Sharp announced three new Blu-ray Digital Video Recorders with different hard drive capacities. The BD-HDW22 with 250 Gigs, the BD-HDW25 with 500 Gigs, and the great BD-HDW30 that will be able to store 1 Terabyte! Even though this sounds exciting the DVRs will not record from BD to HDD, so not ripping Blu-ray discs will be possible with them.

These babies will be available in Japan in early July and have no set prices yet. All three media. DVRs record video in MPEG-4 AVC/H.264, with three different Bitrates (4.8, 8 and 12Mbps). They are equipped with both digital and analog TV Tuners. and will do not support the AVREC function, which allows recording of High-def broadcasting on DVD. As far as Blu-ray player capabilities, they are pretty ordinary…nothing really cool. The HDMI interface outputs 1080/24p content, and bit stream DTS-HD Master, Dolby NR TrueHD, DTS-HD HRA, and the Dolby Digital plus audio.

As usual Japan is always leading the pack when is comes to new technology and this time is no different! Apparently Sharp has really decided to invest on Blu-ray players and maybe shifting a little its focus on HDTVs to our “Blu” friend. We can’t complain! The more players on the market the more competitive things will get and consumers will see the benefits!

You can see the original press release here! Let me know if you need help with your Japanese…

Popularity: 12% [?]

Sony Pictures announced a July full of bloody horror releases. The company will bring some red to the Blu on July 22nd… Let’s hope that all that blood will look good in HD. You should expect:

‘The Exorcism of Emily Rose‘ will come on 2.35:1 1080p with 5.1 lossless English soundtrack

‘Urban Legend‘ will come 2.40:1 1080p AVC with 5.1 TrueHD soundtrack

‘I Know What You Did Last Summer‘ and ‘I Still Know What You Did Last Summer‘ will come 2.40:1 1080p AVC video with 5.1 Dolby TrueHD soundtrack

Sony’s suggested price on the movies is around $28.95 but Amazon has them on pre-order for $19.95

As soon as more details become available we will update this post.

Popularity: 15% [?]

Now that HD-DVD has kissed goodbye to the market for a couple of months. The companies which supported the format are starting to put their heads down and announce their plans to release blu-rays. Today it was Universal’s turn to give more details on their migrating plan. Universal was one of HD DVD’s biggest supporter but when Toshiba pulled the plug on the format the studio was fast on raising the “white flag” and joining Sony’s Blu-ray.

Universal announced today that starting in July; we will be seeing their films coming out on the “Blu” format. The first batch will include: The Incredible Hulk, Wanted, Hellboy II: The Golden Army, Mamma Mia!, The Mummy: Tomb of the Dragon Emperor, “Heroes: Season Two” and many others.

“We’re thrilled that our preliminary slate of Blu-ray offerings comprises such a brilliant collection of high-def centric fare,” said Mr. Craig Kornblau, President, Universal Studios Home Entertainment and Universal Pictures Digital Platforms. “As awareness for Blu-ray continues to grow, consumers will learn to rely on the superior quality picture, sound, interactivity and connectivity that only high-definition home entertainment delivers.”

It will be exciting to see all Universal’s successes in high definition and by Mr. Kornblau’s comment they will inundate the market with their films.

Popularity: 8% [?]

Coming out on Blu-ray this July, “Point Break” was not a huge success when it was first released but its popularity has been increasing ever since. Today, it is considered a cult film, which appeals to a lot of people because of the idea of lifestyle and freedom that we all would like to enjoy.

“Point Break” tells the story of the cop John Utah (Keanu Reaves) hunting a bunch of bank robbers camouflaged with masks of the former U.S. presidents. His investigations lead to a group of surfers and extreme sports worshipers, and the cop becomes fascinated by the lifestyle philosophies and adrenaline rushes of the gang around the charismatic leader Bodhi (Patrick Swayze). Their close friendship changes to a hard-fought rivalry at the end when cop and gangsters face point blank.

Kathryn Bigelow (Director) uses American surf beach settings for this unusual and very stylish action thriller with great stunts like parachuting scenes, bank robberies, a car chase, police raids, martial arts, breath-taking chases and brilliantly photographed surf sequences. Watch out for the Red Hot Chili Peppers as a gang of brutal surf Nazis beating up Keanu Reeves and being captured by him during a hard-fought police raid.

But “Point Break” is even more than that - it also shows the lifestyle of the nineties in many ways. Bodhi and his gang are a group of New Age-like grunge guys reaching out for the most extreme adrenaline experiences. They stand for the new style of extreme/fun sport worshipers, ravers and new spiritualists of the post-yuppie era in the nineties who don’t care about wealth and status symbols but for fun, action, breaking the limits and finding the sum of all senses. “Point Break” is not only a well-done example of modern action entertainment without computer-generated special effects but also a very philosophical and spiritual study of society in the nineties.

We do not have many details on the technical specs of this Blu-ray besides these:

Video Resolution/Codec

• 1080p/MPEG-4 AVC

Aspect Ratio(s)

• 2.35:1

Audio Formats

• English DTS-HD Lossless Master Audio 5.1 Surround
• English Dolby Digital 5.1 Surround
• English Dolby Digital 4.0 Surround
• French Dolby Digital 2.0 Surround
• Spanish Dolby Digital 1.0 Mono

Subtitles/Captions

• English SDH
• French Subtitles
• Spanish Subtitles

Extras

• 4 Featurettes
• 8 Deleted Scenes
• Still Gallery

Popularity: 14% [?]