Voom, the high defintion satellite service, has been the talk of the town recently, and not in a good way. There are questions about its continued existence, and audio|video revolution discusses the topic.

Link: audio|video revolution

With all the attention on the looming format war between HD-DVD and Blu-ray, one could forget that there’s already a recordable HD format out the: D-VHS. audio|video revolution has a review of the JVC HM-DH40000U.

Link: audio|video revolution

Almost half of consumers plan to make their next TV purchase an HDTV, according to a new survery by the Consumer Electronics Association. Most consumers are aware of HDTV, this number having grown significantly in the past year and a half.

Link: CEA

One of the things Sony is doing to prepare Blu-ray for the format war with HD-DVD is to make digital masters of all its films in high definition. That way, when Blu-Ray hits the market, Sony will have a large library of films that they can release on BD-ROM media. Sony hopes to have a large choice of movies right from the get-go, and this is the way to do it. With a major format war brewing between Blu-ray and HD-DVD, Sony would be wise to prepare as many of its movies as possible. Sony owns Columbia Tri-Star and now MGM as well, giving it quite a library. In the looming format war, however, a large library might not be enough.

Link: Hoovers

If you’re in the market for reasonably priced home theater projectors, then 3 names are going to be on your short list: Sony, Panasonic, and Sanyo. They all offer 3 panel 1280-720 LCD projectors for a reasonable price. They all compete fiercely with one another, offering features such as lens-shift, auto-iris, HDMI inputs, and more. These 3 projects are simply among the best bang-for-the-buck projectors you can buy, and ultimate AV knows this, which is why they’ve lately reviewed all three of them:

ultimate AV reviews the Sanyo PLV-Z3
ultimate AV reviews the Sony VPL-HS51
ultimate AV reviews the Panasonic PT-AE700U

CableLabs provides technologies to allow you to watch cable TV without a set-top box. You plug your cable into your HDTV just like you do today with standard definition televisions. This standard for cable on HDTV is called CableCard, because not only do you plug a the cable directly into your HDTV, you also get a little card that you insert into your HDTV as well. Satellite owners are already familiar with this, and now cable TV watchers will be too. CableCard has become quite popular, and many manufacturers are adding support for it. The problem with the first version of CableCard is that is had a one-way communication stream. That is, content can be delivered TO your HDTV, but your HDTV can’t upload any information back. So things like video-on-demand or pay-per-view were impossible.

Well, CableLabs has been working on a solution and Panasonic has signed up for CableCARD™ Host Interface Licensing Agreement (CHILA). I hope that the copy-protection is not too onerous, which was one of the complaints about the certain aspects of the original CableCard before they were modified.

Link: CableLabs

[Update: another commentary by MarketNews about the same article.]

In-Stat has done some research to uncover trends in consumer media and content. Even the summary makes interesting reading, and the full report is available for purchase.

One of the things they predict is that Blu-ray will dominate outside North America, while HD DVD will dominate inside North America. The widespread support from international consumer electronics firms will be the cause. (Blu-ray is backed by many of the big name Asian firms.) It’s an interesting premise, but wouldn’t the same argument hold for Blu-ray’s dominance inside North America? Sony, JVC, Panasonic, et al, all have a large presence in the North American market. And it’s not like there’s a big North American hardware firm backing HD-DVD. So why would the fact that Blu-ray is so well supported only affect those outside North America? The report itself probably says, but I haven’t read it (due to cost reasons).

Link: In-Stat

Avid, the leading provider of high-end NLE software and hardware today announces that it intends to acquire Pinnacle Systems, Inc in a stock and cash transaction.

“Pinnacle’s consumer video business – which to date has shipped more than 10 million units -will form the basis for a new consumer video division at Avid, providing the company with an immediate avenue into that segment.”

On the professional end, “…the parties expect that Pinnacle’s award-winning professional products – such as the MediaStream broadcast playout server and the Deko on-air graphics system – will enhance Avid’s end-to-end broadcast production pipeline, which has helped Avid become a global leader in that industry.”

Here are the press releases on the Avid and Pinnacle sites.

With its Pinnacle Liquid Edition Pro product line, Pinnacle Systems, Inc provides advanced HDV editing software at affordable pro-sumer prices. I believe that with Avid’s strength in the professional NLE arena, and Pinnacle’s consumer experience, competitors will have a force to be reckoned with. Avid’s name alone will give consumer’s further impetus to buy the already popular Studio line of software.

Avid provides its Avid Free DV product as a feature reduced version of its Avid Xpress DV product to penetrate the consumer level market. Xpress DV, currently is only for DV editing, HDV is available on PC in its Avid Xpress Pro HD product, but the price is significantly more than HDV editing solutions from Pinnacle.

Consolidation in the NLE market is inevitable, and this acquisition will will bring the Avid name into more homes, instead of just the work-place.

Rm.

[Update: according to DigiTimes, Toshiba and Canon plan to start producing displays in August, with products hitting the market in March]

Toshiba and Canon are working on another next-generation flat panel display type. It’s called SED which stands for “surface-conduction electron-emitter display”. Remember those old-fashioned CRTs? Look great, but big and bulky? Well, an SED is much like a CRT except that where the CRT had one (or three) guns at the back of the display shooting electrons at the phosphorous screen, an SED has “guns” called “electron-emitters” for every pixel. And they’re a lot closer to the pixel too, so that the screen can be much thinner. SED displays have all the display-quality advantages of CRT, and the convenience advantages of LCD and plasma. If Toshiba and Canon can make this work, this would be a good thing for consumers. We’ll see soon, because Toshiba wants to launch an SED television this year.

Links:

Canon Press Release
c|net article
PC World article

eCoustics relates that Optoma announces a DLP front-projector using TI’s DarkChip 3, for less than $10,000. The H79 boasts a 4500:1 contrast ratio, an 8 segment color wheel, and costs $9,999. It has DVI-I with HDCP but no HDMI or Firewire (few if any have the latter).

-

[Update: audio|video revolution has details on this topic]

4K is better than 2K, right? Sony’s SXRD 4K (4096×2160) projectors for large venues are gaining popularity, with this purchase by Landmark Theatres (as reported by UltimateAV).

-

eCoustics has a great guide to component video cables, and a guide to video cable purchasing.

-

The Plasma TV Buying Guide has a review of some new Panasonic Plasma displays.

-

And according to Twice, Fujitsu is pushing ahead with new LCD and Plasma products.

MPEG4 is a relatively new compression algorithm for video. It can compress normal and HD video no problem, just like MPEG2. But MPEG4 just does it better. After compressing a movie or TV show into MPEG4, it will take up a lot less space than the same movie or show compressed with MPEG2. That’s progress. Now, satellite providers are thinking about using MPEG4 to transmit their signals. This is what this article over at Audio/Video Revolution is all about. Near the end of the article, the author surmises that the satellite providers will find a way to convert MPEG2 set-top boxes to MPEG4. Somehow I doubt it.

Over at Yahoo they have a review of the Scientific Atlanta 8300 PVR. Now, this isn’t a HD machine, but the 8300HD is. So much of what the review says will apply equally to the 8300HD, except for the multi-room stuff. I have the 8300HD at home and my wife and I use it all the time. It’s a great little machine, though sometimes it doesn’t record shows that we tell it to, which is really annoying.

The Inquirer discusses TDK’s plans for Blu-ray media in this article. This is, of course, a vital step for the adoption of any new media type. We all know that the Blu-ray standard supports more than one layer, with 25GB per layer. Also, the first incarnation of Blu-ray will support up to 2 layers. And TDK is working on exactly that - creating two-layer 50GB discs.

HD editing has come to the masses!

Adobe recently announced that a free plug-in was available for Adobe Premiere Pro 1.5 for editing HDV content. See the Press Release for details.

Rm.

If your name is Samsung, that is.

An 82″ flat-panel LCD television. Whew! Now that’s a gigantic LCD TV! And it’s not even rear-projection. Boggles the mind.

UltimateAV has the scoop.