Seen in HD #15 – CableCard: What happened? Star Trek on Blu and more

It’s quiet around here. Too quiet. That’s kind of what it feels like in this post-Black Friday pre-CES month. Not too much news coming out as companies seems to be holding pat until the Vegas show in early January.

Also not much news about Black Friday yet either, a sure sign that it was bleh at best for the CE industry. Blu-ray marketshare for Black Friday week was 12% (only 12% we wonder?) of total packaged media (DVD and Blu-ray) but revenues for that week were a record $69 million.

More signs that studios are still trying to figure out where Blu-ray fits in the echosystem, many are pulling back on their efforts to release TV shows on Blu-ray, with recent casualties being Nip/Tuck and Rescue Me, among others. This begs the question, does every TV series need to be on Blu-ray?

In a Seen in HD First, our hearts are broken live on air. A story from Engadget HD about Toshiba’s Cell TV was updated it seems during the show, pulling Blu-ray from the spec sheet and leaving the Cell TV as what will likely be a very expensive TV with a set top box.

Finally, we look a t report from Ars Technica this week where the FCC in essence admits the CableCard is failing, and something else is going to have to fill its shoes. Why did it fail? What does it mean for the future? What happened to tru2way? Why must cable labs spell things so oddly? We’ll take a look.

In our Blu-ray review, we look at the 2009 Star Trek film. A very solid disc with some very minor video flaws and some very large lens flares go along with a stunning audio mix and a great slate of special features. But did they do right by the original Star Trek? Adam has some views on that.

Our HD picks for the coming week include a stunning admission of lying by Phil, who owns up to misleading listeners by telling them that Glee’s fall finale was last week when it is indeed this week. There’s also a nice slate of holiday specials this week as well, including a great HD film, The Polar Express Saturday at 8 p.m. on ABC. Also, for you Harry Potter fans the Harry Potter and the Half-Blood Prince Blu-ray community screening with Harry himself Daniel Radcliffe and director David Yates is December 12.

A quick journey through the HD sportsman sees college football slow down while basketball picks up quite a bit.

Finally, Inglorious Basterds headlines a solid slate of Blu-ray releases for Dec. 15.

One final note, we won’t have a new show the week of December 14, but we’ll be back the week of Dec. 21.

Click here to download Episode 15!

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