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Sky is to acquire Amstrad’s set-top business for 125 million pounds. If the deal is approved by Amstrad shareholders, the satcaster will find itself with an in-house hardware division that should enable it to speed up new tech developments and better control costs. Hitherto, the company maintained that it did not want to be in [...]

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Spartan epic 300 may be headed to Blu-ray for a second time. Speaking at the San Diego Comic Con, Deborah Snyder, wife of director Zack Snyder and executive producer of the movie, admitted that the film could be re-released with new extras that bring it more in line with the current HD DVD title, when [...]

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It’s all but been written off as a consumer format, killed by its conflict with DVD-Audio, but that hasn’t stopped Sony from finally introducing a Super Audio CD capable head-end for the in-car entertainment market. At the American launch of its XAV-W1 DVD/SACD player, Sony’s mobile electronics marketing manager, Kengo Kurokawa, said the product addressed [...]

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Spider-man has helped Sony double last year’s Q1 profit. The success of the super-hero movie, coupled with strong sales of cameras and computers, helped the company post a 66.46 billion yen profit in its first quarter financials. Sales were up 13.3 percent to 1.977 trillion yen. There was bad news from its TV division though, [...]

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In the US, Microsoft is cutting the cost of the Xbox 360 HDTV disc to 180 dollars. Buyers will also get to pick five free HD DVD discs as part of a generic format promotion. The reduction, which begins on August 1, is expected to herald a more general cut on the console itself. Says [...]

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An upcoming range of LED backlit LCD TVs from Samsung boast a dynamic contrast ratio of 100,000:1, thanks to so-called local dimming technology. The brand’s new 81 series models also offer 1080p resolution and a 178 degree viewing angle, courtesy of a new Super Patterned Vertical Alignment (SPVA) panel. The screens range in size from [...]

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An unlikely marriage perhaps, but a newly announced alliance between Sky and Sony could breathe new life into the PSP handheld. The two will begin a video download service to PSP owners in the UK and Ireland “early 2008”. The plan is to turn the PSP into a media player with access to a huge [...]

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Samsung has finally firmed up details of its first combination Blu-ray HD DVD player. The BD-UP5000 Duo HD will sell in the US for 1,049 dollars and offer full compatibility with HD DVD (including iHD interactivity), Blu-ray Disc, DVD and CD. It will also incorporate HQV video processing from Silicon Optix, for upscaling SD to [...]

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