The Toshiba HD-A2 HD-DVD player delivers 720p/1080i resolution at a transfer rate higher than DVD or even HDTV, resulting in a more detailed, realistic picture. Advanced audio, including Dolby® TrueHD, Dolby® Digital Plus and DTS® HD (core only), along with legacy formats including Dolby® Digital and DTS® bring an increased sonic realism to movie soundtracks. Backwards compatibility means you can enjoy your existing library of DVDs and CDs, and through the process of upconversion using HDMI, your movies are scaled to match the resolution of your HD display. An interface suite includes an abundance of audio/video connections as well as an ethernet connection for firmware updates and future internet delivered features.
HDMI™ can support uncompressed digital video up to HDTV resolution. The HD-A2 player makes use of this conduit by up-converting the standard DVD picture resolution of 720p or 1080i. This makes a DVD player with an HDMI™ connection the perfect match for today’s digital televisions. And because this conversion is performed in the player, the signal remains free frome excessive digital to analog artifacts.
The HD-A2 has built-in processors to handle the multi-channel decoders for Dolby Digital, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby TrueHD , DTS and DTSHD. It employs the use of four DSPs to decode the multi-channel streams of the wide array of audio formats. These 32-bit floating-point DSPs are world renown for their high accuracy and are employed in many high quality audio solutions in the home theater market.
This HD-DVD player is also sold under the model number HD-D2 at wholesale stores like BJ’s, Sam’s Club, and CostCo.
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Toshiba HD-DVD Player HD-A2 Main Specifications
HD DVD playback (including Combo. Format Discs), DVD and DVD-R/-RW DVD upconversion via HDMI™ Video Upconversion - 720p/1080i Video Output: 1080i/720p/480p/480i Built-in Dolby® Digital, Dolby® TrueHD, Dolby® Digital Plus, DTS®, and DTS® HD Advanced high-performance 32-bit SHARC® Digital Signal Processing HDMI 1.2a interface, component video, S-Video, composite video Ethernet connection
Toshiba HD-DVD Player HD-A2 Reviews
CNET has a review of the Toshiba HD-A2 and writes, “The good: Relatively inexpensive; excellent image quality on HD DVD; solid upscaling performance on DVDs; Ethernet jack for firmware upgrades; onboard Dolby TrueHD decoding; much faster load times than its predecessor. The bad: No 1080p output; HD DVD could lose the format war; no multichannel analog outputs. The bottom line: Offering most of the performance of more expensive players, the HD-A2 is an excellent value for budget-minded buyers looking to jump into HD DVD.”
HDTV Magazine has a review of the Toshiba HD-A2 and writes, “Overall the HD-A2 is a great way to jump into the next generation DVD game. It’s only $100 more than the Xbox 360 add on drive (or even less if you’re watching the sale prices) and will always be a very good up-converting DVD player, even if the HD-DVD format eventually goes away or merges somehow into a consolidated format. The audio and video quality are amazing. If you like watching Discovery HD Theater simply because it looks so darn good, you’ve got to get an HD-DVD player.”
Toshiba HD-DVD Player HD-A2 Press Release
Featuring the superior video and audio capabilities of the first generation models and implementing key enhancements to further improve product performance, Toshiba’s HD DVD players set the new standard in high definition technology.
“We are very pleased with the launch of our players and the progress we have made in the past six months,” said Jodi Sally, Vice President of Marketing, Toshiba America Consumer Products Digital A/V Group. “I am confident that our HD DVD players, which provide stunning HD image quality with a variety of advanced high resolution audio options, offer a great value for consumers today.”
The new high end Toshiba HD-XA2 HD DVD player is designed to output 1920 x 1080p, the highest HD signal currently available, via High Definition Multimedia Interface (HDMI(TM)) 1.3. HDMI version 1.3 is the most current, major enhancement of the HDMI specification, which adds support for Deep Color technology. The HD-XA2 also incorporates a 297MHz / 12 bit Video DAC with high-quality, 4x oversampling for increased bandwidth for true playback of an HD picture to a video source. The HD-XA2 comes with a picture setting function allowing customers to optimize picture quality with user adjustable settings for color, contrast, brightness, edge enhancement and block noise, among others. The new HD-XA2 HD DVD player’s 1080p output capability complements Toshiba’s new Cinema Series® Pro LCD TVs, which provide true HD 1080p input capability via HDMI.
The HD-XA2 will be one of the first next generation players to support the video portion of HDMI version 1.3. HDMI 1.3 supports the demands of future high definition display devices, such as Deep Color enabling 36-bit (RGB or YCbCr) color depths, up from the 24-bit depths in previous versions of the HDMI specification. This allows Deep Color compatible display devices to deliver outstanding video quality.
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Posted: Matt on Oct 29 06 | Toshiba, HD-DVD Player | 
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