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The 3D cellphone lands in India for $97, no glasses required
It's not every day that you hear about an autostereoscopic 3D cellphone launching let alone for less than $100 (Rs. 4,299)... off contract. But that's exactly what Spice Mobility just announced in India. The M-67 3D phone features a 2.36-inch 240x320 pixel display with dedicated 3D shortcut key letting users switch between 2D and 3D viewing modes for the UI, images, and video. Unfortunately, this dual-SIM phone is only equipped with a 2D camera, not one of those 3D jobbies being cooked up by Sharp. We're guessing that at this price the viewing experience doesn't approach the Nintendo 3DS, but it's certainly a harbinger of things to come. [Thanks, Jay]
ITRI's display manages 2D and 3D at once, set to challenge Toshiba for hybrid supremacy
We're still not really sure how Toshiba managed to do both 2D and glasses-free 3D in a single display, but we do now know that it isn't the only company to have achieved this stereoscopic feat. Engadget Chinese caught sight of ITRI's similar composite display, which is able to add depth to individual sections of the screen whilst leaving the rest of it stuck in Flatland. It's a 22-inch, 1680 x 1050 panel and, while 3D content is said to be rendered in much lower resolution than the rest of the display, SecondLife doesn't really require that many pixels to freak you out anyhow. No word on a possible retail release, so you'll just have to keep crossing your eyes at your current monitor.
Toshiba prototype display does 2D and 3D at the same time
One of Toshiba's favorite hobbies is to tease the general public with prototype autostereoscopic technology, and that's exactly what we have here today; demoed at SID 2010, this screen can display 2D and 3D images simultaneously on the same 12-inch screen, no glasses required. How it does that is rather complicated, especially when translated from the Japanese, but it sounds like Toshiba's sandwiched a special panel with gradient-index lenses between a high-speed polarizer and the typical color LCD. We'd wager good money it's not coming to a store near you, but we'll keep an eye out for future developments. These days, they have a tendency to pop right out of the screen.
Newsight 3D photo frame promises to let you 'see around' images without glasses
A 3D digital photo frame may seem a bit excessive for even the most all-compassing technology bandwagon, but the folks from Newsight have managed to put a somewhat unique spin on the idea with this frame recently on display at SID 2010. Like some of the company's other displays, this 3D LCD is auto-stereoscopic -- meaning you don't need any pesky glasses -- but it also takes things one step further by supporting what's known as "motion parallax," which effectively means you can "see around" an image. As you might expect, that involves a bit of trickery, but Newsight says its image processing software can take any traditional 3D (or even 2D) image and create five separate images out of it that let you see the same image from different angles. Unfortunately, that image processing must first be done on a PC with the current model, but Newsight promises that the next model will have built-in processing, and it's already talking about a third version that will let two frames send images to each other.
Toshiba Mobile Display touts 21-inch glasses-free 3D HDTV, raises a few eyebrows
While we were fretting about what special tech Nintendo's 3DS would use to generate autostereoscopic imagery on its comparatively puny screen, Toshiba Mobile Display (and others) have been working on bringing that same headgear-free 3D to TV-sized panels. Employing a "multi-parallax" technique, the latest from the Toshiba spinoff firm promises "significant reduction in eye fatigue" as well as approximately a 30 degree horizontal viewing angle. The latter might be peanuts compared to a quality 2D display, but let's not begrudge being offered at least some positional flexibility. Other specs include a 1280 x 800 effective resolution and 480 nits of brightness, which are notable achievements when you consider that the 9-parallax implementation requires the generation of 9 separate images and therefore could be achieved with only an "ultra-high definition LCD module." We've sadly no info about this panel's potential for retail availability, but judging by the bezel-free picture we've been given, that might be a good way off from now.
Telefnica and Philips testing no-glasses-necessary 3D IPTV, got ???18,000 we can borrow?
São Paulo, Brazil stand up, you're first in line for auto-stereoscopic (read: no glasses) 3D IPTV broadcasts courtesy of Telefónica/TVA and, we assume, that swank WOWvx-powered 1080p 52-inch Philips 3D HDTV promised to hit shelves by year end. Fortunately it now has a price, unfortunately, that price is €18,000 and requires you live in the Jardins neighborhood, hooked up to its fiber network in order to have the capacity to suck down all that 3D. Consumer accessibility is pegged at "inside three or four years", so you start saving, the SMPTE will figure out how to make it all work, and we'll sit back and remember how awesome Captain EO was that one time at Epcot Center. Everyone has to do their part.
Philips introducing 52-inch 1080p 3D display
It's no nightmare -- 3D is officially in style. Or it's succeeding in fooling us, one or the other. Further proof that taking things to the third-dimension is all the rage has arrived courtesy of Philips, who has announced its intentions to reveal a 1080p 52-inch 3D display at InfoComm later this month. The unit will utilize the same WOWvx technology showcased a year prior in its 20-inch display, and will feature 700 cd/m2 brightness, a 2,000:1 contrast ratio and an 8-millisecond response time. The auto-stereoscopic display should be "commercially available from Q4 2008 onwards," but we haven't a clue how costly it'll be when it eventually lands.[Via SlashGear]
