Philips enhances Cinema 21:9 with slicker 3D and web TV

Philips enhances Cinema 21:9 3D and web TV
The Philips Cinema 21:9 Platinum series

Philips has announced a new range of Cinema 21:9 TVs (dubbed Platinum and Gold) to bring smarter and smoother 3D plus the next generation of internet TV.

3D Max is Philips' big sell here for the Cineam 21:9 Platinum series, with the new technology offering a wide, 180 degree viewing angle plus lower crosstalk on the Active 3D display.

Philips is boasting a two billion pixel per second processing speed to help enhance the fluidity of the 3D content, plus a 3D max transmitter that connects to multiple pairs of glasses should you decide to invite your friends over to feel the force of stuff jumping out of the screen at you.

If you're after the Cinema 21:9 Gold range, then you'll have passive 3D on offer, with Philips touting its 'Easy 3D' tech that still provides 'sharp images and low crosstalk'.

TV up your nose

But what about the current conundrum: a new 3D telly but nothing to watch on it? Well, Philips has bunged 2D to 3D conversion on there to up-convert your collection to the third dimension - admittedly, we've never seen any auto-converted 2D content that looks any good at all, but with a 3D depth adjuster, we're prepared to reserve judgement.

And in keeping with the trend of using the internet to bolster content, Philips' Cinema 21:9 Gold and Platinum access a 'superconnected media portal' which enables you to stream content from a tablet or smartphone, use one of those devices to control the TV and access Net TV for apps or programmes.

Plus given the frankly whopping screen sizes on offer with the 21:9 ratio, it makes sense to be able to multitask, so with Multiview you can watch a program on one portion of the display and access Net TV on the other.

The Smart LED backlighting of the Cinema 21:9 Platinum series promises a whopping 1200MHz refresh rate and a 0.5ms response rate to ensure super smooth pictures - plus the swish and colourful Ambilight technology on the rear means colours will swim across the rear of the display.

We've not heard anything on the new Cinema 21:9 Gold and Platinum series UK release dates, but we hope it's soon - we're itching to spend likely large amounts of money to bring a really wide TV into our lounge.

Gareth Beavis
Formerly Global Editor in Chief

Gareth has been part of the consumer technology world in a career spanning three decades. He started life as a staff writer on the fledgling TechRadar, and has grown with the site (primarily as phones, tablets and wearables editor) until becoming Global Editor in Chief in 2018. Gareth has written over 4,000 articles for TechRadar, has contributed expert insight to a number of other publications, chaired panels on zeitgeist technologies, presented at the Gadget Show Live as well as representing the brand on TV and radio for multiple channels including Sky, BBC, ITV and Al-Jazeera. Passionate about fitness, he can bore anyone rigid about stress management, sleep tracking, heart rate variance as well as bemoaning something about the latest iPhone, Galaxy or OLED TV.