Ballmer: Microsoft Will Support Blu-ray

After much speculation on whether or not Redmond would jump on the Blu-ray high-definition DVD bandwagon, CEO Steve Ballmer answered with a definitive "yes" last week during a Q&A at Microsoft's MIX08 conference.

In fact, the company is already working to add Blu-ray support to its Windows operating system, he said.

Microsoft is one of the last holdouts in the high-def format war to declare support for Sony's Blu-ray. It has been offering high-def players for its Xbox 360 game console based on Toshiba's HD DVD, but said late last month that it would stop manufacturing them. But Microsoft had stopped short of blessing Blu-ray until now.

When asked about Blu-ray's victory in the format war, Ballmer said that, while HD DVD had its merits, Microsoft is going to support Blu-ray.

"We thought there was a lot of merit to HD-DVD. It was in the market sooner, it had certain cost advantages. We worked to provide an HD-DVD peripheral for the Xbox 360. But at the end of the day, as the industry moves forward, obviously we're going to support Blu-ray in ways that are important," Ballmer said, according to a transcript of his remarks. "I want to make sure there's the right support. We've already been working on, for example, in Windows device driver support for Blu-ray drives and the like."

Ballmer added that, while it might be important for Xbox 360 to have a DVD player today, more HD content could eventually be pushed over the Internet rather than delivered in a physical format.

"Today, I think it is actually pretty important to have some kind of drive. Five years from now, it may not make a bit of difference," Ballmer said.