You may be wanting to buy a Blu-ray DVD player now that the format has won the high-definition disc standard war. By waiting a few months, you could save yourself some irritation. Blu-ray players are theoretically ideal complements to high-definition televisions because they can play movies formatted to take full advantage of an HD display.

But until recently, a battle raged between two competing formats: Blu-ray and HD DVD. The competition limited sales, in part because consumers worried about getting stuck with an obsolete machine. That fear went away in February after Toshiba, HD DVD's main backer, pulled the plug on the format, announcing it would no longer make new HD DVD players.

But Toshiba's decision only took away one of the reasons consumers might want to delay buying a Blu-ray player. Another reason is price. That's significantly cheaper than a comparable player would have cost a year ago, but industry figures and analysts predict prices will fall even more as the parts that make up the players become less expensive and more manufacturers make them.

Already, the number of different Blu-ray player models is expected to double to 26 in coming months, potentially offering consumers a better range of prices and features choices. Another reason not to rush to buy a player is that only about 500 movies are available on Blu-ray, compared with thousands on standard DVD. Unless you are looking for a recent hit or a popular classic, you probably aren't going to find it on Blu-ray.

Again, that's changing. Now that all the major studios are on board with Blu-ray, the number of film titles available should grow steadily. But the longer you wait, the more movies you'll have to choose from.

Waiting could also save you some operating headaches and ensure that your player is future-proof. Few DVD buyers in recent years have had to worry about updating their firmware - the embedded software program that controls how the device functions. Yet many owners of Blu-ray players have found that some movies won't play if they don't update their firmware.

Updating can be a complicated process of downloading files from the internet and potentially burning them to a CD. Amazon devotes an entire page to tips on how to do this. Many consumers may not want to bother - and probably won't need to as the technology matures.

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Danny
DVD News Editor
http://www.dvd-and-media.com