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  • IFA 2014: Samsung To Incorporate Netflix and Amazon 4K Ultra HD TV Apps

    IFA 2014: Samsung To Incorporate Netflix and Amazon 4K Ultra HD TV Apps

    samsung-netflix-amazon-ud-hdtv

    Samsung are partnering up with Netflix, Amazon, Maxdome, Chili, and Wuaki.tv with the intent of incorporating loads of 4K Ultra HD content to their smart TVs. The South Korean electronics giant is expected to launch Amazon’s Ultra HD service in October. Meanwhile, Netflix’s 4K app is going to be stretched to Europe later this year, making a debut with “House of Cards”, the political drama.

    Samsung also reinforced its cooperation with major European content partners, including maxdome, Wuaki.tv, and CHILI “to secure more UHD content to work towards a more robust UHD ecosystem.”

    According to the visual display’s executive vice president at Samsung’s electronics, Won Jin Lee, the UHD era has begun making it important to provide customers with more options as far as the UHD content goes. This will help in continuing the widespread adoption of UHD content. Won further added that Samsung offers its consumers with a wider range of UHD content for them to enjoy on their immersive Curved Ultra HD TVs.

    This is definitely not Samsung’s first venture into the 4K UHD content market. Prior to World Cup, Samsung partnered up with Portugal Telecom and with RTP, the Portuguese broadcaster to show live warm-up matches employing the MEO content service on 4K TVs across the world.

    The next big step for the excellent quality TV revolution is to come up with a secure UHD content distribution solution with the SCSA (Secure Content Storage Association). Samsung is working with SCSA’s founding partners including Warner Bros, 20th Century Fox, Western Digital, and ScanDisk and have sprung a 500GB external hard drive which is pre-loaded with 40 tiles having 4K picture quality that includes ‘life of Pi’ and ‘ Star Trek Into Darkness’.

  • TiVo Releases its best DVRs yet, the TiVo Roamio DVRs


    A major TiVo release was last seen three and a half years ago and while the company has constantly hit the market with new features since – via software updates, hardware revisions, and accessories – it is back with a bang. TiVo Roamio Plus is the DVR the world has been waiting for since it first saw the Premiere and it is now out alongside two other new Roamio DVRs, released in the price range of $200-$600.

    The DVRs feature built-in WiFi and at least four tuners. The user interface has been refreshed to include new and quick-launching YouTube and Netflix apps, as well as a What to Watch Now feature. There is also a new remote that is now independent of IR.

    The Plus and Pro come integrated with TiVo Stream functionality. A cool new trick that the stream feature delivers is out-of-home streaming for recorded and live shows along with the ability to download shows to iOS devices when out of home. The feature will be coming to the Roamio in the fall but it has been tested with a Tivo Stream transcoder.

  • 2011 Sony HDTV Still Leads the Industry

    Several other high-end HDTV units have come to market over the past year. But none have topped Sony’s Bravia XBR-46X929 in terms of style and ability. And with new models coming to market at year’s end, deal hunters could find one at a greater value than ever before.

    Sure, the $2,500 price tag might have discouraged some consumers from stepping up to the plate on this device. But while there may be larger units than Sony’s 46-inch model, none of them marry technology and aesthetic value so completely.

    The front of the Bravia XBR-46X929 is a single piece of Gorilla Glass, giving it a seamless, smooth look when hung up on your wall. And at only 1.5 inches wide, it’s barely noticeable, until you want it to be.

    And once you turn it on, you’ll truly understand the power of what you’ve purchased. The color is as good as it gets, the unit automatically adjusts the backlight section by section, and the image is smooth as can be, even during scenes of huge action.

    The Bravia comes stock with Netflix and 3D capabilities, as well as other huge bonuses such as Amazon Instant Video, YouTube, Hulu Plus, Skype and even digital music services from Pandora. All of those bonuses make the menu system a bit much to manage, but the set will quickly become your only requirement for total home entertainment.

    Again, you can certainly find a cheaper 46-inch than the Sony Bravia XBR-46X929, and the remote is a bit clunky and counterintuitive. But if picture quality and a massive amount of applications mean more to you than the temporary pain of shelling out a few extra hundred dollars, you simply won’t find a better HDTV set on the market. At least until Sony releases its next model.

  • The Top-Rated Vizio M3D470KD HDTV Set

    If you want a high quality HDTV device but can’t see yourself paying more than $1,000, do yourself a favor and check out the 47-inch Vizio M3D470KD. Coming in at a lean $900, this edge-lit LED delivers excellent image quality, intense colors, and fantastic wireless connectivity.

    Vizio’s solid new release centers around the remote control. It’s fitted with a full keyboard, so linking the set with an Apple TV and navigating streaming content is a breeze. It’s not fully without it’s flaws, as the sound from the built-in speakers isn’t fantastic, but you can’t do much better at this price point.

    The M3D470KD features both 2D and 3D viewing, and tests shows it performs well in either setting. And though the image does suffer from some softness depending on the content, it features a wide range of angles of acceptable viewing, which sets it apart from other LED competitors.

    Again, the big drawback is the sound. It distorts without being pushed very far, and the imitation surround sound system is just that. So if you’re looking for the full theatrical experience, it will best be paired with a set of quality speakers.

    It’s also quite green, having earned the Energy Star label. While it uses a fairly average amount of watts when turned on, when turned off it uses close to zero energy. The backlight adjusts to the amount of ambient light as well, so it won’t waste the juice if it’s unnecessary.

    Vizio’s new release isn’t the simplest HDTV to set up, but it comes with a wealth of installed features. You’ll access Netflix, Hulu Plus, Amazon and Vudu Pay-Per-View services and YouTube right out of the box, as well as direct access to many of the most popular websites in the world. You’ll even find a dedicated set of web video channels, pulled from sites like PBS, Vimeo and Funny or Die. So if you’re willing to pay for a solution to the audio issue, you’ll find yourself more than happy with the purchase.

  • Logitech Delivers Google TV to Living Rooms

    Consumers today have access to an enormous amount of content, delivered by a range of sources and increasingly complex devices. To bring this content together through a single interface on the best screen in the house – the TV screen – Logitech has worked with Google on a line of products designed to create the Google TV experience for the U.S. households with an HDMI-ready TV.

    Google TV brings traditional TV programming together with the entire Internet, with the ability to search across them both.

    Logitech yesterday unveiled Logitech Revue with Google TV, a compact, plug-and-play companion box with its Logitech Keyboard Controller, which together provide control over the Google TV experience and home-entertainment devices. The company’s portfolio of products for Google TV also includes the Logitech TV Cam and Vid HD service for HD video calling, Mini Controller as well as other applications designed for the Google TV platform.

    The box is capable of outputing a 1080p (60fps) signal and comes with with HDMI 1.3a in and out, two USB 2.0 ports, audio optical output (S/PDIF), 10/100BaseT Ethernet, 802.11b/g/n connectivity, the Logitech Harmony IR blaster port, and a built-in Logitech Unifying receiver.

    The box ships with a compact keyboard complete with integrated remote and touchpad, HDMI cable, and one IR mini blaster. There is also a selection of accessories: a $149 webcam, and the Revue-specific version of Mini controller for $129.99, as well as Logitech Harmony app for Android and iPhone.

    The Logitech TV Cam lets you make and receive high-definition video calls on your HDTV – no computer required. It has Carl Zeiss wide-angle autofocus lens with 5x digital zoom and two digital, directional microphones and connects with Logitech Revue box using USB. Together, the Logitech TV Cam and Vid HD software enable HD video calls of up to 720p.

    Available for pre-order on Logitech.com, Amazon.com and BestBuy.com, Logitech’s line of products for Google TV are expected to be available online and in Best Buy stores across the U.S. by the end of October. The Logitech Revue suggested retail price is $299.99. The Logitech Mini Controller will be selling for $129.99, and the Logitech TV Cam for $149.99.

    “Just as we have done with the PC and with home entertainment systems, our role with Google TV is to give people the ability to control and interact with their content and devices with unprecedented ease,” said Gerald P. Quindlen, Logitech president and chief executive officer. “With our line of products for Google TV, Logitech will help redefine the user experience in the digital living room.”

    “Logitech Revue with Google TV makes it easy for people to use just one controller to find and enjoy content from a variety of sources – programs from TV providers; the entire Web, including Flash-based games; music, photos and videos from their personal library; and a growing selection of apps,” said Ashish Arora, vice president and general manager of Logitech’s digital home products group. “Logitech not only delivers the Google TV experience for any HDMI-ready TV, but we build on it with exceptional interface devices, control of living room components through Logitech Harmony Link and enhanced experiences such as video calling in the living room.”

    “Google TV combines the power of search, a full Web browser, and Android apps with the TV experience you know and love,” said Mario Queiroz, vice president of product management for Google. “We’re proud to be working with Logitech to launch the very first set of Google TV devices, helping you and me easily access great Web and TV content, all on the same HD screen.”

    “Smart TV delivers a truly integrated experience, with broadcast and the Internet united on one screen,” said Wilfred Martis, general manager, Retail CE, Intel Digital Home Group. “The Logitech Revue brings Google TV to existing televisions, and also offers video calling to provide a new dimension to home entertainment. The smart TV experience requires advanced processing performance, as well as outstanding audio/visual capabilities, and we’re proud that Logitech selected the Intel Atom processor CE4100 to power this revolutionary product.”

  • iPhone 4 is Here

    The iPhone 4 has been finally announced at the WWDC 2010. Steve Jobs himself revealed the new smartphone by Apple: the next iPhone is a 9.3mm thick (a quarter thinner than the iPhone 3GS; “the thinnest smartphone on the planet”, as Jobs said), has glass on front and back (“for better optical quality and scratch resistance”), and stainless steel around. It uses the stainless steel band as part of the antenna system.

    “It’s the most precise thing we’ve ever made,” Apple CEO said.

    iPhone 4 is powered by the A4 chip (designed ”in house”) and comes with two built-in cameras (one on the front and one on the back with an LED flash), two mics (one for a noise cancellation), micro-SIM (“we needed the space!"), 802.11n WiFi, GPS, compass, accelerometer, Quadband HSDPA/HSUPA, 7.2Mbps and up to 32GB of storage.

    The display is a huge innovation: based on new IPS technology ("quite a bit better than OLED"), the 3.5 inch, 960 x 640 Retina Display displays 326 pixels per inch (four times as many pixels as in any standard display) giving us really sharp text and pictures. The contrast ratio is 800:1 (4x better than the 3GS).

    Since the battery is now a bit bigger, its life has been improved. Apple says there is 7 hours of 3G talk, 6 hours of 3G browsing, 10 hours of WiFi browsing, 10 hours of video, 40 hours of music and 300 hours of standby.

    Another new piece of hardware is a gyroscope with pitch, roll, and yaw. It provides 6-axis motion sensing and features new CoreMotion APIs for extremely precise positioning. "We’re adding a 3 axis gyro, and we tied the gyro and accelerometer, compass, and gyro together for six axis. It’s perfect for gaming," Jobs said.

    Back camera has gone from 3 to 5 MP. Apple is using something that’s new to smarpthones — a back side illuminated sensor (giving more light to the camera). There’s a 5X digital zoom, tap to focus, and LED flash built in.

    Camera also does HD 720p (at 30 frames per second) video recording. It supports tap to focus and allows us to edit videos right on the phone. It also has 1-click sharing and the LED flash will stay on for the HD video recording. There is also iMovie coming to the iPhone for $4.99 (“if we approve it,” Jobs joked).

    iPhone 4 will also feature "FaceTime" video calling. It works between iPhone 4 devices, doesn’t require any setting-up and works anywhere there is WiFi. “It’s WIFI only in 2010. We need to work a little bit with our providers,” Jobs said. He added that Apple is going to make FaceTime and open industry standard.

    Apple has renamed the iPhone OS. Now it’s just iOS 4." Becuase it’s on iPad, iPod Touch, and iPhone,” Apple CEO said. He also said that 100 millionth iOS device will be sold this month. "There is definitely a market for your applications," Jobs added.

    As announced earlier this year, new iOS 4 features include Multitasking for third party apps; Folders to better organize and access apps; improved Mail with a unified inbox, fast inbox switching and threaded messages; enhanced Enterprise support with better data protection, mobile device management and wireless app distribution.

    Apple has also added Bing to the iPhone for search (“Microsoft has done a great job on this,” Jobs said). Google will still be the default, but now we’ll have choice of Google, Yahoo, or Bing.

    Developers will get a Golden Master Candidate release of iOS4 today.

    Apple is also bringing iBooks to the iPhone with the iPhone 4. It has the same bookshelf as on the iPad, the same ability to read a PDF and comes with the same controls, highlighting, notes, and bookmarking. We can download the same book to all our devices at no extra charge (“Buy it on your iPad, download to your iPhone”)! In addition, iBooks will automatically and wirelessly sync our current place, bookmarks, and notes across all our devices.

    On July 1st Apple will also start providing iAds to all iOS 4 devices. “Why are we doing this? To help our developers earn money to continue to create free and low-cost apps for users,” Jobs said. According to him, they are trying to combine “the emotion of video with the interactivity of the Web."

    Apple sells and hosts the ads, so developers just have to tell them where to put the ads. And devs get paid 60 percent of the revenue. The company started selling ads eight weeks ago to: Nissan, Citi, Unilever, AT&T, Chanel, GE, Liberty Mutual, State Farm, Geico, Campbells, Sears, JCPenney, Target, Best Buy, DirecTV, TBS Network and Disney. "We’ve got advertisers committing to $60m," Jobs said.

    Price and availability
    iPhone 4 comes in two colors: black and white. 16GB model is for $199, and 32GB model for $299. Old 3GS is now $99

    Jobs said that AT&T is going to make an “incredibly generous upgrade offer: if your contract expires at any time in 2010, you can upgrade to the iPhone 4. You can get it up to six months early."

    The new iPhone will be on sale June 24th. Pre orders begin June 15th. Apple will ship iPhone 4 in US and four other countries on the first day (U.K., Germany, France, Japan). In July they’re shipping in 18 countries more. By September it will ship in 88 countries. "Our fastest roll out ever," Jobs said.

    iPhone 3GS, iPhone 3G and iPod touch users can upgrade to iOS 4 for free starting June 21.

    Reed Hastings from Netflix, Mark Pincus from Zygna and Karthik Bala from Activision were also on stage announcing that Netflix, Farmville and new Guitar Hero will be coming to the iPhone.

  • Boxee and D-Link Unveil The Boxee Box

    At the Boxee Beta Unveiling event in Brooklyn, Boxee revealed that D-Link has been named first choice as the hardware partner to release a Boxee Box – Boxee branded set-top box.

    The device brings HDMI-support, WiFi, Ethernet, an SD card slot and two USB 2.0 ports. It also comes with optical audio, RCA audio and RF remote and plays any non-DRM media.

    According to the companies, the Boxee Box, which has already won a Best of Innovations award from the Computer Electronics Association, “reinterprets what TV should be, delivering all the movies, TV shows, music and photos from a user’s computer, home network and Internet to their HDTV with no PC needed.”

    The full product will be shown at CES 2010 and it is supposed to hit the store shelves in Q2 2010 for about $200.

    Boxee social media center, and its free, open source downloadable enables to stream content from websites like Netflix, MLB.TV, Comedy Central, Pandora, Last.fm, and flickr.

    Boxee is in public Alpha for Mac, Linux, and Windows. This Monday the company launched the Beta and plans to open it up to the public on Jan 7th (also at CES).

    The company say its eventual goal is to let users integrate Boxee into their existing devices (TVs, game consoles, STB, and DVD/Blu-Ray players) where possible or to buy a Boxee Box if their existing hardware can’t run it.

    After launching in June of 2008, boxee has nearly 700,000 Alpha testers. In addition, dozens of content providers have built applications for their content on Boxee and a 3rd party developer made boxee available for the Apple TV.

    In 2009, the company hopes to reach 1 million users across computers, AppleTVs, and other devices that can be connected to a television.

  • Netflix Coming to PlayStation3

    Sony and Netflix – the two of the fastest growing home entertainment brands in the U.S. – are joining forces to make movies and TV episodes from Netflix available to be streamed instantly to TVs via the PlayStation3.

    The streaming via the PS3 system will begin next month at no additional cost to Netflix members in the United States who have a PS3 system.

    Initially, watching movies instantly streamed from Netflix via the PS3 system will be enabled by a free, instant streaming Blu-ray disc that is being made available to all Netflix members.

    The free instant streaming disc leverages Blu-ray’s BD-Live technology to access the Internet and activate the Netflix user interface on the PS3 system, which must be online via Wi-Fi or Ethernet.

    The disc will be required for streaming at least until a PS3 software update sometime in late 2010.

    Netflix members slide the disc into their PS3 systems to reveal movies and TV episodes that can be watched instantly. They can use the Netflix Web site or navigate directly on their PS3 systems to add movies and TV shows to their Queues.

    PS3 system enables consumers to play high-definition games, watch Blu-ray movies, listen to music, view photos, browse the internet, and download content from PlayStation Network.

    Netflix, one of the world’s largest online movie rental services, enables to stream movies and TV episodes to a TVs and computers via Netflix ready devices (such as the PS3) and delivers DVDs to homes.

    According to the companies, the PS3 system’s installed base has reached close to 9 million units in the United States, and Netflix recently reported 11.1 million U.S. subscribers as of September 30.

  • Mvix Launches "Ultimate" 1080p Home Theater Media Player


    Mvix has announces the worldwide launch of the Mvix Ultio, a hard-disk based media center capable of HD digital media playback with video output as high as 1080p.

    The company claims the device supports the largest array of AV formats and codecs of any media player.

    Ultio supports most 1080p HD video codecs, and formats such as H.264, MKV, Dixv HD, MOV, VC-1, FLV, etc.

    It is also capable of playing unique formats such as AVC-HD (normally used in camcorder footage) or FLAC (the popular, uncompressed audio, craved by audiophiles).

    Mvix Ultio is being launched in two flavors: the regular version (without a HDD) is priced at USD $169, whereas the premium version (bundled with 1TB Hard Drive) will be available at USD $259.

    Mike Mallon, business development manager of Mvix, said the Ultio is internet-ready and pre-equipped with a network port and an optional Wireless-N capability.

    He said it sports a samba server and a UPnP implementation, allowing seamless integration with services like PlayOn or Tversity – for streaming video content from Netflix, Hulu, CBS, Youtube, CNN, ESPN and much more.

    "This is our most comprehensive product to-date and we feel very confident about its market traction," he said.

    The Ultio is available now.

  • Amazon Video On Demand Brings New-Release Movies To Roku


    Roku has agreed a deal that will give its set-top box users access to Amazon’s video on demand (VOD) content.

    The agreement means owners of Roku digital video players will be able to instantly purchase, rent and watch digital movies and TV episodes from the Amazon service.

    Currently the Roku player only supports Netflix.

    Amazon’s VOD service has more than 40,000 commercial-free movies and television shows, including instant access to new release movie titles.

    Rental prices range from USD $0.99 to $3.99 per view.

    The deal with Amazon, which will kick in during Q1 2009, is part of an effort by Roku to widen its content offering.

    Tim Twerdahl, Roku’s vice president of consumer products, said Roku owners should expect more content to become available in the first half of 2009.

    “We’re looking to create an open platform for a number of different business models and content types,” he said.

    With Netflix providing a subscription-based model and Amazon a transactional one, Twerdahl said the company was now working hard to get ad-supported video on the Roku player.