Feeling the pressure from the recent price cut of Samsung’s BD-P1400 Blu-ray player, Sony has decided to drop the price of its BDP-S300 Blu-ray player from around $499 to less than $300. The reduced price will be available in major retailers including Amazon.com, Circuit City, and Best Buy.

Amazon is currently offering this Blu-ray player for only $294 with 7 free Blu-ray movies. The movies Spider-man 3 and Pirates of the Caribbean: At World’s End are already included for this sale price. The other 5 Blu-ray movies are in the form of mail-in rebate.

Although Sony mentioned earlier that it would not engage in any price war to compete with rival format, HD DVD, this price reduction is a strong indicator of its changing position. For the week ending December 9, 2007, Blu-ray accounted for 76% of all high-definition discs sold while HD DVD only contributed 24%.

via press release