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Sony has confirmed plans to end production of disc-based games starting in 2028, though existing PS5 consoles with disc drives will continue to support Blu-ray movies, DVDs and last-generation game discs. Owners of the Slim digital PS5 or PS5 Pro can add disc compatibility via a $79 detachable drive, though it does not work with the original Digital Edition model.
Barnes & Noble is selling the Criterion Collection 4K Blu-ray of KPop Demon Hunters for $24.99, down from its $49.95 list price. The set includes a 4K disc with Dolby Vision and Dolby Atmos, two 1080p Blu-rays with the film and bonus features, plus physical extras like postcards and an essay. The discounted copy is in-store pickup only, though Amazon briefly matched the price before reverting to a less generous offer.
A project called DiscImageStudio lets users burn visible artwork directly onto the surface of CDs, DVDs and Blu-ray discs rather than just writing data to them. It was featured in GitHub's Changelog roundup of recent product updates and community projects.
Sony's last standalone 4K Blu-ray player, the UBP-X700K, was listed as out of stock in Japan on October 22, with retailers reportedly told not to expect further shipments, according to Forbes. The player remains listed on Sony's US site and at Best Buy for $329.99, though Amazon no longer sells it new. Sony's UK division declined to confirm or deny plans to exit the market, calling the reports speculation.
According to FlatpanelsHD, Sony's UBP-X700/K will be its last 4K Blu-ray player, and the company plans to phase out disc-based media by 2028. This means the next PlayStation console, the PS6, will not support physical game discs.
A technical blog post revisits H.264, the video codec used across internet streaming, Blu-ray discs, phones, drones and security cameras, explaining the engineering behind its compression. The author demonstrates that a 300-frame H.264 clip of the Apple homepage is far smaller than a single uncompressed PNG frame from that same clip, then walks through the techniques—built on more than three decades of development—that make such dramatic bandwidth savings possible.
Sony has officially ended production of the UBP-X700/K, its remaining Ultra HD Blu-ray player, according to Japanese Sony-affiliated blog Kunkoko, with the news later reported by FlatpanelsHD. The discontinuation was announced in Japan, though the player still appears available from some retailers elsewhere. With Blu-ray recorder sales already ended and PlayStation disc production also winding down, the PS5 becomes Sony's only device in Japan capable of playing UHD Blu-ray discs.
Sony is ending production of its last affordable 4K Blu-ray player, according to a report. The move follows the company's earlier decision to stop manufacturing game discs, further narrowing its physical media hardware offerings.
Sony Japan has marked its UBP-X700/K player as "Discontinued," removing the company's last standalone Blu-ray player from sale, according to FlatpanelsHD. Sony had already stopped shipping the units in February, selling only remaining stock since then. The PlayStation 5 remains the sole Sony device that plays Blu-ray discs, though Sony has said it will halt physical game disc production by January 2028.
Japanese retailer blog Kunkoku reports Sony has discontinued the UBP-X700/K, its final standalone UHD Blu-ray player, which now shows as out of stock with no restock date on Sony's site. This leaves the PlayStation 5 as Sony's only remaining device capable of playing UHD Blu-ray discs. The move follows Sony halting Blu-ray recorder sales globally in February and its summer announcement that it will stop producing physical PlayStation games starting in 2028.
The PlayStation 3, now 87 million units sold since launch, has lost support from most third-party streaming services, including Crunchyroll in 2022, Plex in 2023 and Netflix in March 2026. Despite this, the console can still be repurposed for tasks like streaming media from a PC, playing Blu-ray discs, ripping CDs, and emulating retro games.
A developer known as Sword released version 2.01 of PS5SX2, a tool that lets jailbroken PlayStation 5 consoles run PlayStation 2 games from the console's Blu-ray drive. The software dumps disc contents to internal storage before launching titles, and an experimental feature allows loading PS2 game dumps via an external USB Blu-ray drive, potentially extending support to digital-only PS5 models. The tool requires hacked firmware and builds on existing open-source emulation code.