About Electronics

Broadbandtvnews.com: In a short space of time the digital video recorder has become the second most essential household technology item, beaten only by the mobile phone.

Seven out of ten owners say they cannot live without a DVR (often referred to as the PVR and occasionally DTR), according to the NDS DVR Report.

The survey carried out on behalf of the technology company by Consumer Analysis Group interviewed 1,012 people aged 18-70 years old who have a DVR at home.

Consumers were interviewed in the UK (256), US (252), Italy (251) and Australia (253); all markets where the NDS XTV technology has been deployed.

Nigel Smith, chief marketing officer, NDS: “The survey results show just how fast the DVR has become an indispensable part of people’s lives in the UK, US, Italy and Australia. It’s one of those technologies that, once tried, has you wondering how you coped before.”

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Mobile Magazine: You may have heard that the latest family of GPS navigation devices from Garmin come with lifetime free traffic alerts, helping you get around the bumper-to-bumper gridiron. However, it’s not completely true that these updates are free.

In order to make up for the extra cost associated with providing this service, Garmin has apparently integrated a series of advertisements into the user interface.

This way, the cost of providing traffic alerts is shouldered by the advertisers rather than the end user.

When you access the traffic menu, one of these advertiser’s names always appears at the bottom of the screen. Also, from time to time, one of these ads will pop up on the map view screen.

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ITProPortal: Fashionably late, the LG KC910 smartphone is definitely. However, that ain’t to say that it is bad.

Although others like Sony Ericsson have already announced 8-Megapixel cameras, LG is the only one with a touchscreen display that can (hopefully) rival that of the iPhone.

The KC910 which bears the sweet moniker of Renoir, in memory of the famous French painter, is only 14mm thick and comes with many features borrowed from the popular LG Viewty, like the Xenon flash, manual focus and more.

It can also play DiVX and Xvid videos as well as capture video in full glory at VGA resolutions.

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Electronista: Hitachi unveiled a 1.5-inch thick 50-inch plasma display, which heads up the company’s new UltraThin 1.5 family of products that also includes 1.5-inch thick LCD HDTVs.

The display, which Hitachi is quick to point out is among the largest and thinnest of its kind, will headline Hitachi’s release of plasma HDTVs in the A-, S-, V- and X-series, made up exclusively of 42- and 50-inch displays. While not quite 1.5 inches thick, the new plasma HDTVs will be available with manual swivel stands or remote-controlled powered swivel stands.

The A-series offers the 42-inch P42A202, 50-inch P50A202 and 50-inch P50A402. All feature three HDMI 1.3 inputs and a new UltraBlack Panels boxed cell structure for deeper black reproduction and deeper colors than their predecessors. The S-series P50S602 replaces the video processor with a newer PictureMaster HD VI chip. The 50-inch V-series P50V702 adds Reel60 processing technology that creates interpolated frames for 30 frames-per-second footage.

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Electricpig: British AV manufacturer Arcam not only creates great sounding kit, but serves it up in eye-popping designs too.

The brand new FMJ AVR600 is no exception. Tired of stale AV designs, Arcam’s ditched the knobs for a minimalist look.

Up front there’s a sleek, yet sparse design, while inside it’s all business.

We’re talking 7.1 surround sound, DAB and FM tuners, iPod and MP3 compatibility, optional networking for internet radio and streamed music from home computers, as well as five HDMI inputs, and two outputs for all your home cinema kit.

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Pioneer: Pioneer will introduce the 46-inch KRL-46V LCD TV across Europe in October, rounding off the first wave of our new KURO Full HD ‘HD ready 1080p’ LCD TV range.

Like the recently released 32-inch KRL-32V and the 37-inch KRL-37V, the latest LCD model comes with a high-contrast front filter, three HDMI ports and 100Hz processing.

The superior picture quality of the KRL-46V arises from an intelligent mix of technologies. 100 Hz processing delivers crisp fast action images and gives a unique richness, depth and clarity. The TV boasts a fast response time of 4 ms, which contributes to clean fast moving video.

A special high-contrast filter maximises contrast, colour definition and sharpens the picture. And an automatic backlight adjustment function results in enhanced black levels and deep, accurate colours whereas an ambient light sensor optimises on-screen images according to the brightness of the room.

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Wireless Week: The United States has caught up with Western Europe in the adoption of 3G, with 28.4% of American mobile subscribers having 3G devices compared with 28.3% in the largest countries in Europe, according to comScore.

The number of U.S. subscribers with 3G-enabled devices has grown 80%, to 64.2 million during the past year, comScore reports.

The market has responded enthusiastically as mobile vendors have rolled out their enhanced networks and a new crop of 3G-enabled devices.

The only individual major European countries exceeding the United States in 3G penetration are Italy and Spain.

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PC Advisor: Google’s co-founder, Sergey Brin, said he expects the new Google Chrome web browser to eventually become part of the Android wireless phone platform, which is under separate development by the Open Handset Alliance led by Google.

Brin, in an interview with CNET at the Chrome announcement, said that “probably a subsequent version of Android is going to pick up a lot of the Chrome stack”.

While developed separately, both Chrome and Android’s browser rely on WebKit open-source software for interpreting HTML code that builds and renders a web page.

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Techradar.com: Apple’s target of 10 million iPhones in the hands of consumers by the end of the year could soon be a reality after it has reportedly sold its 8 millionth unit.

Reports state that over 5.5 million units of the iPhone 3G have been sold, which coupled with the 2.4 million original units shifted seems like some healthy sales.

Considering the company has yet to expand into huge territories like Russia and China, the numbers don’t really do justice to the Apple’s success.

But this should be rectified soon with deals rumoured to be coming for these countries.

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SlashGear: JVC’s newest HD350 and HD750 are both THX Certified with 800 ANSI Lumens and native contrast ratios of 30,000:1! Image processor is now featuring silicon optix HQV Reon VX processor instead of Gennum VXP.

The physical size is more compact and slimmer. The core feature of all is the additional of full color temperature adjustment and a color management system (CMS) for enthusiast looking for much accurate color and grayscale settings but only the HD750 will a full 3D color management (RGBCYM) controls for the primary and secondary colors.

Other features includes HDMI version 1.3 (Deep Color/CEC), a new high performance, premium 2x motorized zoom lens with ±80 percent vertical and ±34 percent horizontal motorized lens shift function . An external 12V trigger can be used to trigger electronic screen or used with an optional anamorphic wide screen lens system.

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Crave: Catering to those sensitive souls for whom the smoothness imparted by 120Hz LCD HDTVs is still too rough, Sony will introduce the first HDTV with a 240Hz refresh rate this December.

Dubbed the KDL-52XBR7, this 52-inch model is the only one in the XBR7 series to boast the faster refresh rate.

According to Sony’s press release, the main advantage of 240Hz compared with 120Hz is the “exceptional motion detail in movies, sports, and video games.” Whereas standard 120Hz TVs in Sony’s lineup interpolate an extra frame between the real frames, the 240Hz model interpolates three.

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Techradar.com: Although it is not out until the spring of 2009, one look at Cambridge Audio’s new Blu-ray player will make you want one now. Forgoing the usual black design to a sleek silver look, the UK-based company has shown off its first-ever Blu-ray player.

Called the 640BD, Cambridge Audio has designed its player to fit in with its own range of Azur AV receivers – award winners at the Home Cinema Choice awards, no less.

The 640BD features HDMI 1.3 output, bitstream output of all the latest HD Dolby and DTS surround-sound systems and internal decoding of Dolby Digital EX, DTS ES, Dolby Digital Plus, Dolby True HD and DTS HR surround-sound.

As always, there’s a full set of analog video outputs is supported, and an Ethernet connection, SPDIF, Toslink and dedicated 7.1 and stereo analogue outputs.

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