I've kept pretty quiet on all the comings and goings that have recently happened in the format war over in the US because although they do ultimately affect us in the UK the direct impact for most of us are in the UK stores and what they are doing. Well now I can confirm that the Dixons Group has now dropped support of HD-DVD and will be focusing it's efforts on the promotion of Blu-ray as the new standard in Hi-Definition DVD.

 

Quote from HDTV UK:

 

"Dixons Online has claimed an immediate 150% increase in consumer interest for the Blu-ray high definition disc format after yesterday's announcement from Toshiba. In response, Dixons has withdrawn all models of HD DVD players from its online store.

Managing Director at Dixons, deVere Forster, comments: “This is good news for consumers as the availability of a single format will allow consumers to purchase the High Definition Blu-Ray format DVD player with every confidence and enjoy all the benefits that this fantastic format has to offer. Now that the winning format is clear, Dixons.co.uk’s aim is to have the UK’s widest selection of Blu Ray players available for customers soon.”"

The Dixons group(Actually called "DSG international") consists of Dixons, Currys, Currys.Digital and PC World. Basically this announcement means for certain that the UK Electrical outlets have indeed heeded the latest news in the US and make a decision to go Blu-ray exclusive. Good news for most consumers, the confusion over HD Disks for the mainstream was a fiasco for everyday folk. I personally know more than a few people that had picked up HD-DVD players over the last year that were under the illusion that they'd picked the player that had the industry behind it and would "win out" in the long run. Now thats not going to happen and the way forward is clear for consumers to buy in confidence the new DVD standard that's going to invade all our homes over the next few years.

As a summary as to whats happened over the last week or so in the U.S for those that don't know, NetFlix announced that it would be phasing out support for HD-DVD and concentrating it's efforts on Blu-ray. This move in itself was a blow to the remaining movie studios left supporting HD-DVD, with Blockbuster Rental already Blu-ray exclusive it mean't that the two major DVD rental companies in the U.S would'nt be stocking HD-DVD - a major loss of revenue to the studios.

On the very same day Best Buy(the U.S alter-ego to Dixons over here) also made an announcement that it would be recommending to it's customers Blu-ray over HD-DVD in future as the format to buy. With the American Electrical chain firmly backing Blu-ray the knock on effect was huge. Within a few days Wal-Mart - the world's biggest consumer sales company(Think Tesco's) released a statement that it was dropping HD-DVD, a MAJOR blow to Toshiba. Whilst Wal-Mart is technically a food store chain, in the same way as Tesco's have over the last few years it's expanded it's product range to encompass among other things electrical goods and with the huge number of people using the stores it has quickly become a huge seller of electronics to America.

Finally today, Amazon.com have added they're name to those companies endorsing Blu-ray over HD-DVD on they're sites. With all this happening in such a short space of time the shock and awe effect has forced Toshiba to come out with a major press conference announcing that as from end of March it would be giving up on HD-DVD. As the formats main backer of the technology this basically leaves HD-DVD without any major support within the industry.. and the fallout from it has already brought Universal Studio's, the formats long time exclusive backer to announce that it wil begin releasing it's films in Hi-Def Blu-ray as soon as it's able to. While we have'nt as yet heard anything from Paramount studios it can only be a matter of time before we do, also the interest in Paramount studio's in the UK is relatively small in itself since the majority of it's films are released by Entertainment in Video.. which already release on Blu-ray.