Mole uncovers Toshiba's DVD upscaling plans

Now that the dust’s settled on Toshiba’s humiliating HD DVD defeat, the company is rumoured to be preparing a comeback - in the form of an upscaling DVD player.

According to a report on Japanese news site Yomiuri, sources at Toshiba have let slip about the company’s plans to launch a DVD player capable of upscaling standard-definition DVDs to 1080p HD.

Upscaling an SD image to an HD one is nothing new, but Toshiba will pitch its rumoured player as the best way of doing so. Towards the end of its its time as the HD DVD format's cheerleader, Toshiba began promoting its HD DVD player family as superior DVD players. The units have long won plaudits for the quality of their upscaling technology.

Toshiba has already unveiled “Super-resolution” imagery, which is still essentially standard-definition content upscaled to 1080p, but done with an interpolation algorithm that Toshiba believes is superior to the likes used on rival upscalers, such as Sony’s DVP-NS708H.

One of Blu-ray’s drawbacks is the rather limited number of titles currently available - relative to DVD, at least - along with the still relatively high cost of standalone players. The Toshiba mole has also claimed that the manufacturer's latest player will be marketed as one capable of playing a broader array of content than currently available through Blu-ray.

It's though Toshiba's upscaling DVD player will be out by December. Unsurprisingly, perhaps, it won’t be Blu-ray compatible.