Amazon drops price of Xbox 360 HD DVD player, promptly sells out

Amazon this week began offering Microsoft's HD DVD add-on for the Xbox 360 for only $79.99, but those wanting to take advantage of the deal may be too late, as the online retailer is currently sold out.

The $80 price tag follows a price cut in early December that made the drive available for just $129. It's not clear if the deal was a one-time offering from Amazon, or whether other retailers will follow suit. Making it all the more enticing, Amazon's 6 free HD DVD deal is also applicable to the Xbox 360 add-on.

With consumers largely not interested in buying either HD DVD or Blu-ray products, and DVD still outselling the next-generation formats by a magnitude, both sides are resorting to price cuts and free deals. Blu-ray hardware sales jumped in early January thanks to Sony, Sharp and Panasonic bundling players with HDTVs.

Toshiba and the HD DVD Promotional Group, meanwhile, have placed their bets on affordability. The HD-A3 player from Toshiba is currently offered at under $120 and is Amazon's best selling DVD player. The group is hoping that studios who are Blu-ray exclusive will see no option but to support HD DVD when it is in millions of homes.