Blu-ray players rumored to hit $249 by autumn

Will the pricetag of the Sony BDP-S350 get a $100 haircut?

(Credit: Sony)

Sony will be dropping the prices on its standalone (non-PlayStation 3) Blu-ray players by $100 in September, according to an anonymous source cited by CE insider Gary Merson on his HD Guru Web site.

Around the same time, the source claims that budget players manufactured by Funai and sold under the labels Philips, Magnavox, Sylvania, and Insignia could drop as low as $249. Specifically, the Sony BDP-S350 would drop from $400 to $300, and the as-yet-unreleased step-up model, the BDP-S550, would be introduced at $400, instead of the $500 price that was previously announced.

Now, anonymous sources are a dime a dozen on the Internet, but our normal degree of “beware stuff you see on a blog” cynicism is tempered by two points. First: Merson’s had a good track record on getting the inside scoop on forthcoming price drops in the past (example). Second, the fact that prices are coming down as we approach the all-important holiday buying season just makes sense–we’d be more surprised if the prices didn’t fall.

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