Personally, I am suspicious the reasoning behind MS’ support for HD-DVD has something with Sony being the big name behind Blu-ray.

Microsoft and Intel are throwing their full weight behind one side in the long-running battle over the format for the next generation of high-definition DVD’s.

Today, the two companies will announce that they are backing the HD-DVD format developed by Toshiba over the Blu-ray standard championed by Sony, Matsushita Electric, Samsung and others. Microsoft announced in June that it would work with Toshiba to develop high-definition DVD players. Now, Microsoft and Intel say they will develop software and chips that will allow personal computers to play the next-generation DVD’s from Toshiba. [Read the rest]