UPDATE: I’m not sure if there’s a problem at Amazon or if the offers have been withdrawn for some reason. Click through the links any way and see what happens for you. I can understand if the movie offer expired quickly, but the player offer doesn’t even get listed on a product description page for the players right now.

Amazon’s latest HD DVD player promotion nets you up to 8 free HD DVD movies, making the player effectively cost at least $50 less. Five of those free discs come from Toshiba’s “5 Free Movies” offer, and Amazon chips in the other three. Just as with the “5 Free” offer, you have to select from a list, but the list isn’t bad at all including movies such as 300, Batman Begins, and Blood Diamond. I’m pretty sure they generated that list using an Amazon search for “HD” instead of “HD DVD’ because it contains a lot of Blu-ray titles. Maybe they were trying to accommodate the Blu-ray converts, I dunno. UPDATE: They fixed it, only HD DVD movies are shown.

Here’s how it works: Add the Toshiba HD-A2, HD-A20, or HD-XA2 to your shopping cart – make sure you’re buying it from Amazon and not one of their third-party vendors. Next, go back to shopping for the player (you can click on the player in your shopping cart) and click on the link about the special offer. Select movies from that list and add them to your cart. You’ll probably have to go back and forth between the cart and the page about the offer a couple of times.

The price of the movies is deducted at checkout time. You should play around with your cart a little bit to make sure that you figure out how that 8 or “up to 8″ part of the deal works. I’m guessing that Amazon counts some of the more expensive discs as being two titles. I was able to order 300 (a $27.95 title) along with Phantom of the Opera and Batman Begins and they all qualified. The nice thing about an Amazon purchase is that you have plenty of chances to back out.

I have a couple of screen-shots of my trial run at ordering an HD-XA2 and HD-A20 (note the “place your order” button which means I could still go back and experiment with movie combinations). I selected free shipping, and discovered that my total purchase actually made my potential XA2 purchase cost only $570.03 (the XA2 was listed at $589.98), There’s some promotional pricing magic going on here with the movie purchase (I removed the XA2 and still saw an extra $20 discount). If you know what the additional promotion is, please share in the comments.

UPDATE: The additional promo is “Buy Two HD DVDs and Receive a Third Title for Free.” It appears that you can combine it with the player offer and actually get four movies, or a $19.95 credit for that fourth one (which explains the mystery discount).

Here’s another trial run but ordering an HD-A20 with Batman, Phantom and The Bourne Supremacy. The HD-A20 was supposed to be $328.73, but my entire purchase was only $308.78.

The remaining 5 discs are part of the pre-existing “5 Free Movies” offer from Toshiba, and you can claim them once your HD DVD player arrives. The “5 Free” offer expires on September 30, and you have until October 31 to postmark your claims.

• Amazon’s “Get Up To Eight HD DVDs with the Purchase of a Toshiba HD DVD Player”
• Buy 2 HD DVDs Get 1 Free (Combine it with the Player offer and it works out to four free movies)