Pioneer Electronics has announced their latest internal Blu-ray drive burner– the BDR-2203. Shipping in April with a suggested price of $249.99, the BDR-2203 has the following features:

• Writes up to 8x speed on BD-R & BD-R DL and up to 2x on BD-RE & BD-RE DL Blu-ray Disc Media
• Writes up to 16x speed on DVD-R/+R, up to 8x on DVD-R/+R (DL), up to 8x on DVD+RW, up to 6x on DVD-RW, up to 5x on DVD-RAM, up to 32x on CD-R, and up to 24x on CD-RW
• Reads up to 8x speed on BD-ROM/BD-ROM DL, BD-R, and BD-RE and up to 6x on BD-R DL and BD-RE DL media
• Reads up to 16x speed on DVD-ROM, DVD-R/+R, and DVD-Download, up to 12x on DVD-ROM DL, DVD-RW/+RW, and DVD-R/+R (DL), up to 5x on DVD-RAM, up to 40x on CD-ROM, up to 32x on CD-R, and up to 24x on CD-RW media
• Includes CyberLink PowerDirector, PowerDVD, and Power2Go software applications
• SATA interface

A couple of things stand out to me. First off – burning 25GB of data to a single layer BD disc will take approximately 15 minutes while burning 50GB will take approximately 30 minutes. Nice. Secondly – the price. It has a suggested price of $249.99 which means street prices will definitely be lower. Time to consider getting an internal Blu-ray drive finally.

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Read this in Chinese Simplified and in French

Technorati Tags: Pioneer Electronic, BDR-2203, Blu-ray Burner

Victor-JVC announces the new DR-BX500 Blu-ray HDD Recorder in Japan. Coming out in November, the DR-BX500 features a 500GB hard drive, two digital TV tuners, one analog TV tuner, and a Blu-ray burner. Specs include:

• Record in MPEG-2, MPEG-4, AVC/H.264
• 1080/24p support
• 10/100 Ethernet port
• HDMI, Deep Color support
• Measures 430 x 77 x 361 mm
• Supports BD-RE, BD-R, DVD-R DL, DVD-R, DVD-RW

According to Akihabara News, the DR-BX500 will be available for a price of 1299€.

[Check it out via Akihabara News]

Technorati Tags: Victor-JVC, DR-BX500, Blu-ray HDD Recorder

Looking to upgrade your internal DVD drive on your PC? How about trading it up for a new Sony third generation BWU-300S Blu-ray writer? The device has a suggested price of around $400 dollars and has the following features:

• Supports single and dual layer BD-R media at up to 8x speed
• Records 25GB disc in approximately 15 minutes; 50GB in approximately 30 minutes
• Records DVDs at up to 16x
• Records CDs at up to 48x
• Supports DVD-RAM recording
• Comes bundled with “Men in Black” Blu-ray Disc
• Includes CyberLink’s software suite
• SATA interface

The Sony BWU-300S will be available starting next month.

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Technorati Tags: Sony BWU-300S, Blu-ray recorder writer

Buffalo Technology is now offering two Blu-ray DVD Combo drive solutions – the MediaStation 8x External Blu-ray drive (model BR-816SU2) and the MediaStation Internal Blu-ray drive (model BR-816FBS). Both drives offer 8x read/write speeds for BD-R media – making the drives some of the fastest out there today.

Both MediaStation drives support the following media types: Blu-ray BD-R 8x, Blu-ray BD-RE 2x, DVD RAM 5x, DVD –R 16x, DVD +R 16x, DVD-RW 6x, DVD +RW 8x, CD-R 48x, and CD-RW 24x. 

The external MediaStation connects to a PC via USB 2.0 or eSATA while the internal MediaStation connects using a SATA interface. You’ll get a Cyberlink software suite bundled with these drives which include applications such as PowerDVD, PowerDirector, Power2Go, PowerBackup, and PowerProducer.

Both drives will be available later this month with the MediaStation 8x External Blu-ray drive selling for $399.99 and the internal MediaStation 8x Blu-ray drive selling for $349.99.

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Technorati Tags: Buffalo Technology, MiniStation 8x External Blu-ray Drive, MiniStation 8x Internal Blu-ray drive

Pioneer has introduced two new standalone Blu-ray recorder device with built-in hard drives – the BDR-WD900 with 1 terabyte of disk space and the BDR-WD700 with a 500GB HDD. Features of the Blu-ray recorders include:

• Double digital TV tuner
• BonusView support
• Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio support
• Compatibility with KURO Link
• Variety of input and output connectors including HDMI, Component, Composite, and S-Video (though it’s not clear if there are component inputs on the recorder which would be a shame)

The new Pioneer Blu-ray recorders will be available in October with the 1TB version going for 1900€ and the 500GB model going for 1200€.

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Technorati Tags: Pioneer, Blu-ray recorder, BDR-WD700, BDR-WD900

Hitachi Home Electronics has introduced a new next-generation Blu-ray Disc Hybrid Camcorder called the DZ-BD10HA which seemingly has all the different storage options covered. First off, the DZ-BD10HA has a built-in 30GB HDD which allows you to record up to 4 hours, 20 minutes of full HD video or 8 hours, 40 minutes of 1440 x 1080 video. If you run out of disk space, you can also record videos or still images directly to SD/SDHC flash memory cards via the built-in SDHC card slot. Nice huh? But wait.. there’s more. Hitachi offers yet a third solution – the ability to transfer full HD video recordings from the hard drive or SDHC card to the built-in BD drive – and all this without the need for a computer. The DZ-BD10HA includes editing functions such as splitting, splicing, deleting, merging, and transitions. There’s even a transcoding feature which coverts full HD videos to DVD quality videos. Very Nice.

Other features of the Hitachi DZ-BD10HA include:

• 7 megapixel CMOS image sensor
• Capture videos and image stills at Full HD (1920 x 1080)
• Face detection technology
• Hitachi developed compact, low power consuming, quiet, and reliable 8cm BD/DVD drive
• One-touch dubbing – transfer HD videos from SDHC or HDD to BD drive at one push of a button
• Optical Image Stabilization

The Hitach DZ-BD10HA will have an MSRP of $999 and is available in Japan now and will be hitting the US shores in Sept.

Technorati Tags: Hitachi, DZ-BD10HA Blu-ray Disc Hybrid Camcorder

Panasonic will be releasing a new internal Blu-ray burner in Japan on Sept. 13th called the LF-PB371JD. The drive supports a multitude of formats including BD-RE, BD-R, BD-ROM, DVD-RAM, DVD+-R, DVD+-R DL, DVD+-RW, DVD-Video, DVD-ROM, CD-R, CD-RW, and CD-ROM. Other specs include Serial ATA support, 8MB cache, and support for Windows Vista, and Windows XP.

[Check it out via TechFresh]

Technorati Tags: Panasonic LF-PB371JD, Blu-ray Burner

Now that Sony’s won the Blu-ray vs. HD DVD battle, it’s time for Sony to solidify it’s position in the Blu-ray hardware space. To that end, the company has announced a new line of Blu-ray recorders for Japan called the BDZ series. Models in this new lineup include the A70 which comes with a 320 GB HDD and the high end T90 model which comes with a 500 GB HDD. Both models are capable of receiving unencrypted HDTV signals and can record video in AVC (H.264) format – either straight to the hard drive or to a Blu-ray disc. The systems are also capable of converting videos into other media formats for devices such as the Sony PSP. Other features include analog/digital tuners, Sony’s Room Link, HDMI output, S-Video output (why?), and RCA jacks. Expect systems to show up in Japan around April 30th for at least $1664. Above is the A70 and below is the T90.

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Technorati Tags: Sony, BDZ, Blu-ray recorder, A70, T90