They have been hinting at it for some time and now its official. In a move that could set the new standard for how we watch programmes at home, Sky have announced that a first ever 3D TV service will be launched by them in 2010.
Sky plan to offer a wide range of programs in 3D format including movies, entertainment and sports which possibly could include the 2010 Olympics. Imagine watching the javelin event in 3D or the hurdling with the hurdlers literally jumping out of the screen towards you!
This move follows extensive research conducted by Sky into the commercial feasibility of 3D TV alongside with the increase of consumer demand for the Sky+ HD service. In January this year after the price for a Sky+ HD box was slashed by two thirds an additional 534,000 customers signed up.
The service will be available from the existing Sky+ HD boxes so there will be no need to upgrade equipment, but an LCD TV with 3D enabled technology is required. It looks like polarised glasses will be next years must have accessory!
Will you replace your current LCD TV with a 3D TV? Or do you think Sky’s timing is completely off due to the recession?
Satellite broadcasters BSkyB have announced a 4% rise in annual profits and have added 124,000 subscribers in the past three months.
This boost is a result of price cuts and promotion for its high-definition TV service.
In January, Sky slashed the cost of its HD set-top box to £49, aiming to attract some of the estimated 9 million households with an HD-ready television. Since then it has signed up 534,000 HD customers and now has over 1.3 million subscribers.
They have attracted 124,000 new users in the three months to the end of June and over its financial year as a whole, Sky added 462,000 new customers, its largest gain in five years.
The high-definition service also helped Sky increase the money it makes from its customers, with annual average revenue per user at a new high of £464.
Not only did Sky attracting new users, but they have also been trying to persuade its existing customers to expand the number of its products they take.
This is positive news for the satellite broadcaster and also shows that more people are now buying HD Ready televisions.
It has been in the news for some time now that new operating systems are to be launched by Apple and Microsoft, with both companies claiming that their operating system is the best.
Apples Snow Leopard is due for release in September and they hope to appeal to the growing number of Apple converts; over 10 million Apple Macs were sold last year – the highest ever figure to date.
Microsoft’s new operating system, Windows 7 looks still to be a major contender if the pre-ordering figures are anything to go by. Although it is not available in the shops until October 22, so many people tried to pre order this the official website crashed, in the UK alone pre-order copies sold out in under 9 hours! However, is this a reflection of demand due to desirability or more to do with how massively unpopular Vista proved to be?
There is no doubt that both of the operating systems in contention have some nice and impressive features. Windows 7 is all about faster performance, secure web browsing and interestingly doesn’t require as much processing power as its predecessor, plus there is support for touch screen interfaces.
Snow Leopard, which is a follow up to Leopard, has further tweaked many of the features found in Leopard and also boasts much faster performance, the desktop is very streamlined with the ability to share files even in sleep mode and can boot up and shut down in less than half the time as a Apple Mac using Leopard.
The real tester of course will be when both products are available in the open market, but it should certainly be interesting to see which operating systems grabs the crown! Will you be upgrading your operating system? Which one would YOU choose?
The 3D momentum is certainly picking up speed, and Panasonic are ensuring they stay ahead of the 3D game with plans to release a 3D Blu-ray player by next year.
Having recently overcome some technical challenges, Panasonic are now working directly with Hollywood studios 3D development teams.
The extra storage needed to accommodate the demands of a 3D image have been combated by a new compression codec being fitted, plus the 3D Blu-ray player looks set to have massive processing power – enabling GUI (graphical user interface) and 3D disc menus.
Panasonic are not just stopping with a 3D Blu-ray player either, they also intend to develop a Plasma 3D Full HD Home Cinema System, a 3D-ready digital cinema projector and a 3D-ready MPEG-4 high profile encoder!
It all sounds very interesting as well as being a 3D fans dream come true.
For anyone who is thinking of putting HD Freeview on their Christmas wishlist this year, it looks like Santa will be answering your call.
The Director General of the UK Digital TV Group has anticipated we will be seeing HD Freeview boxes on shop shelves by the end of the year with HD Freeview enabled TVs following shortly after.
This, combined with more channels broadcasting in high definition, means that HD will be easily available for all.
Panasonic are very keen to be seen supporting this move and have already indicated they will be releasing Freeview HD LCD TVs to the market next year, plus they hinted that they will be working on a Blu-ray recorder with two Freeview HD tuners incorporated.
Britain’s oldest working television the 1936 Marconiphone, is thought to have been made in the months that Britain’s first “high-definition” television service began.
The TV set belongs to Jeffrey Borinsky a collector of antique television and radio sets.
He bought the 12-inch screen 10 years ago and is still working on restoring it to its original state.
Mr Borinsky said: “The cabinet was beautifully restored by the previous owner, but my aim is to gradually restore its electronics to its true 1936 magnificence.”
He has now hooked it up to a Freeview box so that it can show digital channels, but Mr Borinsky has had to install a standards converter so that a modern television signal can be seen.
The grandson of television pioneer John Logie Baird says this set would have been of huge interest when it was first bought at a cost of 60 guineas – £11,000 today.
He says: “Television was a very exciting thing; it was something that the whole neighbourhood would come over to watch. People would crowd into the home of the owner.”
Wow what a great piece of history, it is safe to say that technology has come along way since then.
But if you’d rather just see this sort of old style in museum, then perhaps Giant Buyer’s vast LCD and Plasma television range is a more suitable choice.
T-Mobile is may get to distribute the iPhone in Britain, if speculation is to be believed.
T-Mobile who already stocks the iPhone in Germany are said to be in talks with Apple to retail the iPhone in Britain.
Orange and Vodafone are also said to be interested in getting the iPhone if Apple decides to change the way it is distributed in the UK.
As well as a retail success, the iPhone has led to an explosion in downloadable mobile phone applications. Apple said yesterday that users of the iPhone and iPod Touch have downloaded more than 1.5bn programmes since it launched its iTunes “apps” store a year ago.
Having passed the 1bn mark in April the pace of downloads has accelerated.
Have you tested out the fab iPod touch or iPhone applications??
With a lot of electronics spending a large amount of its time in standby mode. Manufacturers have been searching for ways to reduce the amount of power used when an electronic device is in standby, for example both LCD HDTV’s and home cinema equipment spends a lot of time in standby mode waiting to be turned on.
It now looks like NEC and Rohm have achieved a break through and developed chips that radically reduce power use during stand by mode. They have done this by making a chip that is non volatile – in layman’s terms this means when you switch them back on they continue from where the power was turned off. Rohm is shipping chips now and the first products using this new technology are expected by the end of the year.
Tadahiko Sugibayashi, from the Devices Platform Research Laboratories at NEC says
“We’ll be able to cut dissipation for digital consumer electronics in the standby mode to just a few percent of what it is now.” In terms of annual electricity cost, he adds, “That could add up to hundreds of millions of yen in savings in Japan alone.” And of course the equipment would be able to return from standby to normal operating mode instantaneously.”
A source at Rohm commented
“Normally-off equipment will become possible, turning itself on only when power is needed.” In 2008 Rohm demonstrated its microprocessor prototype in normally-off operation, slashing dissipation by 70% from conventional designs. Rohm explains: “This technology has enormous potential in applications such as games, where the system is usually sitting and waiting for player input.”
With the current interest in reducing greenhouse emissions wide spread use of these technologies could help reduce the energy bills and CO2 emissions of the average home.
Sharp proudly revealed their first LED TVs in London last week and have declared LED technology the ‘future’ anticipating at least 40% of their TVs will be LED by 2011.
Whilst most manufacturers tend to opt for sidelight LED technology enabling for much thinner LCD TVs, Sharp have firmly stuck to their guns with their faith in full LED backlighting – preferring instead to focus on delivery outstanding picture quality rather than joining the ‘thinnest LCD TV’ battle.
The LE600 and LE700 from Sharp’s Aquos range have some pretty impressive credentials; not least with the 1080p technology, environmental friendly features including a off switch and a standby power consumption of only 0.01W. The LE600 will be available in screen sizes of 32, 40 and 46 inches. The LE700 has the same size screens with an additional 52 inch model available with some very cool styling and a glass base added plus with 100Hz technology.
Paul Molyneux, Sharp’s UK Managing Director spoke to TechRadar regarding the sizing and didn’t feel this would be a deterrent. “Consumers buy TVs for different reasons – we are selling ours on picture quality. There’s a reason why our TVs are designed in a slightly different way. You have full array LED versus edge LED….If picture quality is what you really want to focus on, then as far as we are concerned you should be buying a full array LED set”.
Even in this digital age with numerous ways of listening to music available, and despite reports that CDs are on their way out in replacement of digital music – CDs are still the most popular way of listening to music.
Music Ally Speakerbox recently conducted its annual survey and out of the 1000 respondents polled a massive 73% of music buyers prefer to purchase CDs rather than downloading, CD burning is still the top method of sharing music and 59% of music fans listen to CDs every day (like yours truly).
Interestingly, a huge 66% of teenagers preferred to listen to CDs – an age group which it was believed were amongst the highest for downloading music or listening via an MP3 player or iPod. This research also goes along with recent statistics that piracy levels are dropping – many online listeners instead choose to purchase music legally or listen via a streaming service.
Tim Walker, Chief Executive of The Leading Question said “Digital is still the future but rumours of the death of the CD are premature. The continued popularity of the CD should be looked upon as an opportunity. We believe that labels and online stores could and should be doing more to build on music fans’ familiarity with CDs to provide them with additional digital content and to use the CD as a bridge into the digital world. Music fans have spoken and digital is evidently not the clear cut replacement to the physical CD”
How do you listen to your music? By MP3 or by CD on your home stereo system or PC?
Sharp
Even in this digital age with numerous ways of listening to music available, and despite reports that CDs are on their way out in replacement of digital music – CDs are still the most popular way of listening to music.
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