CES 2008: Home Entertainment Galore
In our final installment of our CES 2008 coverage, we have a special focus on consumer electronics on the evolving home entertainment market and the many products from Sony, Samsung, LG and more that are raising the bar of technology. Don't miss this exciting finale to our CES 2008 series!
Sony's Booth
Samsung's Booth
Samsung demonstrated its 31" and 14" OLED displays at their booth as well. We won't be surprised if the company follows on Sony's footsteps with the commercialization of OLED TVs this year.
Samsung demonstrated its Ultra High Definition 82-inch TV that outputs video images in the 3840 x 2160 resolution. This is four times the resolution of 1920 x 1080 (Full HD).
Samsung announced two updated series to its LCD line-up: Series 6 and 7 under its Touch of Color initiative. Featuring a hint of amber color mixed with Samsung's traditional piano black bezel frame, these LCD TVs come in three sizes per series (40", 46" and 52"). The major difference between the Series 6 and 7 is that the latter comes with a side-mounted USB 2.0 port so that users can connect their portable thumb-drives and view images or listen to their MP3s via the Series 7's integrated woofer. Not only that, the Series 7 TV comes with an internal flash pre-loaded with premium content out of the box. The Series 6 LCD HDTVs come out in March 2008 while the Series 7 comes out in May 2008.
Samsung showcased the next-generation BD-UP5500 set-top next-gen disc player that allows users to play both Blu-ray and HD DVD discs in a slim and sleek design. Succeeding the UP5000, the UP5500 Duo HD player supports both BD-Java and HD DVD interactivity. Its Ethernet connection also allows viewers to experience a broad array of immersive viewing options with numerous movies as well as download new firmware for the player. Supporting 7.1-ch PCM, DTS-HD High Resolution and Master audio, and Dolby TrueHD Bitstream output via HDMI 1.3, the UP5500 is expecting a US release in the second half of 2008. It is however unfortunate that unlike the UP5000, this model doesn't come with the HQV processor.
Samsung teamed up with Reactrix to demonstrate what could be a marketer's dream. Applicable as a form of interactive digital signage at retail outlets, shopping malls and so on, the Reactrix WAVEscape system is paired up with a 57" large format Samsung display. Passers-by can wave their hands and interact with various objects on the screen based on an overhead mounted sensor that detects hand movements within a certain zone about a few inches in front of the screen.
Viewsonic's Booth
ViewSonic ups the ante for desktop monitors with the introduction of the VLED221wm desktop monitor. It is a 22-inch widescreen display with a 12000:1 dynamic contrast ratio in an LED desktop display. Leveraging on the OptiColor technology to display 118 percent of the color gamut, the VLED221wm is ideal for CAD/CAM, desktop publishing and moving production. With native resolution at 1680 x 1050, it has a 5ms response time and a low power consumption of 38W. Estimated to be available in the US in February 2008, it has a street price of US$799.
Sharp's Booth
Sharp unveiled its new SE94U AQUOS HDTV series at the show that has 27,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio. Available in sizes of 65-, 52- and 46-inch sizes, the "Special Edition" SE94U series features Sharp's AQUOS Net service and new Cornerstone design with a textured-finish casing. The 65" is available for US$11,000, the 52" will go on sale for US$4,200 and the 46" in February for US$3,200.
Sharp also unveiled its second-generation 32" full HD 1080p LCD TV for gaming enthusiasts, which is available in three glossy finish colors – black (LC-32GP3U-B), dark wine red (LC-32GP3U-R) and white (LC-32GP3U-W). Fitted in a slim body on a unique swivel stand, the 32GP has a "Game Mode" that optimizes picture quality during gaming with a custom-designed remote control for gamers to gain quick access to the side-terminal inputs. All three models have 10,000:1 contrast ratio and costs US$1,600 each.
Sharp's AQUOS Net is a gateway that allows customers to plug their TV to the net via an Ethernet port and view independently supplied Web-based content (widgets) in full or split screen. It is available on the new SE94U and D74U AQUOS series. Not only that, Sharp produces Powerline Communication (PLC) adapters which allow you to network your Sharp TV to other AQUOS Net-enabled TVs in your other rooms using the 85Mbps-capable PLC adapters.
Panasonic's Booth
Pioneer's Booth
LG's Booth
Hitachi's Booth
Hitachi demonstrated a wireless HDTV distribution display between two of its Reel60 HDTVs (up to three units stream from one single source is possible) based on the 802.11n wireless network with MIMO protocol. Using a sliced-based technique applies more error-correction towards high priority components in the MPEG stream while the picture quality is said to improve by up to 3dB signal-to-noise ratio.
One demonstration at the Hitachi booth is a Similarity-Based Image Retrieval System. According to Hitachi, with image data in our hard disk drives reaching levels unseen in as many years as we can remember, the Similarity-Based Image Retrieval technology is a search engine that allows users to search for high-definition image and videos. Using information such as color, shapes and forms, a match is quickly found – be it a specific movie scene, the face videos or shots of just one particular person or a specific venue like say "all Eiffel Tower photos and videos".
Toshiba's Booth
With all the buzz about Blu-ray and HD DVD, Toshiba lowered the starting price of its HD DVD notebook line to US$899 starting with the Satellite A205 notebook. Not only that, it has given the Qosmio G45 an upgrade making it the world's first notebook with a HD DVD-R/RW optical drive, pricing it at US$3,200. The HD DVD-R/RW notebook, model AV690, has a recording speed of 1x for HD DVD-RW (single layer) and 2x for HD DVD-R (1x for double layer). Not only that, it also comes with an external High Definition TV Tuner, 17" diagonal 1080p display, PCI-e NVIDIA graphics and four built-in Harman/kardon speakers. Oh, did we mention it also comes with a REGZA Link HDMI port?
First unveiled at CEATEC Japan in October 2007, the Toshiba SpursEngine chip is a co-processor derived from the high-performance Cell Broadband Engine processor found in the Sony PS3 such as the Synergistic Processing Element (SPE) cores. The SpursEngine is designed to take video processing to extreme levels of realism and image quality.
The new co-processor integrates four of Cell/B.E.'s high performance RISC core SPEs plus hardware to decode and encode MPEG-2 and H.264 video. The prototype operates at a clock frequency of 1.5GHz and consumes 10-20 watt power.
Toshiba showed us a hand gesture control demonstration with a QOSMIO notebook equipped with the SpursEngine co-processor. By gesturing in a certain direction in front of a cam-equipped QOSMIO built with SpursEngine, users can play or pause video. Not only that, Toshiba also showed real-time face morphing, video indexing and high-speed video editing and transcoding from MPEG2 to H.264 when editing and recording HD videos to HD DVD discs on the QOSMIO.
Canon's Booth
The Canon VIXIA HF10 records to either a 16GB internal flash memory or SDHC Memory card while its lesser brethren – the HF100 – records to just the SDHC Memory card. Both camcorders use the Canon 3.3 Megapixel Full HD CMOS Image Sensor (1920 x 1080) and feature a 12x optical zoom. Both the HF10 and HF100 (pictured) are expected to be available in the US from April 2008. They will be priced at US$1,099 and US$899 respectively.
The Canon VIXIA HV30 is Canon's HDV-based consumer camcorder that supports Canon's 2.96 Megapixel Full HD CMOS Sensor and Canon's 10x HD video lens. It is expected in US stores in February and costs US$999.
HD Wars @ CES
Similar to how wild and extravagant Las Vegas the city is, the Blu-ray Disc Association booth went for excess displays with a gigantic replica of the Black Pearl ship from Pirates of the Caribbean, with life-sized replicas of Jack Sparrow, Spider-man, a Spartan warrior from 300 and the Silver Surfer. Check out the crowds at the booth.
Blu-ray booth going all out in a show of strength as Captain Jack Sparrow proclaims the future.
What do we have here?
You must be thinking that this huge Transformers display would be something the HD DVD group is having to show them Blu-ray guys who's boss, since Transformers is one of the big ticket movies that is exclusive to HD DVD, but you'd be wrong. Dolby was the one rocking this bad boy.
Meanwhile the HD DVD Promotion Group, which had its booth directly next to the Blu-ray Disc booth, was particularly subdued.
Despite the Warner Bros announcement that the studio would go BD all the way from now on, the HD DVD Promotion Group continues to tout the availability of more than 1000 titles worldwide. The consolation however is that Toshiba is working on a super-editing machine on their QOSMIO notebook for fasts HD DVD editing and recording. We shall have to get a unit in and test it to see if the claim is true.
NME's Red Laser Blu-ray/HD DVD competing technology HD VMD was supposed to be at CES this year, but all we got as an empty booth lot surrounding by this poster.
Home Entertainment Toys
Sanyo showcased what is supposed to be the world's smallest humanoid robot running on eneloop batteries. These guys measure 165mm tall, move with 17-servo engines and can be programmed up to 10 voice commands in addition to their remote control. Robot ninja kick! Haiyaa! Probably great to have around when fighting for the remote.
And while we're on robots. Erector's Spykee gets new friends with the Spykee Cell, Vox and Miss. Spykee Cell can be controlled from a mobile phone via Bluetooth, features a motorized head to take images and works as a Bluetooth speaker phone, which is also compatible with the iPod. Spykee Vox and Miss on the other hand are both voice activated and can supposedly express a limited set of emotions. They can also be programmed as a universal remote to activate devices via infrared. Vox for the boys and Miss for the girls.
D-Box was around again at this year's CES showcasing their Motion Code hardware. These gaming chairs are able to offer up to 2Gs of acceleration and real-time response in racing and flight simulators. What we were really hoping to see was their FPS chair, but that seems to still be in development. Next year hopefully.
For the couch potatoes gearing up their your latest movie marathon, D-Box Motion Code system is also available for the movie buffs. For those that don't know, this isn't just a rumble pad in your chair activated by bass or sound, they guys at D-Box actually program movement frame by frame to make sure you feel everything, like a bullet hit. Of course, this means that the system would only respond properly to movies and games that they've already encoded in.
We checked out a little bit more generic seating and came across the ButtKicker. Now, this is just pure low frequency transducers, giving you the butt kicking you need in a general setting, and works in all situations and movies.
There was some ButtKicker mini models available too.
Quite a lot of people waiting around to get their butts kicked at CES this year. Oh well. Till next year!
Goodbye CES, Hello 2008
The biggest news from CES 2008 would probably be the constant tug-o-war between the two next-gen disc camps - Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA) and the HD DVD Promotion Group. For this particular 2008 show however, it seems that the BDA had the one-upper this time round (yes, they even built a booth complete with the Black Pearl ship and a life-sized Jack Sparrow). Anyway, despite that edge, we see Samsung and LG introducing Duo HD set-top players that allow users to playback both Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD movies. Of course, there seems to be more news on BD-Java features such as BD-Live and Bonus View, where viewers can access additional information from the Internet via their set-top players or watch a PiP commentary or access local storage while watching a BD movie.
On the TV side, the biggest news is probably Sony's and Samsung's introduction of OLED TVs, with Sony being the first to sell it at retail. We also saw TV resolutions supersede Full HD to hit resolutions four times that of Full HD. The third biggest trend we noticed is the race to create the slimmest TV - be it LCD or plasma. If you own a TV that's thicker than 9mm, you might just lose that super-nerd status among your TV pals.
While we were expecting more studio involvement in the show (well there were some booths by Sony Pictures, NBC Universal and a press conference on the role of movie studios in the tech world organized by Variety magazine) but CES 2008 is still very much a tech show, with little doses of entertainment and celebrity appearances on the side (Jerry Seinfeld, Tony Bennett, Dean Devlin, Yoko Ono and so on).
All in all, CES 2008 gave us a good glimpse of what exactly are the tech vendors focusing on for the next year and how they plan on pushing the boundaries of what's cool beyond just all this confusing talk about HD Ready/Full HD and the next-gen disc war.
We're sure Homer Simpson won't mind having any of these technologies to get through 2008. And, while it would seem that he's already settled upon his popcorn of choice, the dust is far from settled yet.
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