When January arrives each year, gadget fans feel a familiar twinge that
can be only one thing-it’s time for another Consumer Electronics Show
(CES) in Las Vegas. But the show is also an early indicator of which
display and playback formats will most influence feature sets in
higher-end acquisition devices that capture and post the original
content. At this year’s show, it was all about 1080p display and
high-definition DVD.
If you’re shooting and posting in HD, then these two trends mean plenty
to you-you want to know your audience sees your work in its fullest,
richest detail. The biggest HD unveiling at CES was the formal
introduction, with products, of the two competing high-definition DVD
disc formats: Blu-ray Disc and HD DVD. Many of the top manufacturers
showed a standalone player for the home theater market, and some also
showed a combination writer/player for installation in a computer.
Toshiba and Sony were especially aggressive in pushing their HD DVD and
Blu-ray formats, respectively. Few manufacturers were willing to reveal
prices or shipping dates, though the HD DVD camp was pushing
affordability over features and shelf life. Toshiba plans a March introduction for its two standalone HD DVD players: the $499.99 HD-A1 and $799.99 HD-XA1. Sony’s Blu-ray Disc player (the BDP-S1)
will ship in early summer and support 1080p. Though Sony will likely
price its systems much higher, the company seems to understand the
equal importance of these two emerging trends. But the bad news is that
there still is, at this writing, two competing formats, leading to both
confused content creators and confused consumers.
Displays supporting 1080p were also out in full force- Panasonic demonstrated the TH-65PX600U, a 65-inch plasma display with a native 1920 by 1080 resolution; Samsung showed an 82-inch LCD television (the LN-S8281D), that supports 1080p and has a pixel response time of 8 milliseconds; Sharp’s entry in the 1080p sweepstakes is the 57-inch LC-57D90U AQUOS LCD television; and JVC expanded its LCOS-based HD-ILA televisions to include 56-, 61- and 70-inch screen sizes.