One of the UK’s biggest DVD retailers, Woolworths, has decided to dump the HD DVD movie format in favour of its rival, Blu-ray.

This makes it the first major UK retailer to exclusively back Blu-ray and comes just a few weeks after key movie studios Warner Bros. and New Line Cinema defected to the Blu-ray camp. Rumours abound that Paramount – one of only two studios still backing HD DVD – could jump ship soon too.

The decision by Woolies was based on the fact that the Blu-ray movies outsold HD DVD movies by a factor of 10-to-1 over the Christmas period. Woolies claimed that high-def (HD) movie sales are rising by 40% every month while DVD sales remain ‘flat’. Only Blu-ray movies will be stocked in stores from March while HD DVDs will only be sold online.

“Sales figures clearly show that the market is moving towards one format of high definition DVD,” says Woolworths DVD buyer Steven McGunigel. “The main reason is the success of Sony’s PlayStation 3 machine. Because it plays Blu-Ray discs, there are over 750,000 homes in the UK that can view the new high definition format. There is no where near that number of HD-DVD players around. Switching to Blu-Ray only will provide one clear offer to customers in the format they want to watch high definition movies in.”

Sad to see a format dying off – and that’s what’s happening here – but the sooner there’s only one the sooner consumers can start buying HD movies without fear of them becoming obsolete in a year.

Now if only the Blu-ray camp made affordable players it would be perfect.-Martin Lynch

HD DVD blu-ray movies

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