High Display

With the CES and MacWorld behind, we still have some big events ahead, and one of them is PMA 2008, scheduled to take place in Los Angeles, between the 30th of January and February 1st. With this occasion, a lot of new products from our area of interest will be revealed, one of them being Mustek's digital photo frame called PF-A950PS...

To be honest, I didn't see any digital photo frame from Mustek so far, but I've seen tons of scanners (after all, they are the largest scanner manufacturer), so this is a first timer. With a motto like "Digital Life, Live It", it was obvious they must have such devices in their products list, so let's see what will we get from PF-A950PS, shall we?

The 9.5-inch photo frame comes with NXT flat-panel speakers incorporated, and since it's resolution and size are more than decent, you can even use it as a fully-featured video player. Did I say features? Let's take a look at them...

Mustek's PF-A950PS has a resolution of 800X480 pixels (16:9 aspect ratio), only 128MB of internal storage, but is fully compatible with SD, MMC, MS, MS Pro, xD and CF memory cards, supports the MP3, JPEG, AVI, MPEG and XviD formats, and it also features an USB 2.0 port.

These being said, if you would you like to get you hands on one of these, then I have to tell you that the Mustek PF-A950PS will only ship in May, so you'll have to wait a bit. Anyway, if you are one of those that like to plan their expenses, then add $249.99 to the list, for a new digital photo frame...

To be honest, I am not crazy about television, but I love to discover new TV sets, LCD TVs, and so on. Anyway, it's interesting to see how some people get to own at least one TV for each family member, and also watch TV on the road, in a plane, sometimes even in the bathroom! Sounds crazy enough? Well, here's something interesting for those that can't go to the bathrrom without watching TV - Aquavision just announced a full HD TV for your bathroom, having a screen size of 57 inches!

Aquavision is a producer that manufactures TVs for bath and shower, kitchen, mirror (for those that can't even look in the mirror without watching TV!) and also waterproof TVs featuring a towel rail (to have a fully equipped bathroom...). So far, the largest monitor for bath & shower from Aquavision was the 40-inch model, but now they announced a 57-inch one!

The Aquavision 57" should be revealed to the public at this year's Integrated Systems Europe 2008 show, in Amsterdam. This show is going to last 3 days, between the 29th and 31st of January.

The "codename" of this new waterproof monitor is AVF 57-4LCD, and the technical specifications look simply stunning, considering the place where you should be watching it, first of all - full HD (1920X1080) resolution, analogue and digital tuners, two HDMI inputs and, of course, a waterproof remote control! To make things even more interesting, when the TV is off, you can use the screen as a mirror, but if I think well, considering the 57-inch size, you should either have a huge bathroom, either place the AVF 57-4LCD next to your indoors pool, if you have one...

When a new product is released, and its brochure starts with the phrase "High-quality LCD monitors don’t necessarily have to be associated with high-end price tags.", that's something worth checking out, because it's either a lie, either a new product from a successfull line that offers great quality for a good price. Since I am not crazy about checking out lies, today I'll tell you about 5 new products that have just been added by NEC to its AccuSync series of LCD monitors...

These new LCD monitors from NEC come to replace the old AccuSync-2 series, but despite the fact of having 5 new models, they are only 17-inch and 19-inch ones. As you can see in the image above, they feature a new cabinet design, but the "unseen" features are the following: 5ms response time, 300cd brightness, contrast of 700:1 for the 17-inch models, and 800:1 for the 19-inch ones, but best of all, they come for a good price.

Last addition that is worth being mentioned here is the new Eco Mode, that has two major benefits: first, allows you to protect the environment by preserving energy, and second, it helps extending the life of your LCD monitor.

The models released today are the 17-inch ASLCD73VX, ASLCD73VX-BK, the multimedia ASLCD73VXM-BK, as well as the 19-inch ASLCD93VX-BK and, at last, a 19-inch multimedia LCD monitor, ASLCD93VXM-BK. Estimated street prices range between $224.99 for the ASLCD73VX and ASLCD73VX-BK, up to $274.99, for the ASLCD93VXM-BK.

All the AccuSync-3 monitors above are "Windows Vista-compatible" (aren't they all?), according to NEC's website, but I didn't find any information about them being "Vista certified". Anyway, if you have that much free time to spare, you can read the press release for yourselves, here. Let me know if you find out any hidden detail that I missed!

Multi-touch displays became really popular with Apple's iPhone, after JazzMutant, a French company, released the Lemur Input Device in 2005. Anyway, despite Apple's move to register the word multi-touch as a trademark associated with their iPhone, a German company called Lumin Visual Technologies just released a multi-touch system called (you'd never guess that!)...Lumin Multitouch!

According to the official data sheet of this product, "the Lumin 42” – Multitouch Terminal comprises a 4500 ANSILumin projector, an Intel-Mac-Mini and a Lumin Multitouch Screen. Our new polymer foil creates a tactile screen surface
which is pleasing to touch and does not degrade with age, [..]. The screen has excellent optical qualities, such as optimal gain, brilliant contrast and high resolution, operating over a wide range of ambient light conditions. The Multitouch Terminal is housed in a white plastic shell."

The software package included incorporates "the Lumin input recognition software and a series of standard applications, which are pre-installed for plug-and-play operation", but custom applications can also be created, with the help of a software interface provided to help you accomplish this.

At this time, pricing for this device is not public, but available on request. Its power consumption is pretty high, in my opinion, with up to 750W, while the lamp's lifetime is only 3000h in Eco-Mode, and 2500h in Normal-Mode. The resolution of the MultiTouch is the goold-old 1024X768(XGA), and the included Mac computer is a mini featuring a 1.83GHz Core 2 Duo CPU, 1GB DDR2 memory, and 80GB hard drive and Mac OS X 10.5/Windows XP, together with a Wireless Apple Keyboard and Mouse kit.

To see the device in action, and also find out more about it, you can visit the official page, here.

Japan is the leading country when it comes to TV innovations, and for them, it seems HDTV is no longer enough. Why? Well, rumors emerged already about the next step, Hi-Vision broadcasting, also known as Ultra-HDTV. Anyway, don't worry about your brand new full HD TV becoming obsolete, because this thing is only going to become reality in mid 2020s...

If you forgot, let me remind you what is usually known as "full HD" resolution - 1920X1080 pixels video, also referred to as "1080p HD". The new standard, intended to be ready for the masses by 2025, will have a resolution exactly 16 times as higher than full HD, and the idea is to be used in conjunction with 60-inch screens and above.

Well, for a 60-inch screen and an insane (at least at this time) resolution of 7680X4320, your livingroom should also get larger. Much larger. Probably you'll need a special "TV hall", next to your house...and even specialist at the Japanese nationa broadcasting company, NHK, agree with this. According to a research engineer of the company, “Watching fast-moving images at close quarters could "make people feel sick"".

At this time the new broadcasting system is being tested on a 500-inch display with a 22.2 surround sound system, specially built in NHK's labs for this purpose. Ehem...well, once upon a time, Bill Gates was saying that "640kB ought to be enough for anybody", and we see where we got today. By 2030, probably the UHDTV will be something as common as today's 720p displays, but there's a loooong wait until then...