In DVD wars, winner on Main St is Blu-ray

NEW YORK/LOS ANGELES (Reuters) - Toshiba Corp (6502.T) may not have officially given up on its HD DVD format for high definition DVDs, but the word on the street on Sunday was that rival Sony Corp's (6758.T)(SNE.N) Blu-ray had won the war.

"Blu-ray won. It's fantastic and I trust Sony," said one customer, William, browsing the DVD player aisles at the Best Buy Co Inc (BBY.N) store on New York's Fifth Avenue.

"Blu-rays are flying off the shelves, but we have to order if you want HD," said Tania Bonetti, who works in the home theater section of the store, where DVD players cost from $399 to almost $1,000.

Another sales assistant, Michael, said: "We still sell HD DVD's but we are telling customers that Blu-ray won."

And in a sign that Main Street has already anointed Sony the winner, Blu-ray disc prices were slashed drastically at both Best Buy and at the next-door Circuit City Stores Inc CC.N, another of America's huge consumer electronics stores.

Both stores' fliers for their President's Day sales prominently featured select movie titles such as "300", "Ocean's Thirteen" and "The Departed" in Blu-ray format.

"Step into Hi-Def with Blu-ray," said Circuit City's ad, listing discs at $24.99 -- up to $10 less than normal. The ad did not even mention HD DVD format.

Best Buy had the same deals, with some Blu-ray titles as low as $14.99. "I have never seen Blu-rays on sale like this before," said Bonetti at Best Buy.

On Saturday, a Toshiba source told Reuters the Japanese company is planning to give up on its HD DVD format, conceding defeat to Blu-ray.

Separate consortiums led by Toshiba and Sony have battled for years to set the standard for the next-generation DVD and compatible video equipment.

The war, often compared to the Betamax-VHS battle in the 1980s, was blamed for slowing the growth of what is expected to be a multibillion dollar high-definition DVD industry.

Stephanie Prange, editor in chief of Home Media Magazine, said the war's end should boost high-def DVD adoption.

"It would definitely help. The two formats, though both were good, have confused consumers and prevented them from moving into the high-def future," she said.

Prange said Sony, which lost its Betamax bid, had its ducks in a row for the current format war. It lined up early studio support and included a Blu-ray player in its new PlayStation 3 video game system, creating an instant customer base.

"This time I guess they learned from their mistakes," Prange said of Sony.

Toshiba suffered several setbacks in recent weeks, including Friday's announcement by retailing giant Wal-Mart Stores Inc (WMT.N) that it would abandon the HD DVD format and only stock Blu-ray movies.

"Toshiba's plan all along was to be the low-price version. If Wal-Mart isn't going to sell their players, who will?" Prange said, noting that Wal-Mart calls itself the low-price leader.

Akeem, the Circuit City sales assistant, said he was still selling lots of players in each format. And for customers who did not necessarily care about the format, there is a model by LG, selling for $599, that plays both HD and Blu-ray.

And Best Buy's Michael said some people were buying Toshiba units, even though they know Blu-ray will be the format of the future. "They figure that HD discs will become cheaper."

(Editing by Jeffrey Benkoe)