For a mere $150,000, you can have your butler go pick up lug the new Samsung HP-R8082 80″ plasma screen into your study.

Eighty inches. I see numbers like this all the time, but when I actually think about it, it blows me away. That’s bigger than my widescreen rear-projection HDTV! And by a considerable amount - my display hits 57″. (Which I’m finally getting ISF calibrated on Saturday, BTW.)

This Samsung beast has a resolution of 1920 x 1080, and I certainly hope that it will accept 1080p signals, though I doubt it.

Sound And Vision Magazine - Samsung HP-R8082 80-inch Plasma HDTV

Sony yesterday announced the Sony HDR-HC3 HDV 1080i camcorder. This little cutie is 26% smaller than it’s predecessor, and is cheaper to boot. It has an HDMI output, a Carl Zeiss lens, and a CMOS sensor. The camcorder also shoots 4 megapixel still images and stores them on a much-maligned (though I like them) MemoryStick card. The camcorder uses miniDV tapes, and has that ever-so-handy image stabilization feature.

This camcorder will be available in April for $1700 which, unfortunately, is still out of my reach. I’m currently in the process of buying a new car (probably a Jetta 2.0T) and I don’t think my wife would appreciate my coming home with one of these. (Never mind the fact that I’d have to give up my leather seats to do so.)

eCoustics - Sony HDR-HC3 HDV 1080i Camcorder Announced

HDTV sales have gotten a spike recently due to events like the Olympics and the Superbowl. I can definitely understand that. The other day the HDTV channel my wife was watching suffered some MPEG compression glitches. So she switched to the equivalent SD channel to continue watching the same event, and boy did I get an earful! Watching the Olympics in HDTV is clearly wonderful. Any Olympics fan deserves to treat themselves to HD versions of all their favourite events. Personally, I’m not a big fan of the Olympics, but watching four snowboarders race down a hill to the finish line really caught my attention. Wow that was cool!

What do y’all think of the new snowboarding events?

eMediaWire - Olympics Generate Major Spike in HDTV Sales

Need an HDMI switcher? What about one that has five inputs and one output? And one with a remote control? And with an HDMI signal booster?

Yup, this switcher is packed with features, and I haven’t even listed them all. Parasound is using this switcher to add HDMI capabilities to their Halo C1 and C2 processors, as well as their NewClassic Model 7100.

av rev - Parasound Adds Five-In/One Out Dedicated HDMI Switcher to its Zcustom Line

One of the largest hurdles to the introduction of BD and HD DVD has been DRM. Who’d have guessed it? But yeah, Hollywood has to cripple everything it sees, and it’s doing so this time around with AACS. But thankfully, AACS has finally started licensing their gunk, so that Toshiba can start selling the HD DVD players soon, and Sony doesn’t have another excuse not to release the PS3.

Licensing of “AACS (Advanced Access Content System),” a content protection standard to be used for play-only package media of next generation optical discs such as “Blu-ray Disc” and “HD DVD,” will finally start. A license management group “Advanced Access Content System Licensing Administrator (AACS LA)” has unveiled “AACS Interim Adopter Agreement” that describes the agreement within the group. In the wake of this announcement, AACS licensing will officially start shortly.

The license from the license management group AACS LA will provide device manufacturers with IDs and encryption keys to be assigned to their devices.

Tech-On! - AACS Licensing Begins - Next Generation Optical Discs Finally Ready for Launch

eCoustics now also has a review of the excellent Sanyo PLV Z4 projector. I’ve mentioned several other reviews of this set. Many of them are listed on the HD Buzz page. So I won’t go into too many details here. This is a 1280 x 720 3LCD projector with lens shift, zoom lens, and a dynamic iris. This review actually show the menu system, which is nice. Interestingly, this projector has a graduated overscan control, which is very nice.

The review comes to a short but consise conclusion:

The Sanyo PLV-Z4 is a winner at less than $2k (street price). The lens on this projector in particular is superb. Although you might think the Natural mode is the one to always use, you might find, as I did, that some of the other modes, with higher brightness, contrast, and color, are more exciting.

eCoustics - Sanyo Plv Z4 Projector 2 2006 Part 1 Review

According to this press release, Toshiba is preparing a marketing blitz for the HD DVD players it will start selling in March. The HD-XA1 and HD-A1 will be the first HD DVD players to hit the American market. Toshiba has already launched a web minisite for HD DVD and will soon have a consumer and retail tour, targeting over 40 cities.

An interesting sidenote is that a firmware upgrade will be required for full interactive features.

I wonder if you’ll have to attach your own Dolby Digital decoder as well?

PRNewswire - Toshiba Tours America to Promote the Launch of HD DVD Players

The Sony VPL-VW100 SXRD projector is so impressive, Ultimate AV had to split their review between two articles. Or something like that! I covered part one of the Sony VPL-VW100 SXRD review already. This is my coverage of part two. What does Mr. Norton have to say? Read on…

First of all, he noted that several times the projector just would not power up for him. Quite annoying to say the least. A little hardware fiddling would get it to run, but if this were my projector I would be totally ticked off. This is an “early unit with no serial number”, so hopefully the problem has been fixed with production run projectors.

There is good news, though, on a different front. Mr. Norton tested the projector’s ability to lock onto 1080p sources through its HDMI input and sure enough, it works like a charm. So future PS3, HD DVD, and BD owners rejoice! Also, Mr. Norton did some gamma testing, and after a problem figuring out a good way to test gamma, found that the gamma tracked very well, though a bit on the “laid-back” side.

Lastly, Mr. Norton compares the Sony VPL-VW100 to the Yamaha DPX-1300. The Yamaha comes out on top when it comes to sharpness, brightness, adjustability, cheaper replacement lamps, and accurate colour points. The Sony beats the Yamaha on noise levels, black level, lack of rainbows, and silky smooth image. Also it helps that the Sony is less expensive.

Mr. Norton concludes by saying:

The Sony is a remarkable value and without question one of the best video projectors on the market. If you are looking in this price range—or even significantly higher—you’d be crazy not to put it at or near the top of a very short shopping list.

Ultimate AV: Sony VPL-VW100 SXRD Video Projector Part II

I don’t own a front projector, though I hope to one day. (The Sony VPL-VW100 SXRD projector looks nice. I’ll take one of those please!) So I don’t know too much about different kinds of projector screens yet. But I think they might be a lot like tires. Tires are what actually connect your car to the road and are therefore one of the most important things on your car. Similarly, the screen is where all that work the projector does actually gets showcased to your eyeballs. So therefore the kind of screen you buy must be pretty important. You wouldn’t want a screen to ruin all the hard work your projector does, do you?

Which makes me wonder about this screen from Screen Innovations. Supposedly it’s for use in high ambient light conditions. Wouldn’t it be somewhat of a waste to use a projector in those kind of conditions? Maybe. But Screen Innovations is definitely trying to show off your projector in both the best and worst of lights.

It succeeds, to a certain extent:

If the room has a fair amount of ambient light, but isn’t bathed in sunlight during the daytime, a projector, combined with the Visage screen would allow you to skip the plasma, and rely on the projector, at least for normal TV/HDTV type viewing, sports, etc. If you are trying to watch a movie with a dark scene, if there is a fair amount of light in the room, you may be able to seem most of the action, but dark areas will still be mostly washed out.

Projector Reviews - Screen Innovations Visage High Gain Screen

Mission Impossible III gets a small trailer in HD. I hope this movie is better than the last one.

Apple - Mission Impossible III

Starring a quartet of west coast, life-long friends who have achieved a level of comfort in their lives and have now settled into a life of designer clothes, charity events, and caring for the men (and offspring) in their lives. But as they approach ‘a certain age,’ unsettling things are starting to throw their comfortable lives off balance.

Apple - Friends with Money

A vibrant retelling of the classic story of Marie Antoinette, the naive Austrian princess, who is thrown into the scandal-ridden world of the French aristocracy when she is betrothed to King Louis XVI. While still a teenager, Marie Antoinette conquers her fears and becomes France’s iconic queen.

Apple - Marie Antoinette