EngadgetHD passed on the bad news that Samsung is halting production on their new BD-UP5500 HD-DVD/Blu-Ray Combo drive player, and will completely abandon the current BD-UP5000 already in production.

This means that my hopes in waiting for a price drop on the combo players are being dashed before my very eyes.

I guess the only real glimmer left is that these BP-UP5000′s end up going for cheap just to get rid of inventory. I have no clue if that will even happen.

Either way…the idea of having one unit that plays my tiny accumulated HD-DVD library, plus all the Blu-Rays I want to purchase eventually is starting to look like a longshot.

So the boys here were right…the Cap’n, The Trousered Ape. I hate it when that happens.

Oh, thanks to EngadgetHD for the photo above, they always do great art.

On a few side notes, Best Buy is cutting their HD-DVDs by 30% (yipee) and Circuit City is apparently accepting recently purchased HD-DVD players back for store credit towards a Blu-Ray player.

That’s a nice deal by Circuit City, I’m now hoping Amazon jumps on board.