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Category: hdtv

  • Samsung Promises Thinnest Ever HDTV


    Samsung is to unveil a flat-panel HDTV measuring a waif-like 6.5-millimeters at this week’s Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas.

    The TV set is reported to be between 6.5mm and 7mm across its width and has an LED (light emitting diode) backlight.

    There are suggestions that the TV tuner is not actually in Samsung’s set – located instead in a base station.

    That aside, if the dimensions are confirmed it would be the thinnest LCD TV yet demonstrated.

    Currently that accolade is held by Philips, which unveiled an 8mm prototype LCD television at the IFA electronics show in Berlin last year.

    At the same event Sony showed a 9.9mm set that is already available – making it the thinnest LCD TV in retail stores.

    Samsung has a news conference for Wednesday at which the TV set is expected to take centre stage.

  • Season's Greetings From The Biz-news Team

    Everyone at hdtv.biz-news would like to thank you for your support in 2008. We hope you will continue to enjoy the latest HDTV industry news and analysis in the year to come.

    Best Wishes For The Holiday Season and a Very Happy New Year

  • Hybrid Disc Plays On Blu-ray and DVD


    Japan-based Infinity Storage Media has launched the first Blu-ray / DVD hybrid disc.

    The disc sports a single-layer of Blu-ray (25GB) on one side and a conventional dual-layer DVD (8.5GB) on the other.

    Essentially it works by having different permeable layers for DVD and Blu-ray and different thicknesses between them.

    Since the lasers penetrate to different depths, it allows either the DVD or Blu-ray to be read depending on what player the disc is on.

    Obviously, the main benefit of the hybrid is that it’s backward compatibility.

    This means that users can switch it between their Blu-ray and DVD players without the need to have two different copies.

    The Japanese market is to be the first to benefit with the release of locally-made drama Code Blue.

  • YouTube HD Videos Now In Widescreen


    After weeks of trialling its new HD capabilities YouTube has officially launched its high-def channel.

    Users clicking on the newly added "watch in HD" option will automatically see the videos play in widescreen (16:9 aspect).

    YouTube originally announced its intention to go widescreen in November following the video sharing giant’s recent decision to start hosting full-length Hollywood movies.

    As well as boosting HD content, YouTube plans to add filtering options, including the ability to search HD videos.

    The Google-owned company will also be adding three new landing pages – youtube.com/music, youtube.com/news and youtube.com/movies – with a view to simplifying categorization and search.

    With competition intensifying as the likes of Hulu showing high definition videos, the improvements suggest YouTube is responding well to the challenge.

    The changes come just as Warner Music is pulling all its music videos off YouTube because of Google’s refusal to pay more money.

  • Blu-ray Growing In Popularity – Except With Yahoo


    It’s fitting that after a roller-coaster year for Blu-ray the high-def format should end 2009 on a high AND a low.

    With sales in the US encouraging, a poll by Zogby International shows that Blu-ray players are one of the most wanted holiday gifts this season for HDTV owners.

    The players are only beaten by consumers looking for a second HDTV.

    Overall, Blu-ray players received 30 per cent of the vote, beating other popular gifts such as GPS systems, Nintendo Wii, and MP3 players.

    On a low note was the decision by Yahoo to put Blu-ray at number three in its year-end Best and Worst Tech Products list.

    A key complaint about the format was the continued high price of discs despite the plumetting cost of players.

    Yahoo also wasn’t happy with the slowness of the technology, including its lengthy boot-up time.

    The Zogby results were part of an online poll conducted between December 2-4 which polled 1,726 HDTV owners asking them which gift they would like to receive this holiday season.

    Of those who responded, 66 per cent indicated they would be purchasing titles for themselves.

    More than half the respondents (55 per cent) said they would be purchasing titles for friends and family who owned Blu-ray Disc players.

    Not surprisngly given its early sales figures, the poll also found that The Dark Knight is the most anticipated title this holiday season, followed by
    Mamma Mia, Wall-E, The Chronicles of Narnia: Prince Caspian and Hancock.

    Reports suggest that sales of Blu-ray titles in the US and UK are picking up well.

    Figures for the UK show that sales reached 462,500 units in November, an increase of 165 per cent over the previous month.

    While final December numbers aren’t available until January, initial sales are encouraging – helped considerably by the success of The Dark Knight.

    A total of 6.5 Million units have been sold in Europe to date (up 320 per cent), with the market share expected to double next year to 6 per cent.

    So far, roughly 800,000 stand-alone Blu-ray Disc players have been sold in Europe, but that number is expected to triple for next year, up to 2.5 Million
    .

  • Nominations Open For The Outstanding HDTV Person and Product Of 2008


    With 2008 fast drawing to a close biz-news.com is seeking YOUR help in choosing outstanding candidates for the titles of Man/Woman of the Year and Product/Service of the Year.

    We would like you to nominate an individual and/or product/service that you feel has contributed greatly to the HDTV sector over the past 12 months.

    The winner will be selected from the nominations submitted by our readers – professionals and technology enthusiasts in the industry.

    Obviously, as this is a crowd-sourcing survey, we need your participation.

    Spreading word of this survey to friends and colleagues will also ensure a wider participation in the poll and will give a much more accurate result.

    If you have more than one nomination for either category you can make multiple submissions – but you can only vote once for any person or product.

    We will publish the results in early 2009 and share the raw data with the community. (Personal information about contributors will not be disclosed).

    After a year like 2008 there are plenty of good candidates – so please give it some thought and send your Man/Woman and/or Product nominations to us.

  • Movial Launches HD Video Calling for PCs


    Movial has announced a new software application that offers PC-to-PC, and PC-to-Mobile HD video.

    Victor Donselaar, president of Movial, said the Communicator PC 7.2 HD video calling technology significantly reduces the CPU and bandwidth utilization compared to other technologies.

    He said this enables users to run multiple applications at the same time.

    The video technology comes complete with high-quality, high-resolution, real-time, two-way video communications and advanced voice processing technology.

    It allows tight lip-synching of video and voice, which Donselaar said allows for much more natural conversation.

    “With Movial Communicator PC 7.2, subscribers can see and talk to a person as if they were sitting in front of them,” he said.

    “With high-speed Internet connectivity more readily available and video capture and display costs decreasing, users can finally enjoy a much richer multimedia face-to-face encounter."

    Movial also announced that it has signed a deal with Cyta, the leading telecommunications company in Cyprus, which has launched an IMS PC play with its broadband telephony service bundle, powered by Communicator PC 7.2.

  • XStreamHD Beams "Blu-ray" Quality Video Direct-to-Home


    XStreamHD has successfully tested a transport system that delivers Full HD movies, music, and games directly to subscriber homes via satellite.

    The system, tested on the AMC-16 satellite at 85 degrees west ongitude, will be able to provide content throughout North America.

    XStreamHD, which first announced its plans for the innovative new satellite delivery system in January at CES 2008, had expected to launch the service in October.

    George Gonzalez, founder and CEO of XStreamHD, said today that the service will be able to deliver Full HD (1080p) content to homes, independent of Internet or cable congestion, by unlocking existing FSS (Fixed Satellite Service) capacity.

    He said the XStreamHD test had shown that the network’s could deliver Blu-ray quality video with up to 7.1 lossless channels of DTS Master Audio.

    The company is to offer its customers access to movies, HDTV, music and electronic games.

    There’s no word yet about partnerships for movies or HDTV content but as XStreamHD will be showcasing its transport system next month at the 2009 Consumer Electronics Show, more might be revealed then.

  • VUDU Brings The Web To TV


    VUDU has launched a new platform that brings Web-hosted applications and services to consumer appliances, including its own Internet movie player.

    The VUDU RIA (Rich Internet Application) platform will deliver TV shows as well as Web apps which enable users to share their photos and watch the tens of millions of YouTube videos on their HDTVs.

    The company plans to open VUDU RIA up to third party developers in the first half of 2009.

    Prasanna Ganesan, VUDU’s Chief Technical Officer, said the goal in creating the new platform was to allow anyone with Web development skills to easily author Internet-driven applications for the TV.

    "We are very pleased with the results and look forward to opening up VUDU RIA to the developer community," he said.

    VUDU says it plans to add more applications and services throughout 2009.

    Edward Lichty, executive Vice President of Strategy and Content, said VUDU RIA enabled customers to quickly open up huge libraries of web based content to TVs in living rooms around America.

    The company has created an initial set of applications and services in a new area of the VUDU home page, called VUDU Labs. It is available to all VUDU owners in the US amd has applications that include casual games, implementations of Flickr, Picasa and the entire YouTube library, as well as a new "On Demand TV" area with more than 120 channels.

    These include free on-demand shows provided by major network television and on-line specialty sites spanning news, food, music and sports.

  • Growth Strong In HD Videoconferencing and Telepresence


    A third of videoconferencing managers report that the economic crisis is likely to lead to an accelerated deployment of equipment rather than a slowdown.

    A survey from Wainhouse Research reports that customers are continuing to invest in "visual collaboration solutions", even in the current economic climate.

    It says the two largest drivers for this are travel reduction and improved decision making.

    Nearly a quarter of respondents have either deployed telepresence suites or are planning on deploying within one year.

    It’s not just full-room telepresence systems that are experiencing growth but videoconferencing solutions generally, including desktop videoconferencing applications.

    Wainhouse’s annual survey of videoconferencing end users indicates that in the past year, both interest in and purchases of more advanced visual solutions have increased dramatically.

    The results shows that 32 per cent of respondents have systems that can now support 720p HD videoconferencing.

    To support these and other unified communications applications, customers are continuing their migration to IP, with users reporting that 76 per cent of video calls now take place on an IP network – up from 66 per cent one year earlier.

    In addition, interest in integrating videoconferencing to unified communications platforms has grown significantly, according to the report.