Fate Of High-Def DVD May Lie With MICROSOFT

(From The EE Times)

After months of intense wrangling between the competing
BLU-RAY and HD-DVD groups, the battle lines in the war over a next-generation high-definition DVD format have moved to the doorstep of MICROSOFT CORPORATION.

Several industry sources last week told EE TIMES that MICROSOFT is muscling into the optical-disk fray by leveraging its operating-system clout to bundle HD-DVD within VISTA, the company's next-generation OS.

There's also talk that the software giant may be planning to
offer cash incentives in the form of "coupons" to system vendors or retailers if they agree to support HD-DVD. Such coupons would provide "credits" or "memos" for each PC that is sold with HD-DVD inside.

Many consumer electronics companies in the BLUE-RAY camp are scrambling to figure out, respond to and possibly preempt the next move by the world's largest and richest computer software maker.

Fate Of High-Def DVD May Lie With Microsoft