The recorder, which includes a built-in broadcast satellite tuner, will hit store shelves in Japan on April 10. No date has been set yet for an overseas roll-out, she said.

The machine will give Sony, the world's largest consumer electronics maker, a head start over its partners in the Blu-ray consortium, a nine-member group of industry heavyweights that unveiled a common format for blue laser DVDs a year ago.

Blue light, with a shorter wavelength than red, can read and store data at much higher densities needed for high-definition recordings.