Online Price Dip: $440 for a 40″ Toshiba 1080p HDTV?

Prices are continuing to slide downwards for new HDTV units, seemingly hitting new lows every few weeks now.

Amazon has, for example, a really cool deal on a 40″ 1080p Toshiba HDTV with a USB connection and loads of good features, well-rated on the site as well: $440, brand new? Pretty amazing indeed, as our predictions of pricing sliding downwards is coming true pretty rapidly. We only hope this spurs slightly lagging sales into the new 2011 model year, as technology and TVs are looking better overall than they ever have.

It’ll be curious how many more deals like this will pop up as vendors seek to clear inventories following the big Super Bowl push.

Reality Check: Samsung 3D set drops $600 already?

Now we’re not ones to brag (openly anyway), but it seems like home 3D HDTV sets aren’t exactly lighting up the sales charts, and price drops on some channels are already happening: Amazon.com is now selling the new Samsung 46″ 3D HDTV for just $1,999, a $600 drop over just last month, not a good sign typically this soon.

The set had been originally priced at $2,599, but sales of the 3D unit have been pretty slow, being ranked #1,400 in Amazon’s electronics category, and Samsung apparently wants to give it a kick start by offering a lower price. We don’t know for how long, but it looks like it isn’t lighting a fire under many consumers…or early adopters. (Note: The lower Amazon price will appear when you click to place the set in your Amazon shopping cart.)

We’ll keep an eye on this trend as it develops, but we’re not holding our breath it’ll get better in the short term.

Best Buy and Deals: Some breakthrough HDTV prices being posted

Best Buy hasn’t always been identified with the greatest prices in the world really, but hey, now they’re trying, at least when it comes to HDTVs. Their latest offers are pretty darn solid, as posted by HDguru.com.

They wrote about the Dec. 13th circular released with some of the lowest prices on some models ever posted, something we heartily approve of here at Screen Sleuth, being ones who always love to get the latest HDTV units and save money too. Feel free to check it out.

Feel free to look here to see all the deals, bundles and even Amazon comparisons too.

Opinion: Where do I get cheap Blu-Ray movies?

Now that the holidays and Black Friday is fast approaching, thoughts turn to HDTV movie entertainment, via Blu-Ray discs.  But where can the deals be found, even before the holiday season is fully upon us?

Culling the comments of people from many sources, it appears Best Buy is a great place to grab BRs at a pretty cheap price, with regular 30% off sales and the like.  Amazon.com is also a popular destination for BR fanatics to fill up their movie collections at a very fair price.

Blu-Ray machines themselves are poised to be as low as they’ve ever been this holiday season, so it stands to reason that discs will go down accordingly as well.

Where do you, our readers, shop for the best BR deals?

Out On A Limb: Akamai predicts more HD video online

Sure, Akamai helped put together a IDC whitepaper finding smooth playback and high res is important to the majority of online audiences — services it provides, of course, but the results are pretty much common knowledge anyway. This article is relevant mainly because the more HD expands to various audiences – both online and offline – the better positioned it’ll be in the future.

Last year a survey they conducted (also rather self-serving) found 75% of broadcasters wanting to do HD online and in the last year, we’ve had a huge revolution in HD content on the net, from the Olympics to the likes of Netflix, Amazon, and cable/satellite providers adding more selection in HD like DirecTV, DISH and Comcast.

The gist of this report: Publishers need to release and continue to advance HD streaming to keep up with the the Joneses, video quality is really key to a user’s experience, and HD means users will be happier. We could’ve told you that, minus all the legwork that went into this paper.