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Japan holds off on choosing tech for next-gen mobile TV
We'd surmise that neither Europe nor the Americas are anywhere close to worrying about a next-generation mobile TV standard, since virtually no carrier has managed to monetize the standards they've already adopted -- but things work a little differently in Japan where one-seg tuners are offered on nearly every portable device with a screen that's sold. A refinement of the existing ISDB-T technology designed to take advantage of the analog TV shutdown, ISDB-Tmm, had been pushed by NTT DoCoMo, while competitor KDDI -- the country's main CDMA operator -- had wanted to adopt Qualcomm's MediaFLO in a regulatory decision originally scheduled to be made by the middle of this month, but the government has apparently decided to hold off in the hopes that the two sides can work together on a mutually beneficial standard. Commercial availability of the network had been expected in 2012, so it'll be interesting to see if these two giants can bury the hatchets long enough to work this out.
LitPhone projector phone, new pocket PJs surface in Hong Kong
Outside of Samsung's W7900 Show and a few nondescript prototypes, the projector phone sector has been largely stagnant. Thankfully, it seems at least one no-name company is looking to make a name for itself by developing yet another entrant. The LitPhone, designed and showcased by China's own SCT Optronics, is a GSM handset that sports CMMB TV tuning, a touchscreen and a built-in projector with an undisclosed native resolution. Furthermore, the company also demonstrated its USB-powered PCLit mobile projector at the Hong Kong Electronics Fair, which debuted alongside Join Technology's JP77 and WE3 Technology's WE8626. Have a glance at the whole bundle down in the read link -- just don't get those hopes too high about a US release date anytime soon.
Panasonic delivers first LCD packing built-on Japanese HD DTV antennas
Inside what appears to be a run of the mill Panasonic 17-inch 1366 x 768 edge LED backlit IPS LCD (ok, maybe not so run of the mill) is a world's first, picking up that title because it can go where your external antenna wiring doesn't. Capable of picking up all 12 segments of Japan's digital TV broadcasts courtesy of that funky rear mounted antenna -- lighting up (pictured) is thankfully optional -- the TH-L17F1 HDTV is completely ready for Japan's still upcoming DTV transition. Of course, diversity antennas alone are nothing new, with plenty of DVB / ISDB (the digital TV format of choice in Europe and Japan) tuners capable of picking up multiple sub channels or, in this case, able to kick down to 1seg in particularly bad signal conditions, to improve picture quality. We don't know how well that could work with ATSC broadcasts in the U.S. but never fear, we're sure Panasonic will figure out a way to bring over annoyingly distracting (and hopefully better at picking up digital TV signals) antenna technology soon enough.[Via AV Watch]
Qualcomm suppresses "yuck" face, drops MediaFLO and ISDB-T on same chipset
Qualcomm may be many things, but it ain't stupid. On what basis do we make that bold claim? Historically, it's been very good about supporting and profiting from standards that aren't its own with one hand, even as it's pushing alternatives with the other. They've pulled this trick recently with comprehensive LTE support with CDMA migration -- a double whammy, considering that CDMA is Qualcomm's baby and LTE goes head to head with Qualcomm's UMB. Now, the firm is pairing up its MediaFLO mobile TV tech on a single hunk of silicon with support for ISDB-T, used in Japan and Brazil; essentially, the idea is that free programing would flow over ISDB-T and pay channels would come down on the FLO signal. It's an interesting concept, we suppose, but with mobile TV yet to be a profitable venture in most parts of the globe, it might be still be an idea just a bit ahead of its time.[Via Phone Scoop]
Samsung bringing mobile TV to Brazil with V820L
Have 1,499 reais (about $904) to blow? Live in or around Sao Paulo, Belo Horizonte, or Rio de Janeiro, Brazil? Great, because Samsung has a little something it wants to show you. The V820L pivoting flip is a capable 3G phone in its own right, complete with Bluetooth, a 2 megapixel cam, microSD expansion, and a front-facing secondary cam for video calls, but it also adds digital TV reception for Brazil's nascent ISDB-T spectrum. The relatively expansive 2.6 inch display should be a boon for watching your favorite Portuguese-language programming on the go, though it sounds like the limited coverage could be a big bummer at this point until broadcasters have the time to build out the network just a bit. It sounds like carriers might subsidize the phone a bit to knock down that stratospheric price tag, but even so -- just how much do we want to pay for a few square miles of entertainment?[Image via Abril.com, thanks Marcelo R.]
Sharp intros teeny, tiny digital TV tuner
Everyone wants digital OTA TV on their cell phones, right? We sure do and are glad to see Sharp making that dream come true for at least part of the world. Their latest creation crams all the goods into a tiny 1.3x1.3x1.25 mm chip which only uses 85mW of power. Unfortunately, this little guy isn't headed to the States though, thanks to our ATSC digital standard - the VA3A5JZ912 only works with Japanese "Wansegu broadcasts." In other words, this OneSeg or ISDB-T tuner simply will not work over here due to our type of digital broadcasts. ATSC tuners are getting smaller by the press release, so hopefully sometime soon we too can watch TV on our cell phones without paying a provider. Just because you can watch TV on your cell phone though, doesn't mean anything good is going to be on.[Via I4U]
D-PA relaunches to hasten 2011 DTV cutover in Japan
Yes, the beginning of the end if officially upon us, and yes, the Japanese are still probably more interested in colonizing the moon with robots than worrying over that pesky DTV cutover, but "a stronger and larger Association for Promotion of Digital Broadcasting (D-PA) will be relaunched next month, merging two separate organizations" in an effort to "speed up" the adoption of Digital TV. The newly-formed entity is now supported by "local broadcasters, mobile phone service providers, and TV manufacturers," and essentially hopes to broaden the marketing efforts in order to "achieve a target goal of 30 million DTV sets sold in Japan by March 2008, or about 63-percent of the country's 48 million households." Of course, the D-PA should probably get started on fleshing out an actual set of guidelines for making the switch by 2011 if they hope to garner any sort of following, but they should really take heart in the fact that they've got an extra 24 months to get things in order compared to we Americans.
Greenhouse kicks out 1Seg TV tuner in USB fashion
While we've seen plenty of TV tuning love for the UK / US crowd, it's about time we saw a new rendition to pick up those delightful digital terrestrial broadcasts while cruising through Tokyo. Greenhouse has busted out a silicon-wrapped 1Seg TV tuner for the Japanese market, but upped the ante on the typical USB stick design. By offering 360-degree rotation, you shouldn't have any problems blocking up spare ports while tuning on your laptop, and it also includes a magnetic base / extension cord to place the antenna at the faraway sweet spot. Aside from pulling in ISDB-T signals, this device also touts an electronic program guide and USB 2.0 / 1.1 connectivity, but unfortunately encodes the content as it's recorded so it can only be played back on the PC in which it was brought in on. So if the inability to view your shows on any other device than the one you used to tune with (somehow) doesn't faze you, you can pick up the GH-1ST-U2K now for ¥10,800 ($94).[Via Akihabara News]
I-O Data unveils LCD-TV241 LCD monitor with TV tuner
In a world full of LCD TVs that treat PCs as second rate, I-O Data is taking a stand for those who'd like just a dash of television with their PC monitor. The LCD-TV241 rocks a 24.1-inch screen, 1,920 x 1,080 resolution, Japanese D4 input (which supports Hi-Vision), HDCP compatible DVI-D input, 1,000:1 contrast ratio, and 8ms response time. You'll also find a built-in analog (sorry, no ISDB-T love) TV tuner with integrated PIP, a rather uninspiring remote, and a sleek array of touch-sensitive controls gracing the frame of the black (or white) panel. While that analog tuner won't do you much good past 2011, this LCD knows your PC is your first love anyway, and can be picked up in Japan later this month for ¥133,000 ($1,130).[Via Akihabara News]
Sony's Vaio X, now with DTCP
Sony just gave a little bump to their Vaio X living room PCs. The VGX-XL71S features an ISDB-T digital tuner, a pair of terrestrial analog tuners, up to 1.5TB of disk, a 2.8GHz Pentium D 920, nVIDIA GeForce 6200 graphics, a dual-layer DVD recorder, up to 2GB memory, and whole host of audio and video outs including HDMI. Notable here, is Sony's expanding product support for DTCP-IP allowing you to pump your TeeVee recordings around your home network packaged in a delicious DRM wrapper. Coming at the end of the month for ¥214,000 (right around $1,880) to your local tech bodega in Japan.
Toshiba Gigabeat V30T: a Portable Media Center with mobile TV
While we've been patiently waiting for the US launch of the Gigabeat S (set for release today tomorrow according to Amazon), Toshiba has been quietly prepping their new Gigabeat V series of Windows Portable Media Centers. Sure, the V30T player looks nothing like its sleeker sib, but that's due to the fact that this portable flaunts a new Wansegu (AKA, OneSeg) ISDB-T tuner for viewing the Japanese-flavor of mobile digital television launched last month -- in other words, the T-DMB / DVB-H / MediaFLO of Japan. Now on top of extracting that sweet TV from the ether, the V30T features a 3.5-inch, 320 x 240 display, support for WMV/WMA/MP3/WAV/JPEG and PlaysForSure WMA formats, and a brawny battery capable of up to 7/9/25 hours of TV/video/music playback, respectively, while keeping it all less than an inch thick. But this is all about the TeeVee Jack, so the V30T packs in a 30GB drive which, when combined with the EPG, allows you to record broadcasts up to 24 hours in advance for a maximum of about 130 hours of recorded, portable video. Expect the V30T to drop late June for about $450 in green.[Via Impress Watch]
Qualcomm wrangles three mobile TV standards into one chipset
Qualcomm has announced its Universal Broadcast Modem, a mobile TV chipset supporting DVB-H, ISDB-T, and Qualcomm's own FLO technology alike. The UBM, as it's known, is not dependent on a Qualcomm device chipset, which should help ease adoption. Sadly, samples won't be available to manufacturers until 2007, meaning we have a long haul ahead of us before we see devices using the technology. Although we think it's awfully big of Qualcomm to swallow its pride and bundle support for competing technologies with FLO, we'd rather see more standardization instead -- heck, we don't even have any one of these three available to consumers in the States yet. [Via Phone Scoop]
