Gadzooki

Ways to Get Better Satellite TV Reception in Your Home

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Satellite television is the preferred choice of many people primarily because of its quality programming and reception. While it is now strongly competing with cable TV and internet TV, it remains to have a significant number of subscribers.

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In the U.S., the number of households with satellite TV subscription reached 66.8 million as of 2012. In Europe, DBS satellite services had an overall market share of 21.4 percent and Australia, this type of TV service is also a more popular option among homeowners because of the distances in population centers. In far flung areas, this is the most feasible option for receiving channels from news and soaps to movies and sports.

Satellite TV, similar to cable, utilizes digital technology to bring numerous channels to homes. The main difference is the use of satellite, a box and dish that needs to be installed outside the house or building.

Quality of video and sound is also what attracts subscribers. But this aspect is also dependent on the position of the dish outside the home or apartment building.
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Toshiba launching new upscaling DVD player: XDE600

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Before Toshiba has embraced Blu-ray and announced its first Blu-ray player, it was a staunch advocate of technology to upscale standard definition DVDs, to the point that it suggested the technology was almost as good as Blu-ray itself.

Well, although it now has a foot in the Blu-ray camp, it hasn’t given up on the XDE (eXtended Detail Enhancement) technology which significantly improves SD DVD picture quality above and beyond what simple upscaling players do, and has announced the XDE600 DVD player.

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Toshiba launching its first Blu-ray player: BDX2000

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Now that Toshiba has embraced Blu-ray and joined the Blu-ray Disc Association, it has announced its first standalone Blu-ray player, the BDX2000.

As you’d expect from any modern Blu-ray player, it incorporates all the latest features including BD-Live Profile 2.0 support, for full interactivity on compatible discs, full 1080p output including upscaling of standard definition content, support for advanced HD audio including Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio, and Deep Colour.

Toshiba has also put its own REGZA-LINK functionality into the player, meaning that it’s possible to control it and other compatible equipment from a single remote control unit.

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Sony commits to 3DTV products by 2010

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sony-logoWe already know that the Sony-created Blu-ray format is to go 3D sometime soon, and now Sony has committed to 3DTV development in the coming year.

Speaking at this year’s IFA conference, Sony announced that it would launch a 3D-compatible BRAVIA LCD HDTV next year, based on a frame sequential display and active-shutter glass system (a method of 3D display where the TV set alternates the image for the left and right eye, and glasses open and shut in sync with the image on the screen).

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HANNspree launches new high definition TVs

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HANNspree might not be the first name you think of when it comes to high definition TVs, but features wise there’s nothing much wrong with the new ST series.

The full HD (1080p) sets are initially available in 25- and 28-inch screen sizes and incorporate HANNSpree’s X-Celerate technology that reduces motion blur and improves 3D rendering, plus a 10,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, de-interlacing, digital noise reduction, several pull-down processing modes to correct frame rate errors, and multiple aspect ratio support to ensure that pictures aren’t distorted whatever format the source broadcast or video arrives in.

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Televisions of the Future

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The CES show was host to some rather amazing gadgets and gizmos this year – in fact arguably one of the best years for some time. Things really seem to be getter better – but not only that, they seem to be getting bigger as well. What I mean by that is of course that televisions are the next (and current) big thing!

As a first at CES, the world’s first laser television was displayed. This was debuted by Mitsubishi who state that it is a ‘new category’ of display to offer alongside the likes of LCD and plasma technology. The reason for the development of this type of screen is that it offers (apparently) more of the colour spectrum that the eye can see, which is reportedly limited in current technology.

The laser set comes in at a particularly impressive 65 inches and has three lasers in the standard colours of red, green and blue. These are projected from the rear of the television (in a similar manner of DLP) but offers amazingly crisp, vivid and colourful images. Prices haven’t been revealed but the tv will be shipped later in the year.

Samsung has expressed interest in laser technology, but it didn’t show any at CES. Instead, it decided to display a 3D plasma screen – interesting from a company that does some of the best plasma sets in the world. Apparently, the 42 and 50 inch screens will be available in 2008 and rely on a PC connected to the set and polarised glasses to create the 3D image.

Samsung have also shown their OLED (organic light emitting diode) displays, known for being brighter than LCD and much thinner. More importantly, they also use less power to create the image – something which will no doubt seem to be important to consumers being fed the green message at the moment.

The reason for the brighter image is that the OLED does not require a backlight for the display as the organic material is naturally lit when an electric current runs through it. Different materials produce difference colours and this provides screens that are brighter and have a better contrast ratio.

I can vouch that OLED does look excellent as my Creative Zen V is supplied with just this technology – however, unfortunately for television creation it is extremely expensive, meaning that this will be for premium sets only in the future.

Perhaps one of the most amazing developments at CES was the display by Panasonic, noted for their Viera and V-Real technology on their current plasma display systems. Their offering was in fact the world’s largest LCD display – taking up a whole wall and featuring Advanced High Definition.

Whilst of course, a 150inch tv is always going to look amazing (unless you’re standing too close and can see the rather large pixels), the really amazing technology behind it was the ‘interactive wall’ that featured facial recognition and customised displays.

The technology is expected to take up the whole wall (no doubt of some millionaire’s mansion) and is able to detect the distance of the viewer from the screen and optimise the size of the image to suit. Rather impressive I’m sure you agree.

Other items of note were the super-thin LCD (at only 3mm deep) and deep-black screens. So, whilst most of it was interesting, it’s perhaps the ‘taste of things to come’ that really offers up a glimpse of the future. I for one can’t wait.

Upscaling DVD players breathe life to DVD

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With the raging High Definition war between Blu-Ray and HD-DVD, the future of the DVD is becoming bleak. Most a growing number of consumers are slowly throwing their hats into this HD war and picking which among the two competitors will win in the end. But DVDs are really not about to meet its demise. It actually still has a lot of legs and with new technology will still remain a viable format for the foreseeable future.

The key to DVDs increased longevity will be in the area of upscaling. A number of new DVD players in the market right now offer upscaling features. What this feature does is to bump up the native resolution of DVDs to HD levels, that is, 1080p, through HDMI. This is a cheaper alternative to the still high prices of next generation players and also extends the life of your existing DVD collection. All you need is an HDMi equipped TV and you’ll be enjoying your own forays into HD.

This may be a path that I’ll take soon. I still do not have enough to buy myself a Blu-ray player (my format of choice) and I have a sizeable DVD collection. The wife approval factor is good too because it is not very expensive.

[tags]blu-ray, hd-dvd, dvd, upscaling[/tags]

In Defence of HD

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NEC_T2000_Plasma_TV.jpgFairly recently there’s been a huge boom in the television market. In particular, this has been in relation to flat screen technology such as DLP, Plasma and LCD. This boom has been driven by a consumer need for technology that offers better clarity, sound and image quality. The rise of DVD’s has also fuelled the purchase of home cinema systems. So where does HD fit in?

Well according to Sky UK I will be “wowed by the difference” when watching HD. Well, is this in fact the truth? Lets put this in some sort of personal perspective. About a year and a half ago I saw Monsters Inc running on one of the first HD screens in the UK that was commercially available. The quality was unparalleled. So why are people indifferent to HD when the quality is so noticeable?

The first point is that people may have not bought an HD enabled set when lat screens first became available. They may have paid a lot (as my folks did) for a TV that was new at the time, but obsolete in a couple of years due to not having the capacity for HD. Naturally, if you’d just paid £1,000 (or more likely more) on a television you’re not going to just nip out and buy another.

Another restriction to HD take-up is the amount of channels that are offering it at the moment. The BBC broadcast signal will go digital only, though this won’t have much of an impact on the quality of the picture overall, and there’s been difficulties rolling this out. HD seems to be faster yet still not widespread. Nonetheless, a growing number of channels are sending out the HD signal.

Finally there’s just so much technology about (with so much jargon, slang and corporate buzzwords) that it can be incredibly hard to make any sort of sensible choice. Quimby covered this very well in his recent article, and I’m in total agreement. Now we have HD, DVD, SA-CD, CD, VCD, HD-DVD, BLU-RAY and more I’m sure besides. This is not to mention ‘alternative’ kit such as Tivo. My oh my.

I genuinely think that there’s a market for new business in the form of a ‘Technologist’. Essentially you tell him what you need – whether it’s a TV, computer or toaster – and you give him a budget, and he tries to find you the best kit or advises you on the reason to hold back a month or two. Obviously he’d get a cut of the sale, say 10 percent or something. Then he could deal with all those acronyms and leave the rest of us to do the watching. Then again, being at the forefront of tech, I wouldn’t complain if I had that job…