Toshiba HD-DVD player (HD-A1)

High-definition DVD player arrives! World holds breath!

If you can't wait for Toshiba's UK HD-DVD players to arrive in November, you can satisfy your lust for definition by importing a player from the States. This is one of two debut models from Toshiba, intended for the Yanks, but compatible with lil' ol' "Yooropeen" HD-ready TVs.

First impressions? It's bloody enormous, and the retro design makes it look even more imposing. It's like the Space Odyssey monolith, materialising on earth and scaring the natives.

Awe turns to irritation as you wrestle with its primitive operating system, however. Disc loading takes an age, and it often ignores remote-control instructions - better things to do, no doubt. It should play HD-DVDs from anywhere in the world, but it will only play region 1 DVDs.

Once it finally consents to play a disc, that gob-smacked feeling returns. Viewed on a Panasonic plasma, Serenity has a level of detail that leaves DVD behind. Faces look more realistic; computer-generated images take on a three-dimensional quality and colours are, er, more colourful.

Some early HD-DVDs are not as impressive. Viewed side-by-side with its DVD incarnation, improvements to Apollo 13 are more of a small step than a giant leap. The £20+ extra you'll have to shell out for each disc adds to that familiar feeling that, as an early adopter, you're being (very luxuriously) shafted.

Still, early adoption also gives you a warm glow, and discs should improve rapidly if the format takes off. You'll appreciate the extra functionality of the very impressive HD-DVD menus, too.

It's got teething problems, then, but this is still a stellar debut for HD-DVD. How will rival format Blu-ray compare? Watch this space...