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DreamBee 1080p projector could double as alien probe
DreamVision has released a 1080p D-ILA-based projector called the DreamBee, which boasts a 15,000:1 contrast ratio, and 1000 lumens of brightness. The oddly-War of the Worlds-shaped projector includes an RS-232 port and a pair of HDMI inputs, with the usual analog video and audio connectors, and retails for $14,000. The DreamBee Pro model adds another pair of HDMI ports, along with an external scaler for source management, and is priced at $19,000. Both models are available in colors like midnight, coconut, blue sky, hibiscus, and sunflower. No word on the possibility of a custom "red alien weed" color, or whether the controls are tentacle-friendly.
Blu-ray: Actually, we are the top in European sales
The HD DVD Promotional Group recently claimed that 74% of the market share for European high-definition DVD players is held by HD DVD, but the Blu-ray Disc Association points out that they conveniently "forgot" to include PS3s and PC drives in their count. Including those puts Blu-ray in the lead instead, with almost 95% of hardware sales. HD DVD lobbyists contend that most who buy game consoles don't even use them for watching high-def movies, while everyone who bought an HD DVD player will do exactly that. The fact that the PS3 is still basically cheaper than many of the standalone high-def players (Blu-ray or HD DVD) means it's not exactly honest to discount them completely either. All we know is that the format war continues, but as long as prices continue to fall, it's tough for the average consumer to complain about that.
HDTV Listings for July 13, 2007
What we're watching: For a Friday the 13th, we have an amazing lack of horror flicks tonight, but there's a new show on ABC, Greek, and Bruce Lee in Enter the Dragon on HDNet.Our traditional high-def listings continue below.
Samsung to introduce its third-gen Blu-ray player August 31
VideoBusiness has got a few more details on what to expect from Samsung's third generation Blu-ray player, the BD-P1400. Look for the player to make its debut on August 31 at the 2007 IFA in Berlin, with support for Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby True HD and DTS-HD audio, as well as a built in Ethernet port. Whether it will meet the new standards for Blu-ray players released after October remains unanswered, as well as how much it will cost. With Sony's BDP-S300 and recently price-reduced PlayStation 3 both already on the market at $499, we'll soon see how much lower prices can get.
Microsoft announces Disney movies in HD on Xbox Live right....now
Microsoft's E3 conference is still ongoing, but they were more than happy to note that Xbox Live Video Marketplace has already raked in more than $125 million in revenue, and is bigger than any cable providers' VOD offerings. As if that wasn't enough, for everyone who thought Blu-ray would be their only option for Disney films in HD, Microsoft announced that it is bringing both catalog and new releases to Xbox Live, in high definition, starting tonight. Our friends outside the U.S. have something to look forward to as well, because it plans to bring the video marketplace to Canada & Europe by the end of this year. Check out the live blog for more details.Update 1: Check out the official details after the break.Update 2: More info from Reuters indicates 35 titles from Disney are available now, including Bridge to Terabithia, The Queen and Deja Vu, but no Pirates of the Caribbean: At World's End (currently available on iTunes in theaters) on the way yet.
HDTV Listings for July 9, 2007
What we're watching: While Monday is usually a night for The Closer, we'll check out the MLB Home Run Derby on ESPN.Our traditional high-def listings continue below.
HDTV Listings for July 7, 2007
What we're watching: It's 7/7/07, and we've got ongoing Live Earth HDTV coverage on Universal HD all night, with a few hours on NBC as well. NASCAR's Pepsi 400 brings night racing from Daytona to TNT and Miami Vice hits Cinemax at 10.Our traditional high-def listings continue below.
European Commission looks into Blu-ray studio agreements
European regulators have begun an inquiry into possible antitrust and anticompetitive practices by the Blu-ray Disc Association as it relates to agreements and restrictions on producing content for Blu-ray and its competing high-definition format, HD DVD. At the urging of some in the HD DVD camp, the European Commission has sent letters to many of the Hollywood studios asking them to produce any correspondence relating to their backing of the Blu-ray format. Of the major studios, Sony, Disney, Fox, Lions Gate, and MGM only release titles on Blu-ray, while only Universal is exclusive to HD DVD. Analysts say much is riding on the outcome of which format wins, with sales of content and players as a big incentive for either side. Is this inquiry just a case of sour grapes by HD DVD that sees itself as in trouble while Blu-ray has better agreements with studios? Or is the BDA not playing fair by using those vertical relationships to form a de facto monopoly? Those in the EU aim to find out.[Thanks, LJKelley]
Live Earth delivers 24 hours of HD concerts July 7th
Satellite heavyweight Intelsat is shaking up the summer programming schedule from its usual list of reruns and walking dead cancelled TV shows by sponsoring Live Earth: The Concerts for a Climate in Crisis. The 24 hour concert scheduled for July 7th, will be its largest HDTV undertaking ever, eclipsing even the World Cup, with uplinks from 8 stages around the world sending high definition feeds of artists including Snoop Dogg, Madonna, The Police and others to an estimated 2 billion viewers. The only channel with the full event in high def will be Universal HD starting at 4 a.m. on the 7th. We can't decide which is the better cause, environmental awareness, or something in HD to watch this summer, but with this we don't have to choose.[Via Multichannel News]
HDTV Listings for July 1, 2007
What we're watching: Tonight is the series finale of The Loop on Fox. We'd tell you more about it but we've never watched it before, and with three episodes airing in one evening, this seems as good a time as ever to start...and finish.Our traditional high-def listings continue below.
Analysts say only a fraction of gamers use video playback capabilities
Research analysts at The Diffusion Group have released an interesting study into the habits and knowledge levels of gamers in relationship to playing back videos, DVDs, and other video content on their consoles. Only 30% of console owners surveyed knew their game boxes were capable of playing back movies or other content, and only 13% were actually using it for that purpose. Read on for more.
Hitachi's fall lineup is all 1080
Hitachi has announced a fall lineup of plasma and LCD displays, with the main selling point that all of the sets include 1080 lines of vertical resolution (although two of the plasmas offer a stretched 1280 x 1080). There are ten new HDTVs in all, with a 60-inch plasma and two 55-inch models, three 50-inch plasma displays, and four LCDs in 47- and 42-inch ranges. All models include Hitachi PictureMaster IV or V video processing, and some include a new technique to eliminate judder on 3:2 pulldown called Reel60. Some models also offer Power Swivel to allow the display to turn up to 30 degrees. The models range in price from the 60-inch Director's Series plasma at $7,996 to the 42-inch S-Series LCD at a mere $2,300, and will be released steadily throughout the summer.
Samsung launches new 8G plant, cheap 52-inch LCDs on the way?
Fans of cutting edge electronics are usually used to dealing with delays, disappointments and broken promises, but this time it looks like Sony and Samsung are delivering their latest LCD plant well ahead of schedule. The eighth generation facility designed to mass produce the 52-inch HDTVs we love so much should be able to produce as many as 50,000 panels per month starting in July. Samsung is still predicting steep drops in the price of LCDs, with the president seeing the cost of the 52-inch panel lowered to $1,000 by the end of next year.
Cablevision adds Voom HD channels, could have up to 500 more
In addition to recently adding Versus and Golf in high definition, Cablevision has also added all fifteen of Voom's high-def channels to its lineup, giving them a total of 40 HD channels. As longtime readers know, Cablevision owns the parent company for Voom, so we should be more surprised it took them so long to add the content. Cablevision is also beefing up its fiber optic network to call satellite provider DirecTV's bluff, creating a claimed capacity of up to 500 channels by the end of the year. As we've said many times, DirecTV can claim they will have more channels than anyone, but other companies can add those same HD channels, all it takes is some upgrading or new set-top boxes. So, even though it's still up in the air whether there will actually be 100 HD channels by year's end, the good news for all consumers is that cable -- and IPTV -- providers aren't taking this lying down.
JVC designs tiny 4k D-ILA chip
JVC announced at InfoComm 2007 a 1.27-inch 4K2K D-ILA chip for use in projectors that offer up more than four times high-definition resolution. Intended initially for medical, modeling, and simulation use, the chip can produce a ten-megapixel 4096x2400 pixel image with a 20,000:1 contrast ratio. While DLP-based 4K 2K projectors are currently in use in some digital cinemas, the JVC chip will be used in D-ILA, a variant of LCoS (Liquid Crystal on Silicon), and has a higher pixel density. Much like professional racing technologies trickle down to the average sedan on the street, the research that goes into 4K projectors can also make their way to HDTVs in the home, bringing smaller, higher-definition sets to a living room near you. We say bring on the quad-split-screen HD! Edit: Texas Instruments informs me that they do not offer any 4K DLP cinema projectors, only 2K (1080p).
HDTV Listings for June 18, 2007
What we're watching: Our summer HDTV schedule gets a boost tonight with the return of The Closer on TNT, followed by the series premiere of Heartland.Our traditional high-def listings continue below.
HDTV Listings for June 16, 2007
What we're watching: Sure we already saw it on Blu-ray, HD DVD and Xbox Live, but it Superman Returns on Cinemax gets yet another look tonight.Our traditional high-def listings continue below.
HDTV Listings for June 15, 2007
What we're watching: Tonight we've got another new episode of Standoff, as well as the return of Kyle XY to ABC. Sports fans can check out Friday Night Fights on ESPN2-HD, or coverage of the U.S. Open on ESPN and Universal HD.Our traditional high-def listings continue below.
Attention Wal-Mart shoppers: New Sony HDTVs incoming
Want a new Sony HDTV but can't stand to look at the prices of the latest Bravia's? Consider yourself in luck as a "value priced" line should be hitting Wal-Mart, Target and other retail shops near you in the next couple of months. No word on price or specs, but it certainly appears the company will be going right at the Vizio's and Westinghouse's of the world. Other details released include plans to ramp up Blu-ray standalone player shipments "5 or 6 times" over last year's 100,000 units, and again that we can expect to see those beautiful OLEDs from CES to hit the streets in Japan...but only in 11-inch sizes. They also found time to mention that they don't plan on releasing a hybrid player, and that while 40-inch is the most popular LCD size now, their 8G plant will be on line soon to make 46- and 50-inch HDTVs at even lower prices. Read - Sony plans TV line for Wal-Mart, Target Read - Sony May Increase U.S. Shipments of Blu-Ray by Sixfold in 2007 Read - Sony: Gearing Up To Sell Flat Screens, Wal-Mart Style
Fifth Element Blu-ray exchange program details announced
Considering what a mythical reference title The Fifth Element was when released on DVD (and Superbit, and Laserdisc!), it was surprising to see it reviewed as just another softly-focused, dirty, and scratchy launch title for Blu-ray. Many reviewers and fans complained about the lackluster MPEG-2 encoding, and the general poor quality of the transfer. Sony has announced details and contact information about a plan to exchange the first -- now discontinued -- batch of Blu-ray Discs for the remastered edition, due to be released in July. The new version is a new 1080p transfer from a different master, and includes Dolby TrueHD as well as uncompressed PCM audio. It will also be encoded in MPEG-4 AVC, which will hopefully show off the improved compression of the newer codec. Quite an olive branch from Sony for those who have already picked it up, and a show of good steps toward making Blu-ray titles the best they can be. Now the question remains, how many of the other initial MPEG-2 Blu-ray titles will be remastered like this?
