Toshiba Reveals XD-E500 Upconverting DVD Player

So what do you do when you lose a costly format war, refuse to market a Blu-ray player and want to slow down potential customers warming to new technology? Well, if you are Toshiba, its simple: You market a new super-upconverting DVD Player!



Our friends at Engadget have taken a look at the US version of the player and to be fair they remark that it sets out to do what it claims to do; nothing more, nothing less.

Now, don't get me wrong, upscaling technology rightly exists in the market, especially to families starting to invest in new HD panels. However, if there are only 576 lines of resolution (as with PAL video), there really is only so much that can be done to further improve it.

The standard definition colour field can only display so many colours. And thats also not forgetting that half of the upgrade to Blu-ray is high definition sound. DVD will only ever be lossless audio in Dolby or DTS flavours, with heavily compressed audio. Moving up to Blu-ray affords the ability to have lossless sound. Which is basically like listening to a 192 kb MP3 and then listening to the original CD.

Toshiba Australia haven't issued word on when we will be receiving the units, but I will try and get my hands on one for a TweakTown show down. Until then...