Blu-ray players made news at CEDIA this week, the Custom Electronic Design & Installation show in Atlanta. Pioneer introduced the first THX-certified device, the Elite BDP-09FD with a price tag of $2200. Russ Johnston, EVP for home entertainment business solutions group for Pioneer said, “We’re having trouble keeping it in stock at retailers.” I’m not sure who’s rushing out to buy a $2200 Blu-ray player. Maybe each store only gets one, a savvy marketing strategy used by Microsoft for the Xbox 360. For those who demand the best in their home theater equipment, here are the specs for Pioneer’s BDP-09FD: True 24fps at up to 1080p resolution...

We now know a little more about the new iTunes 9 that is set to come out soon. We knew that it would be Blu-ray friendly and include some sort of social network integration, but we weren’t prepared for this. According to Boy Genius the new iTunes 9 will be a giant resource hogging monster with the following specs: • Blu-ray integration to go with Blu-ray support in upcoming Macs—iTunes 8.2 sorta kinda pointed to Blu-ray, if you recall • Ability to re-arrange your iPhone/iPod touch apps in various ways (the one feature I actually want) • Social networking integration: This seems like it'll start out slightly more involved than say, iPhoto's Facebook integration...

All the Apple fanboys are finally getting some Blu-ray love. BoyGeniusReport reports that one of iTunes 9’s newest features will be Blu-ray support. The timing seems right. The annual Apple media event is just around the corner and this seems like that type of announcement that would make that agenda. Other improvements include the ability to visually organize and arrange your iPhone and iPod touch. There is also a Twitter/Facebook/Last.fm integration. We’re not sure what that is exactly, but I guess you’ll be able to instantly broadcast to your friends what songs you’re listening to? I guess we will have to wait for Apple to officially announce this until we know...

Here’s one more nail in HD DVD’s coffin. Rumors indicate that Toshiba will release a Blu-ray player by year’s end. In case you haven’t been following the whole HD DVD vs. Blu-ray war going on, Toshiba was one of the biggest proponents of HD DVD. As if we didn’t know HD DVD were dead already, this perhaps could be the final blow. I mean, really, how many of us are actually buying HD DVDs today? Exactly. It’s about time Toshiba admitted defeat and made a Blu-ray player to drive prices down further for cheap people like me. The new player is rumored to be released sometime before Christmas, although we don’t know where. Probably Japan though. They...

How's that for keeping the consumer happy (or at least not too bitter)? It's been some time since Blu-Ray clearly took over the HD front. But rather than being a sore loser, now you can take advantage of your old HD-DVD coasters and turn them into Blu-ray discs.If you've got a stack of Warner Bros. films on HD-DVD, simply go to Red2blu.com and exchange your discs to Blu-ray. In fact, you don't even have to send the actual disc. Just send the cover art sleeve and the UPC (because cover art sleeves might be easy to copy/procure otherwise). Oh, and $4.95 per movie and $7-9 shipping and handling (drat!).There are some stipulations, like 1 copy per household, 25 movie limit. So if you have...