TI has introduced some new technology to make DLP displays even better. Called BrilliantColor™, it increases the colour depth of DLP projectors by offering up to 6-colour processing.

BrilliantColor™ for DLP technology utilizes a new color-processing algorithm and system level enhancements to enable higher picture brightness while providing truer, more vibrant colors. Enabling a greater than 50% brightness increase in mid tone images, common in video and natural scenes, BrilliantColor™ will be available in both business and home entertainment projectors with SVGA, XGA, 720p, WXGA, and SXGA+ resolution.

Through greater flexibility in color processing, customers can expand beyond the red, green, and blue color palette and include yellow, magenta and cyan, which allow for more realistic and lifelike color reproduction.

Mitsubishi Digital Electronics America is the first customer to announce products with BrilliantColor™ technology, with 4 new projectors announced here at InfoComm, one of which will be on display at its booth #1404. TI expects other customers to launch products with DLP BrilliantColor™ technology in 2005. It will also be demonstrated at the TI booth (#701), along with other innovative DLP products.

Link: eCoustics - DLP Technology Splashes New Colors into Display World

ultimate AV reviews the SIM2 Grand Cinema HT 300 DLP projector. It uses a six-segment colour wheel an TI’s HD2+ DLP chip with DarkChip3. The reviewer is pretty sensitive to rainbow effects and sees them only occasionally with this projector, which is a good thing. The lamp has a rated life of 8000 hours, which is very good. The projector uses a separate unit for all the video connections, and the two are linked with an optical cable. The projector has both DVI and HDMI inputs, which is great. Fred Manteghian, the reviewer, seems to like the projector:

SIM2 is an Italian company. What, you couldn’t guess from those sleek lines? The unit is, in a word, elegant. But this is not simply a case of all style, no substance. The HT 300 E-LINK is perhaps the finest single-chip DLP projection system made to date.

Link: ultimate AV - SIM2 Grand Cinema HT 300 E-LINK DLP Projector

Daytek announced a 32″ LCD HDTV and 42″ Plasma EDTV displays for the Canadian market on Friday.

The DT3220 is a 1366×768 LCD display with component and DVI-HDCP inputs. It is currently available for $1,999 Cdn. It has a contrast ratio of 1000:1.

The EPT-4202AN is a plasma display with a contrast ratio of 3000:1, and is available for $2,299 Cdn. Resolution wasn’t stated, but it’s not HDTV.

Link: marketnews.ca - Daytek Debuts LCD HDTV & Plasma EDTV

Hello! A note from the author here.

Because of the volume of next-generation gaming console news being posted here I’ve decided to break them out into a separate website, PS3Blog.net. Don’t let the name fool you! You’ll get all the same posts about the next-gen consoles as you’ve been enjoying so far. The blog is about the PS3 and its competitors, the Xbox 360 and the Revolution. If you’ve been a long time reader you know that I have a PS2 and that I’ll probably be getting a PS3. My friend Todd who has an Xbox will probably get an Xbox 360. Steve, who has a GameCube, is currently wondering if it’s worth the bother to get a Revolution. We’re hoping Nintendo pulls something good out of their hat. So while I have great respect for the Xbox 360 and Nintendo, I’ll probably be getting a PS3, hence the name. I’ve you’ve registered to post here, don’t worry, I’ve carried your usernames over to the new website. All the posts that were about high definition console gaming that used to be here are now at the new site. Hopefully it’ll all be seemless.

So check it out!

Link: PS3Blog.net

One day after the HD-DVD camp announced spring 2006 support for HD-DVD-R media, Pioneer and Mitsubishi announced that they jointly managed to lower manufacturing costs of the Blu-ray equivalent, BD-R. They used the spin coating manufacturing technology.

Link: discwrite - Blu-Ray Recordable Discs Production Becomes Cheaper
Link: EETimes - Blu-ray disk enters next-gen DVD race

Samsung has announced a trio of new plasma displays.

The 50″ PPM50M5H is an HD device with a resolution of 1366×768. The 42″ PPM42M5Sis just a standard definition display, so kindly ignore that I mentioned it.

The press release talks of the 42″ PPM42M5H strangely. It has a resolution of 1024×768 and yet “is true high-definition by matching the 720p HDTV format without the need for processing”. Huh? That doesn’t make sense. Anyone?

Samsung’s new lineup of plasma displays offer advanced Anti-Burn Technologies including Auto Pixel Shift that keeps the images moving imperceptibly and Samsung’s Always White technology combines with its Signal Pattern Process to eliminate electrically charged residual images.

The new models feature an array of signal inputs for direct hook up to nearly any video source. Each display device includes inputs for composite video, component video that offers 480i/p, 720p and 1080i viewing, S-Video for gaming applications, DVI for digital video sources and an RGB input for use with a PC.

Link: Samsung - SAMSUNG Showcases New Plasma Monitors For PRO A/V And Commmercial Applications

If like many of us you can’t wait for blue laser HD disc players to hit the market, but you’re willing to buy a red laser DVD solution for HD, then JVC has a solution. Their SRDVD-100U player can play HD material stored in MPEG2 or Windows Media 9 (WM9) formats. HDV camcorders are already available, so this is a great way to burn all that material.

“The industry isn’t going to wait for blue laser players. The onslaught of high definition programming brought about by HDV cameras and recorders demands a readily available disk playback system now,” said Tim Tokita, product marketing manager for JVC PROFESSIONAL PRODUCTS COMPANY. “The SRDVD-100 is the perfect complement to our new ProHD lineup of cameras and recorders. JVC is proud to deliver an innovative product that meets the demands of the professional market.”

The machine has a DVI/HDCP output and component analog outputs as well, with resolutions of 720p and 1080i both supported.

In addition, the SRDVD-100 includes a front panel USB 2.0 connector to view other media files stored on solid state memory from a digital camera or from external hard disk drives. The SRDVD-100 supports most media types including USB Memory Stick, I-O Data HDD products, and any FAT16/32 storage device or card reader.

Link: JVC Professional - JVC Unveils Affordable Pro HD DVD Player

It looks like it may not be so hard after all to create an HD disc player capable of playing both HD-DVD and Blu-ray media. Supposedly Marshall Media Inc. has developed a new optical head product that can read CDs, DVDs, HD-DVDs, and BD-ROMs within a single pickup. They don’t have a bunch of lasers of different wavelengths, instead they tune the laser to choose which wavelength to operate at. This should make the device affordable enough to be used in HD universal players. Going to Marshal Media’s website, however, doesn’t show any of this.

Link: DVDFile.com - Movement on the HD disc front
Link: Marshall Media Inc.

And for some more news in the “how many ways can you say it’s over” category, Toshiba vice-president Yoshihide Fujii puts even more nails into the Blu-ray / HD-DVD merger coffin:

“We won’t talk from our side,” Toshiba Corporate Senior Vice President Yoshihide Fujii said.

“The 0.1-millimeter format seems impossible now,” Fujii said, referring to the Blu-Ray optical cover layer thickness.

Link: DVD Recorder World - Toshiba Forge Ahead With HD-DVD - No Plans To Talk With Sony

And lastly, Toshiba says that they’ve developed a recordable HD-DVD disc, with a capacity of 15GB. Shouldn’t they already have had that by now? Anyway, the discs will be sold next spring.

Link: Audioholics - Toshiba Develops Recordable High-Definition HD-DVDs
Link: Toshiba - Volume Production Technology of HD DVD-R Discs Established

PC World has reviewed a slew of plasma displays.

The LG Electronics set has good features but a few display problems, while the NEC’s forte is definitely display quality. The Pioneer is a little uneven in performance, the Panasonic has a good image but is otherwise lacking, and the Philips has good colour but is missing some features. Just stay away from the Fujitsu, Sony, and Dell - it doesn’t look like they’re worth the effort.

So if you’re looking for a plasma, check out the NEC first! With a resolution of 1024 x 768, it’s not technically HD, but it’s awfully close!

Link: PC World - Plasma Review Summary
Link: PC World - LG Electronics 42PX4D
Link: PC World - NEC PX-42XR3A
Link: PC World - Pioneer PDP-4350PU
Link: PC World - Panasonic TH-42PX25U/P
Link: PC World - Philips 42PF9966/37
Link: PC World - Fujitsu P42HHA40US
Link: PC World - Sony WEGA KDE-42XS955
Link: PC World - Dell W4200HD

In this article I mentioned the Blu-Ray Cinema player. I postulated that this player is based on the Blu-ray recorder currently selling in Japan. Well, it turns out that I was incorrect. (It happens.) The Blu-Ray Cinema Player has been renamed Blu-Laser Cinema Player (probably not to get confused with Sony’s offering) and it is a proprietary format being sold by Blu-Laser Cinema. It would have been nice of them not to name the player and the company almost the same, but oh well. The player uses Ultra Density Optical (UDO) technology by Plasmon Corporation.

The player has HDMI and component outputs, and can come configured with WM9, H.264 MPEG4, and several proprietary formats. It stores 30GB per disc, and has a 1080i option for $4,999 versus the 1080p option which goes for $5,999.. It looks like this player isn’t targetted for home use, but rather at production houses.

Link: Home Toys - BLU-LASER CINEMA(TM) DEBUTS HD SCREENINGS IN HOLLYWOOD, CA
Link: Blu-Laser Cinema

NEC is introducing several new projectors and plasma displays that will be shown at InfoComm 2005, NEC announced yesterday. They will be showing off six projectors (I assume they’re LCD, though the press release doesn’t say) starting at $795. They also be showing several plasmas ranging in size from 42 to 61 inches that start at $1,995. Resolutions aren’t mentioned, but going to NEC’s website reveals that most of the projectors aren’t HD, so be carefull.

Link: Yahoo! Finance - NEC Features Six New Projectors Together for the First Time at InfoComm 2005

Now, you can never have too much of a good thing, can you? The Sanyo PLV-Z3 is not a new projector, but it is one of the better 3LCD projectors available, and if you’re in the market for a projector you owe it to yourself to research as much as possible, and that include product reviews. Therefore, I am linking to another review for this projector. The first one I posted a link to was from ultimate AV. Here it is. And this one is from Secrets of Home Theater and High Fidelity. It’s quite a good review, with closeup pics of the interesting bits and some screenshots of the GUI. The projector has an HDMI input that works well. The folks seem quite impressed with the projector:

The Sanyo PLV-Z3 is a fine projector. It has improved contrast over the Z2, adds better menus, and has the new HDMI input jack. At $2,000, it is an extremely competitive product, and will deliver a great home theater experience.

Link: Secrets of Home Theater and High Fidelity - Sanyo PLV-Z3 Three-Panel 16:9 LCD Digital Projector

I just downloaded the QuickTime 7 Preview for Windows, because I’ve been dying to see some of those movie trailers in HD. So anyway, I downloaded QT7, installed it, downloaded the Serenity trailer, and man it looks gorgeous. Just one problem. It seems that my 2.4GHz Pentium computer isn’t fast enough to keep up. H.264 (the new code being used to compress all that HD goodness) is quite a processor hog and it definitely showed. As it is, it’s more or less unusable on my machine for the 720p source that I was watching. Which really bites! Serves me right for not having the recommended minimum system - a Dual 2.8GHz Intel Xeon with at least 1GB of RAM and a 64MB graphics card. Tsk tsk.

Link: PRNewswire - Apple Unveils Preview Release of QuickTime 7 for Windows

The other day I posted an article about a really long HDMI cable. Well, there is more than one way to skin a cat, and there’s more than one way to get an HDMI signal from point A to point B, even if point B is far away. You can use repeaters. A repeater allows you to extend the length of an HDMI run by connecting two HDMI cables together. ultimate AV checks out one such repeater by Ultralink. Verdict: good stuff!

Link: ultimate AV - Ultralink HDMI-RPT HDMI Repeater

Not today. MPEG2 HDTV requires a bandwidth of at least 19Mbps and it’s unlikely that you’re getting that at home. But that may all change, if Scott Wilkinson over at ultimate AV has his facts right. (And why wouldn’t he?) He says that the International Telecommunication Union (ITU) has ratified a new high-speed standard called VDSL2 (Very-high-bitrate DSL 2). VDSL2 can reach speeds of up to 100Mbps! That’s plenty of space for streaming HDTV content, with room to spare.

Link: ultimate AV - Hot Streaming HDTV