The need for healthy holiday sales in a bear market, competitive pressure from movie download services, and media speculation about the future success of the Blu-ray format itself has resulted in falling Blu-ray player prices across a range of current and older models, according to ABI Research.

Tier 2 players and older models (6-9 months) are now widely available under $200. Amazon is offering a Samsung model bundled with four discs for that price. Holiday season prices may be in the $150-200 range. All of this runs counter to many of the industry?s original market forecasts and expectations.

"Blu-ray vendors and dealers are starting to realize that for Blu-ray to become the next DVD, they need to lower player prices in order to generate interest and build volumes," comments ABI Research principal analyst Steve Wilson."They are also getting more competition than they expected from download alternatives such as Xbox 360 and the Roku Netflix player, TiVo and Amazon. However downloads provide an opportunity as well as a threat: both LG and Samsung have concluded agreements with Netflix that allow some of their players to download movies and TV shows straight from Netflix. The more the Blu-ray players adopt these download capabilities, the better they will be able to differentiate themselves from standard DVD players."

Despite the low proces, Blu-ray sales are also expected to suffer in the fourth quarter, thanks to the shaky economy. Generally, economy dictates the level of investment companies will put into development and marketing, and perceptions of economic health are a critical factor in consumer purchase decisions. And the current economic slowdown could mean that consumers would be cautious in their spendings in the upcoming holiday season and especially for pricey Blu-ray players and discs.

Sony Corp. unveiled a new e-book reader Thursday with a built-in light and a touch-sensitive display, features that set it apart from Amazon.com Inc.'s competing Kindle reader.The PRS-700 is Sony's third model of the Reader, and will go on sale at the end of the month for about $400. It represents further experimentation on the part of manufacturers trying to find the right formula to make e-book readers more than a niche product. Neither Sony nor Amazon have revealed sales figures for their readers.

Like the earlier models and the Kindle, the PRS-700 has a six-inch screen of "electronic ink," which presents dark gray text on a light gray background. Unlike the liquid-crystal displays of laptops and cell-phones, e-ink displays cannot be lit from behind, but the PRS-700 has light-emitting diodes that can be turned on to illuminate the screen from the sides.The 10-ounce device also comes with a stylus, which can be used to highlight text or make handwritten notes. It can hold 350 books in its internal memory, and more in a memory card.

The PRS-700 does not have an equivalent of the Kindle's signature feature: wireless access to Amazon's e-book store for near-instant book downloads. Instead, books are loaded on to the device by connecting it to a PC.

Steve Haber, president of Sony's Digital Reading Business Division, said the company aims to have a wireless version, but it would have to work with multiple book vendors.

While the Kindle downloads books only from Amazon's store, Sony is differentiating itself by de-emphasizing its own store and opening up its Readers to e-books from other vendors.