3D TV partnership from Sony

In Asia 3D tv is seen as the next big thing in seling you a new TV. At the Vegas expo this will certainly take up much space and Sony already created some nice partnership according to the wall street journal

By GABRIEL KAHN

Sony Corp. announced a partnership with RealD, as the Japanese electronics giant continues its push into the growing market for 3-D home entertainment.

Under the terms of the agreement, Sony will license some of RealD's technology and equipment, such as 3-D eyewear, which can be used with Sony TV screens and other equipment intended to create a three-dimensional viewing experience similar to what is now offered in movie theaters. The equipment is expected to hit stores in 2010.

No other terms of the deal, announced Thursday, were disclosed. RealD's agreement with Sony isn't exclusive, which means the Beverly Hills, Calif.-based company can also partner with other equipment makers for the same technology.

This year marked a massive roll-out of 3-D technology in movie theaters, as Hollywood released a string of films, such as DreamWorks Animation SKG's "Monsters vs. Aliens," and Twentieth Century Fox's "Avatar," which hits screens this weekend. News Corp. owns Twentieth Century Fox as well as the The Wall Street Journal.

Sony, along with other electronics manufacturers, is racing to roll out equipment that aims to provide a comparable 3-D viewing experience at home. RealD already provides an array of 3-D technology used in making three-dimensional images for movies, as well as other applications. Partnering with a large electronics manufacturer could open up a new market for its technology.

Sony's LCD panel technology "will work in sync with new 3D eyewear based on RealD's technology," Hiroshi Yoshioka, the Sony executive in charge of Consumer Products and Devices Group, said in a statement.

Ready for the next format war ... 3d format. Sony be first to deliver but can they set the standard

According to the Financiel Times 3D TV is now coming close.

Sony to throw its weight behind 3D TV

By Maija Palmer in London

Published: September 1 2009 22:01 | Last updated: September 1 2009 22:01

3D technology looks set to hit the home consumer market next year, with Sony on Wednesday announcing plans to sell 3D televisions globally by the end of 2010.

Sony’s decision to throw its weight behind the technology will be an important boost for the 3D industry, which has so far focused mainly on cinemas. British Sky Broadcasting has said it would introduce a 3D satellite channel in the UK next year, but it had been unclear whether there would be equipment available to view it on.

Speaking at the IFA technology trade show in Berlin, Sir Howard Stringer, Sony chief executive, will announce plans not only to sell 3D Bravia television sets, but to make Sony’s Vaio laptop computers, PlayStation3 games consoles and Blu-ray disc players compatible with the technology.

Mr Stringer is expected to tell the audience: “Today, 3D is clearly on its way to the mass market through technology, distribution and content.

“As with high definition a few years back, there are a variety of issues yet to be addressed. But the 3D train is on the track, and we at Sony are ready to drive it home.”

The consumer electronics industry has yet to agree on a single 3D standard, posing the risk of a format war akin to that between VHS and Betamax or Blu-ray and HD-DVD.

There are several types of 3D technology. Sony has opted for “active shutter” technology, using electronic glasses containing tiny shutters that open and close rapidly in synch with the television image to create a 3D impression. Cinema 3D uses “polarisation” technology with simpler glasses. However, this only works when viewers are at a certain angle to the screen, making it less suited to home viewing.

The electronics industry is looking for the next technology to boost sales, as high-definition television sales move past their peak. Hyundai is producing early 3D sets for the Japanese market and Panasonic has flagged up plans for products.

Sony’s commitment, however, improves 3D’s chances of becoming mainstream. It has given no indication of prices, but analysts expect early 3D TVs to cost several thousand dollars. Hyundai’s 3D TVs cost more than €3,400.

In cinemas, uptake of 3D has grown ninefold over three years, with 7,000 digital 3D screens expected to be in use worldwide by the end of 2009.

Apple, Sony ang Google make your life easier

It might sound a bit strange, the combination of Sony, Apple and Google but together they are doing some nice stuff on (geo)tracking. So far these are seperate applications but it gives a clear direction for the next few years on what to expect.

Google obviously is known for search but also for their maps and what you can do with it. Well Sony now jumps into this with GPS tracking on their latest HD videocameras (the option was alreay available on their photo cameras as a seperate add on). This means you can easily track your complete vacation in picture and video (HD) on Google maps (pretty cool on your multi touch dining table, both for preparing the trip as well as showing it to others afterwards but how to navigate easily though this on a TV with the 10 foot experience .............. suggestions, please let me know))

Now Apple comes in with their iPhoto version 8.0. This has face identification and recognition and it goes pretty far. if for example you notice it's not seeing someone's head, you can right click and ask it to "Detect Missing Faces."

It goes back to the picture and guesses at new potential faces. The upside is, it will probably see the face you want it to see, without you manually marking it. The downside is, it may well see faces where there are none. I tried it, and it worked, but it doesn't make the facial recognition smarter, just

less discriminating.

If you use the "Add Missing Face" feature to manually draw a box around a known face, this new software will actually also search that box to see if it can identify the face. This has not immediate impact on your life, but it means that if iPhoto does see a face there, where it didn't before, it will "count" it when doing facial recognition stuff.

When you are using Faces to name people, it now pulls names from your Address Book. This means, when you start to type in a name, you immediately get choices. If you don't like all your friends being so formally listed with first and last name, you can change the tag globally very easily later, on the Faces corkboard home screen.

Another very helpful improvement in Faces is the ability to name other people when confirming shots of a particular individual. Like, say you have a bunch of shots of yourself—if you know a shot isn't you, you right click that shot and choose "Name," then add in whoever that person's name is. It's helpful because before, the choice was either "Yes, this is me" or "No, this is not me."

CISCO now entering your home - Sony, Philips, Samsung, Onkyo etc watch out!!!!!

After moving into the enterprise AV market as discussed here Cisco is also moving into your living room. They already had a nice entry point with their wireless access points, routers and other network devices but now they really show off with some products not designed to hide away

They just announced at CES it's Wireless Home Audio line up and some NAS devices for home use. This is a nice start to compete with Sony, Philips, Samsung, LG, Pioneer, Onkyo etc. The way they do this is a smart one. They do not start with the entry from the consumer electronics site being a direct competitor from sony, philips etc when showing their AV systems but taking a d-tour via the network

The digital living room is slowly becoming reality since we all have our live reduced to some bits and bytes (digital pictures, DIVX movies, MP3 music, IPTV (remember CISCO already has an IPTV platform), DVR etc) but integration and implementation into a living room is still not easy. Microsoft does a nice try with Windows home server and Mediacenter (I have both and really like my them but there is still some room for improvement, also from the content and service delivery parties to work together to give the consumers an great offering). However these initiatives are still not there for everybody and you need to be tech savy to manage this infrastructure.

Maybe CISCO can elevate the digital living room to a new level that can be used by anyone (including older people that did not grow up with computers). So the big questions are:

• Can they provide an easy to implement infrastructure
• Can they handle all media formats nicely (some standardization would be nice but I guess we are not there yet)
• Is it open enough to work with other devices in the home
• Do they have the rigth partners to make it a great offering for the consumers (I still hate it that my digital TV from UPC can not be integrated into my mediacenter (or MCE/VMC alternative) in a nice way)
• Do they provide the right applications so it will be an integrated experience (how will they fit in their line of home monitoring cameras for example)

At least they start of with a nice lineup and they support the most important standards. Hope they are easy to upgrade in terms of functionality and support of standards. The line up is:

The WHA is a whole-house, multi-zone audio system using Ethernet and draft 802.11n wireless networking and DLNA 1.5. The lineup includes three players, powered speakers, a wireless touch-screen controller and iPod dock, all scheduled to hit stores this quarter with pricing starting at $300 for the entry-level player.

The DMC350 Conductor Wireless-N Digital Music Center is an all-in-one wireless music system with integrated speakers, seven inch LCD touch screen, integrated CD player and IR Remote. Pricing was not announced and it appears that this will be the last family member to become available.



The DMC250 Director Wireless-N Music Player with Integrated Amplifier ($449.99 MSRP) drops the CD player and speakers and adds a 50 W amplifier.

The DMP100 Player Wireless-N Music Extender ($299.99 MSRP) is the entry-level player. It has stereo line outputs and all the functions of the more expensive player options, but no display, CD player or amplifier.

The DMWR1000 Controller Wireless-N Touchscreen Remote ($349.99 MSRP) features a large color touchscreen and thumbwheel and can be used to control all players and a docked iPod The other components available include the DSPK50 Stereo Speaker Kit ($149.99 MSRP), MCCI40 iPod Dock ($79.99 MSRP). Additional DMRIR500 IR Remotes (that come with all players) can be purchased for $29.99(MSRP).

For your purchasing convenience, Cisco has kindly assembled three kits:

• Premier ($999.99 MSRP)Two-room starter kit with Director and IR Remote, Player and IR Remote, and Wireless-N Controller.


• Trio ($849.99 MSRP)2 Players, 2 IR Remotes, and a Wireless-N Controller, for adding the WHA to existing audio systems.


• Executive ($549.99 MSRP)Single room kit with Director, IR Remote and speakers.
  

Along with the WHA, Cisco also kicked loose a new line of NASes that put its previous NAS200 to shame. The Media Hub line consists of three two-bay NASes with a very friendly Flash-driven web interface, UPnP AV / DLNA and iTunes servers, photo slideshow, remote access and NTI Shadow-bundled backup (for Windows only).
The NMH405 (500 GB) and NMH410 (1 TB) models both include a front panel LCD display and 6-in-1 card reader. The NMH305 does not have the LCD or card reader and sells for $50 less than the 405. All versions come with one drive—you add the second to either expand capacity (JBOD) or increase security (RAID 1).

MSRPs are $429.99 for the NMH410, $349.99 for the NMH405 and $299.99 for the NMH305. All will be available shortly.