This ginormous disc changer lets you load up to 400 Blu-ray discs (or for you hillbillies out there – DVDs and CDs). In addition to playing a ton of discs without ever leaving the comfort of your BarcaLounger, the player can automatically download Gracenote MusicID and VideoID data over an Ethernet connection, saving all of the information (including cover art) that you need to easily navigate disc titles onscreen. Plus, navigation is easy, thanks to the familiar Sony “Xross” media bar interface that’s made its way onto the PS3, PSP and recent Bravia TVs.

The bad-boy of a player features all of the high-end features you’d expect to find on a top-of-the-line Blu-ray player, including full HD 1080p video and 24p support for optimal playback of movies shot on film. The changer also sports an advanced upscaling system for those rare occasions when you have a crappy old DVD lying around. The Cinema HD upscaler dynamically adjusts image quality at the per-pixel level, which is a rarity in cheap Blu-ray players. Audio support includes Dolby TrueHD, Dolby Digital Plus, DTS-HD and DTS-HD Master Audio 7.1 channel sound.

You can get your hands on the Sony BDP-CX7000ES Mega Disc Changer over on Amazon with prices between $1798 to $1899 (USD).

[screenshot via Engadget]

Now you can bring back those fond floppy memories with these clever floppy disk gift tags. Edinburgh, Scotland crafter feelfuzzy makes these gift tags from leftover retro 3.5-inch floppy disk labels, adhered to heavy card stock, and hung from a string.

They’re available over on Etsy for $5.50 a pack of 5. Of course, if you happen to have box of floppies lying around, just grab a drill, punch a hole through the corner of the disk itself, and you’ll be just that much cooler when you hand out the presents.

Designer Naoto Fukasawa actually took home the coveted Red Dot Design Award for his UFO-like lamp design, which provides both direct and diffused illumination from a low-energy (5 watt) LED light source.

A set of double joints allows the stem of the Zamac (zinc alloy) lighting fixture to tilt from 0 to 90°, while the head of the lamp can be rotated through a full 180° of freedom.

The ITIS lamp comes in both high-gloss black and high-gloss white finishes and is available from Stardust.com for $395 USD.

While it won’t handle transfers of DIVX, MiniDisc or SelectaVision Videodiscs, the BetaMaxHD will convert between two of the most undoubtedly out-of-fashion consumer media formats money can (or can’t) buy.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

I’m not sure how I missed this one back on April Fools’ Day, but I thought it was too good to not mention.

I think I’ll stick with my cassette to 8-track tape converter.

While the game has been resurrected numerous times on everything from CD-ROM to DVD to PC, this is the first time it’s making its way to true high-definition disc formats.

Bucking the recent industry trend of Blu-ray only releases, the classic title will be hitting both Blu-ray and HD DVD formats, and will support widescreen Full HD (1080p) resolution. The game has been lovingly restored and remastered from the original film footage, and pumps up the volume with an enhanced 5.1 surround soundtrack.

Expect the title to include interactive gameplay using your video player’s remote control (or your PS3 controller), as well as picture-in-picture commentary by the games original creators Don Bluth, Gary Goldman, and Rick Dyer.

Space Ace should hit stores on April 8th for a rather pricey $49.95. Digital Leisure has started to accept pre-orders now. While you’re there sure to check out Bluth’s other classic, Dragon’s Lair in high def if you haven’t already.

[via Punch Jump]

The player includes CyberLink’s PowerDVD BD Edition, providing playback of Blu-ray discs on your computer screen. In addition to store-bought Blu-ray movies, the player supports discs burned in MPEG-2 or H.264 format, and standard DVD discs or recorded DVDs encoded with MPEG-2 or AVCHD formats.

The $199.95 BDU-X10S is available for pre-order now and should start shipping later this month.

Unlike some of the more cryptic modern watches coming out of Japan these days, the Seiko Discus is actually quite easy to read. A set of three numbered discs continuously rotate to display hours, minutes and seconds. The wheels are are partially masked by a frosted glass face with a clear glass window highlighting the current time. If you can’t figure that out, a tiny pair of green arrows on the glass make it even more obvious what time it is.

The Discus is part of Seiko’s Moving Image series, a line of automatic timepieces with decidedly contemporary styling. It’s available in two versions: one with a stainless body and white face, and another with a black metal body and a smoked glass face.

While the Discus is not officially for sale in North America, I was able to find a couple over on eBay, priced at about $890 each.

After dropping the price on Toshiba’s HD-A2 HD DVD player to $199, there’s now an ad that shows an unbelievable price of $98.87. I’m sure this is a loss-leader for Wally World, but it’s still but it’s a clear sign that the HD DVD camp means business. As far as I know, the sale is a one-day only deal for this Friday (November 2, 2007 starting at 8am), but I wouldn’t doubt that the regular retail price for these players drops close to this level as the holidays approach.

With the cheapest Blu-Ray players running around $400 (on sale), these kind of aggressive discounts will help HD DVD gain ground on what was a losing battle up until now.

[Wal-Mart via Engadget HD]

The Cathay PK-24 desktop stereo looks like a miniature grand piano, but when you pop its lid, there’s a CD player hiding in there. Playback controls have been cleverly disguised as piano keys, and the speakers are hidden in the sides of the piano case. It’s also got an FM radio built in for those days when you’re tired of your Beethoven and Bach and want to listen to some commercials instead.

And if the basic black baby grand doesn’t excite you, it’s also available in white and hot pink versions. The piano CD player is currently only available in Asia, where it costs a whopping ¥19,000 (about $173 USD, yeesh).

According to the artist, the rings that surround the Free Time watch signify “The cycle of life, with a beginning, middle & end is synchronized by the 3 rings and guide us along our path to openings where time limits are set free. Our journey through time, passes the story of our past & present, to a hopeful future”. If that’s too thoughtful for you, just take it at face value. It’s a cool looking watch.

The Free Time comes in a unisex design and has an all stainless steel body. It’s also water resistant up to 3 atmospheres (about 100 feet). The $90 watch is available with either a black leather or stainless steel band from Projects US.

New Medium Enterprises’ (NME) proprietary HD VMD (Versatile Multilayer Disc) format uses standard red lasers, but crams in 4 layers per disc to handle the data needs of full high-definition content. VMD’s cost advantage comes from the fact that discs and players can be produced using much of the already existing infrastructure that’s set up to produce standard DVDs. First generation VMD will store up to 24GB, but there are already plans in the works to expand this capacity further using more layers, and potentially thinner wavelength blue lasers as prices come down.

The manufacturer claims the format supports full 1080i and 1080p resolutions, as well as bit rates up to 40 Mbps (about half way between the two competing HD formats). The players support video compressed in MPEG- 2, MPEG-1, VC-1, H-264(AVC) formats. As an added bonus, HD VMD is region free, so you don’t have to worry about where you bought your discs. Audio support includes Dolby Digital and DTS, but none of the more advanced audio formats you might find on Blu-Ray and HD DVD players. Even the least expensive HD VMD players offer HDMI and component outputs, and will scale old-school DVDs up to 1080p over the HDMI connection.

The most obvious downside to the budding format is the current lack of available content. NME has only scored distribution rights to a a handful of movies that I’ve ever heard of. Launch titles include: Hostage, Apocalypto, Pulp Fiction, Babel, Saw II and Saw III. Most of the other movies are either lesser-known independents, older films or Bollywood features from India. It’s doubtful that the company will be able to garner support from most major studios, given their already significant investments in the other HD formats. With HD DVD and Blu-ray prices on the decline, HD VMD will face a serious uphill fight.

A couple of builders from Germany painstakingly dissasembled an old 5-1/4″ hard drive, recalibrated the motor to run at a speed that lines up the drive precisely with marked hour indicators, then modified the head mechanism to move in 60 step-per-hour increments to indicate minutes.

For some reason, they weren’t able to get the motor to turn at exactly 24 rotations per day, instead turning 32 times, and quickly skipping the four “hours” between 12 and 1 on the dial.

Incredibly, the entire device is built from recycled parts (note the old power supply unit that serves as a base). Other than the electronics which control the speed and sequence of actions, the hard drive mechanism remains pretty much unchanged from its original state.

You can read more about the complexities of this very cool build here.

[via Hackaday via CrunchGear]

Daniel’s Circles Mirror is an amazing combination of mechanical and digital technologies. By using a radial gradient from black to white, each of the 900 overlapping discs rotates to create the illusion of shades of grey.

Rozin create custom software to convert the digital images captured by a video camera into data which could be used by the motors which rotate the circles.

Click to View Embedded Video Clip

Be sure to check out Daniel Rozin’s other interactive works. If you’ve never seen them before, they are really quite amazing. Daniel is represented by bitforms gallery in New York if you’re interested in any of his works.

The BD-HP20S will feature full 1080p resolution with 24 frame-per-second playback, which is ideal since most movies are shot at 24fps. The player will also have an HDMI 1.3 interface and Dobly TrueHD audio playback as well. It’s also supposed to offer a new “Quick Start” capability which should have movies playing faster than previous players.

It’s expected to retail for around $499, but with a likely PlayStation 3 price drop any day now, I wouldn’t be surprised to see street prices go lower than that.

[via High-Def Digest via Gizmodo]

To shake the old CD up a bit, the designers of Poland’s Baba Akcja have taken the boring round disc and turned it into something far more visually interesting.

The discs were designed to symbolize various computer viruses, but I’m just drawn to the bright colors and shapes. My personal favorite: the tribute to the old 5-1/4″ floppy disk.

Given their odd shapes, I’m not sure you’d ever get these discs to survive spinning around in your CD player at thousands of revolutions per minute, but I still think they look cool.

[via DesignSpotter via GeekAlerts]

That’s right. Starting on July 1 and running through September 30, purchase a Blu-ray player and you’ll be able to redeem a coupon for FIVE free movies (from a selection of twenty-two pretty decent titles). Even the PlayStation 3 qualifies for the offer (60 GB model only though.)

Here’s a list of all the qualifying models:

Some of the free titles include Species, Underworld, The Italian Job, Corpse Bride and Babel among others.

The official site for the promotion isn’t open yet, but it should be in a couple of days.

[via Blu-ray.com via High-Def Digest]

The Black Jax Odyssey Ultimate Flying Disc is loaded with four extra bright LEDs, powered by a rechargeable Lithium battery.

Amazingly, even with the circuitry, the disc weighs in at an impressively light 185 grams, ensuring a smooth flight through the air. The Odyssey is available in red, blue and green versions, and costs just under 20 bucks.

[via 7Gadgets]

The BDP-94HD is a true second-generation Blu-ray player, featuring such niceties as CEC to control other devices control over HDMI cable. The player also has full support for Dolby TrueHD and Dolby Digital Plus 7.1 channel audio. In addition, Pioneer has included their Home Media Gallery feature that allows streaming of video, music and photos from your network-connected Windows PC.

Aimed at the high end of the market, the $1000 player should be hitting stores later this month.

If this really comes to fruition, the retail giant could be the one to make the difference in the high-definition format wars. With their purchasing muscle, cranking out millions of players that cost this little could retail in the $100 to $200 range, which could be a huge blow to the Blu-ray camp.

[via Gadgetell]

Apparently, Microsoft is now offering a disc replacement program for certain Xbox 360 titles. According to the site, they will replace certain discs that have been damaged for any reason for $20 bucks each.

The program currently covers a limited number of titles, including:

• Crackdown
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