Toshiba Moves Forward With HD DVD

MarketWatch:  It appears that Toshiba doesn't plan to revive stalled talks with Sony on unifying the format for next-generation DVDs. The two companies had been in negotiations to potentially avoid a "format war" like the one seen between the competing Beta and VHS videocassette formats in the 1980s - but at the moment there is a stalemate - so the battle for market dominance continues between HD DVD and Blue Ray..."We won't talk from our side," Toshiba Corporate Senior Vice President Yoshihide Fujii said yesterday at the firm's Tokyo headquarters and Marketwatch reports that his comment suggests the two sides are unlikely to reach an agreement before Toshiba's planned HD DVD hardware launch from late this year. Toshiba and partners (including Hitachi Maxell and Mitsubishi Kagaku Media/Verbatim) plan to begin shipping HD DVD players in the fall, with HD DVD recorders to follow in the spring of 2006.