the TiVo “Daily Picks” and “Most Popular Shows,” rated by real TiVo subscribers
• Search programs by title, actor/director, keyword
• Browse by category

Announced over a year ago, it’s great to see this finally see the light of day. I’ll be downloading it right after I publish this.
[via TiVo.com]

Not exactly a gadget, but if you’ve got one of those new-fangled Blu-Ray players or a PS3 around now’s the perfect time to boost the ‘ol library. Amazon is running a 50% off sale on over 40 titles, and there’s actually a few decent ones in here. Black Hawk Down, House of Flying Daggers, Memento and more than a few others.

No time limit on the sale, I guess it’ll be there till they’re gone.

[Via TheLastBoss]

Watching the video below I was blown away by how seamless and awesome using one of these multitouch monitors must be. It’s right out of Blade Runner or Minority Report, and it’s just amazing to see in motion. But do we want them?

Think about it, right now we have a pretty comfortable spot with always having at least one hand on the keyboard and the other either on the mouse or also on the keyboard. Are you going to want to run both hands over the monitor screen to move windows around or zoom in on pictures? Personally I’d rather just stick to the mouse. Nonetheless, the demo IS incredible.

[Gizmodo]