HD-DVD drives have been available for several months now, long enough for the early birds to give them a try. While HD-DVD and BluRay propagation is still fairly small, largely due to high prices and few titles, Toshiba is getting ready to launch their second-generation models. Among other things, the new player will come in two varieties, including a "basic" model that has a pricetag of only $450, a much more palatable amount than the $900+ the majority of players cost. With more titles being made available and more displays capable of higher resolutions, the second gen players will probably see much more sales than first gen did:
"Considering that the number of titles has just reached 100, with some in the United States, we have also sold tens of thousands of HD DVD players," said Yoshihide Fujii, president of Toshiba Digital Network Co. Brisk sales "encouraged us to introduce two models to the world market."
Toshiba expects that the units as an aggregate will reach 600,000 within the next five months, and increasing to 4 million during 2007.