Following Warner’s Blu-ray Only announcement, Blu-ray’s hardware was a comfortable 90% of the market share. However, what wasn’t mentioned is that this figure was unintentionally leaked as it accounted for “free Blu-ray player” promotions.

As a strike back, Toshiba’s $100-200 price cuts on their players went into effect on January 13th which probably accounts for the sales spur. We’ve seen the Toshiba HD-A3 for $199 and this can be lower?

Source: http://www.pocket-lint.co.uk/news/news.phtml/12532/13556/hddvd-figures-recover-in-states.phtml

“Strike back”?  Toshiba dumped the format.  The only reason HD DVD player prices dropped so low was so retailers wouldn’t be left with obsolete product that no one wanted.

why would anyone want to buy a player for a format that is no longer supported?

A lot of thrifty people saw this as a chance to grab some super cheap HD players and movies, and took advantage of Toshiba giving up.

Most of the HD-DVD movies I’ve been buying lately are DVD/HD-DVD combo discs, so if my HD-DVD player ever dies I’ll still be able to watch the DVD side just fine.