Audio Video News

The Blu-ray folks who have been guzzling champagne for the past week might want to put the cork back in the bottle and put it in the fridge. Yesterday's raft of Apple announcements included the company's entry into high-def movie downloads and deals with several major studios.

Head over to the iTunes store and check out iTunes Movie Rentals. You can order movies directly from your TV, using the Apple TV device, and watch them on Macs, PCs, iPods, iPhones, or Apple TV (with the appropriate software updates). The cost will be $3.99 for new titles and $2.99 for back catalogue.

Stop the servers: That includes more than 100 high-definition titles in Dolby Digital 5.1. The cost is a dollar extra, $4.99 for new titles and $3.99 for back catalogue. Look out, Blu-ray, there goes your rental business. We assume you're already ducking and covering, HD DVD.

Following months of feverish negotiating, the House of Jobs has signed up 20th Century-Fox, Disney, Warner Bros., Paramount, Universal, Sony Pictures, MGM, Lionsgate, and New Line Cinema. More than 1000 titles will be offered by the end of February.

Under a deal between 20th Century-Fox and Apple, iTunes Digital Copy will enable a DVD purchaser to bump a copy of the material to a PC, Mac, video iPod, or Apple TV.

Addenda: Our alert web producer Jon Iverson adds the following note: "The movies are 24fps 720p HD. The datastream is also a quarter to half that of BD for example. So your HD mileage may vary." While we're at it, here's a list of what you can and can't do from Engadget.