Digital Trends

On purpose, I chose various types of film material, from action/adventure movies with a lot of special effects to romantic comedies to musicals — some were recent releases and others were classics from various studios. The images pumped out from the HD-XA2 and displayed on the Mitsubishi 1080p DLP set were so vivid and life-like that they looked like top-quality, true 35/70mm feature films shown at your local multiplex. All selections had a true film-like quality with superlative HD imagery. That’s how good the image quality was from the HD-XA2, as displayed on a next-generation HDTV.

 

It is something that needs to be seen to be believed, and heard to be fully appreciated as well. I believe that one thing that separates the XA2 from other players is the wise choice to include Silicon Optix Reon video processing. High quality video processing cannot be understated and can easily turn really good products into really great ones. Certainly, Toshiba wanted to put out the best possible next-generation, high-definition optical disc player, and they have with their HD-XA2.

 

So, why talk about HD DVD products anyways? I know that a good portion of the world thinks that the next-generation optical disc format war is over, with Blu-ray Disc being the de facto winner. Reportedly, BD movie titles are outselling HD DVD titles 2-to-1. Well, besides the PS3 that I have used, I'm still waiting for a review sample of a Blu-ray player from Sony, Pioneer, or Philips. Forget about Samsung for the time being. And, in terms of image quality, HD DVD can't be beat. HD DVD is also more affordable than Blu-ray; a $600 1080p with HDMI 1.3 will be available later this spring, but it won't include the Reon HQV chipset, which is worth the price of admission for the XA2. Toshiba's HD-XA2 is truly a player for all seasons and all formats, from SD to HD DVD.