Everybody is talking about 3D TV.
This year's CES was buzzing about it. Samsung, Panasonic, Sony, Toshiba and LG all showed off 3D-capable HDTVs, some with 2D-to-3D video conversion technology that claims to add depth to existing content on the fly.
More recently, Sky made broadcast history by showing Arsenal vs Manchester United in 3D. Later this year, Blu-ray 3D will bring high definition 3D movies into your living room. A 3D revolution looks inevitable, albeit slow to unfold.
Of course, 3D is also a convenient way for manufacturers to sell more HDTVs. Plummeting telly prices continue to benefit consumers – you can pick up a 5-star rated Samsung LE32B550 for less than £400.
But cheap HDTVs have also dented the profits of the big hardware manufacturers. It's why they'll be trying to convince you that your current HDTV is already out of date. Yes, it might have optimised gaming modes, DLNA connectivity, LED backlighting and internet widgets. But we bet your HDTV doesn't have...
Organic Light Emitting Diodes (OLED)
OLED is viewed as the natural successor to LCD. It boasts superior brightness and colour reproduction because the organic material used to construct an OLED panel emits its own light when charged, so there's no need for a separate backlight.
LED or otherwise. OLED and AMOLED displays are already being used on portable devices, including the Zune HD and Google Nexus One. They're also expected to make the transition to laptops – Dell recently teased an OLED-equipped Studio XPS.
Building OLED HDTVs is proving a bigger challenge. The problem is that OLED displays remain expensive to manufacture, especially in large sizes.
Not enough factories are geared up to produce them, so working TV prototypes are few and far between. But there have been some promising developments. Both Sony and Samsung showed off 3D-capable OLED concepts off at CES 2010.
Mitsubishi has recently unveiled a massive 149-inch prototype OLED display (consisting of several 10 x 10 cm panels) that will be appearing at the Integrated Systems Europe (ISE) show in February.
While the TV industry distracts itself with 3D, OLED and 3D OLED displays are undoubtedly the future of TV displays. But we might have to wait until the end of 2011, early 2012 before they become commercially available beyond the 11- and 15-inch novelty panels currently available.
Quad pixels
Manufacturers are always trying to improve the quality of their displays, whether it's through favouring PDP over LCD, boosting the refresh rate or adopting LED backlighting.
Sharp has taken a different tack. Its proprietary 'four primary colour' technology adds an extra yellow pixel to the existing Red, Green and Blue setup in a typical LCD.
Sharp's future Aquos models will feature this new RGBY technology to extend the gamut of viewable colours to more than a trillion. According to Sharp, this quad pixel approach will enable its LE920, LE810 and LE810 models to reproduce colours that have been "difficult to portray using conventional LCD displays, such as the golden yellow colour of brass instruments."
Multi-core processing power
The new Toshiba ZX900 Series Cell TV could be the shape of TVs to come. Featuring a version of the same Cell chip that powers the PlayStation 3, the ZX900 boasts eight co-processing cores running at 3.2GHz.
It has, says Toshiba, 143 times the multimedia prowess of its current MetaBrain TVs and is capable of upscaling HD content to 4K and converting 2D video into 3D video in real-time.
The Cell chip can also juggle multiple video streams. The Japanese version of the Cell TV will incorporate 14 TV tuners – 11 digital terrestrial tuners, 2 digital satellite tuners and 1 analogue terrestrial tuner. According to Toshiba, it will be capable of recording eight programmes in parallel or displaying them simultaneously in split-screen.
Your comments (6) Click to add a new comment
tonymontana
February 4th 2010
6. I am excited for this technology but I can't see whats wrong with saying good content would make and break the market for these new technologies.
I couldn't agree more with that. I want to pick up a 3D TV but I think good 3D content is really the killer app. If there is no good 3D content the 3D TV's will be a very hard sell.
I don't really understand the criticism I'd think what he is saying is just common sense.
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nickdalodger
February 4th 2010
5. I don't understand why people feel the need to vent on these news stories, so you don't like new technology get over it.
Jeez if you don't have something decent to say just sit your butt back in front of your top end 1980's set up or get over it.
Some of us are interested in the new tech coming out and enjoy reading about it, I'm sure the manufacturers are gutted if Pete doesnt update his set up, also try TIVO when Virgin brings out their new receiver that will do what you are on about..
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pete_l
February 4th 2010
4. @deeban
That's the difference though: tech for it's own sake, or because it makes life better/easier/richer. We got my old mum an LCD TV for her birthday some years ago and set it up properly here before installing it for her - not impressed. Worse picture quality than our (top o' the line) CRT. Plus, engadget's 1080p viewing distance calculator shows the smallest screen size needed to actually see the HD-ness of the picture is 47 inches (Note: smallest). Even then, it's the same old films, game shows, sports so the content itself isn't worth the price. (The phrase "polishing a ..." comes to mind. Now matter how much HD polish you apply to the programmes, they're still ...)
So far as other tech goes: Yup, fine. No problem - but just buying stuff 'cos we can and not getting any benefit from it is folly.
Healthy skepticism rather than blind consumerism.
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deeban
February 4th 2010
3. @pete_l. I like your idea at the end, and yes that would be useful, but what amazes me is that your on a site which is devoted to tech and moan about how pointless it is? if you are still using a 28" CRT, i can only imagine your house would be indistinguishable from that out of an '90s property. I have a HD tv, with a HD virgin box and an xbox 360 with surrond sound and I cant imagine going back to a CRT. I enjoy watching programs on a bigger screen and the (few) channels that are in HD does make a difference. Ofcourse the content is important, but judging by your statement that's all that matters. my advise, this site isnt for people like you. tvguide.co.uk will be right up your street :)
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awire
February 4th 2010
2. A bit of a single minded view.
1) Yes telly is ****.
2) People that buy HD TV's don't just watch SD tv on it. a lot of people now have Blu-ray players or an Xbox 360 or a PS3 or all the above. The whole point of HD TV's was to make bigger screens look better so it would be perfect for your situation.
3) Are you talking about IPTV which we should be seeing this year at some point from SKY and we have seen since last year on Virgin (maybe even 2008, i can't remember)
TV sets are used for so much more that terrestial channels now.
Try and keep up with tech ay'
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pete_l
February 4th 2010
1. All I want is decent programmes
I don't care what the technology is - it doesn't contribute to the entertainment value of the programme. So doesn't matter if the set is LED, LCD, Plasma, CRT, 14-inch, 60-inch, surround-sound, 3D, 2D, 1D(!), fed directly into my brain, smelly-vision(!!), from CD, DVD, Blu-ray, advert-supported, paid for or free to air. If the content isn't worth watching then any TV and all the gizmos that come with it are a waste of space and money.
The only thing that would change the amount of TV that I watch is better programmes. At present I am quite happy with my OLD 28-inch CRT. Getting an HD set is pointless, as the room's seating is too far from the screen (2.4 - 3m) to make any noticable difference. Likewise having a contrast ratio any better than 100:1 is wasted, since we don't view in a completely darkened room: just a normal, properly lit domestic environment.
If the TV manufacturers want to entice me to change sets, the ONE thing that would do it would be intelligent scheduling. Imagine this: Your TV keeps a record of which family members watch what programmes (ok, that's possible). It knows what genres are popular and what is never watched. It interrogates the EPG to record similar types of programme, without being asked and presents the viewers with a menu of what it thinks you might like. It can resolve schedule clashes on it's own, by intelligently recording the least-repeated programmes first (and maybe getting others from iplayer, etc.). So you effectively end up not with 500 channels of rubbish, but with just 1 channel that only shows things you want to watch.
Now that would be worth paying for!
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