Sony’s Blu-ray burning foursome
Sky HD's all well and good but when its measly 160GB portion is used up, what's an HD addict to do? Sony has the answer. Its four new recorders will s
Sky HD’s all well and good but when its measly 160GB portion is used up, what’s an HD addict to do? Sony has the answer. Its four new recorders will sling up to 50GB of footage onto BD disc. Hurrah!
They’re the first to swallow roomy dual-layer platters to happily squeeze up to 16 hours of HD onto just one of the shiny blue discs.
As if that wasn’t enough, each also comes with its own hard drive. The top of the range BDZ-X90 (bottom right) gets a 500GB disk, which, give or take a Songs of Praise here and Antiques Roadshow there, will record an entire week’s worth of HD telly in one go. It also packs HDMI 1.3 for extra future-proofed tricks such as compatibility with movies enhanced by super-rich ‘Deep Colour’.
Top left is the 320GB BDZ-L70 which plays nice with AVCHD camcorders for one-touch dubbing and boasts enhanced x.v.
Colour for twice the colour range of standard sRGB.The two twins are the 250GB BDZ-T50 and 320GB T70. As well as the smaller hard drive, the 50 only gets one digital tuner to the T70’s two, which means it won’t be getting up to any ‘record one channel while you watch another’ shenanigans.
All four will do 1080p at cinema speed 24p, but as an extra bonus the X90 pushes it all the way up to 1080p 60p for the ultimate HD experience – the flash get.
Essentials Sony BDZ-X90, BDZ-T70, BDZ-T50 and BDZ-L70 Price: £TBA (¥140,000 – ¥200,000 in Japan) On sale: November Contact: Sony
Dan Grabham
Editor-in-Chief 
