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Akihabaranews: Mitsubishi Electric has introduced today a new Car Navigation System with the NR-MZ50. Announced at 150,000 Yen and schedule for August, this new 2DIN AV GPS comes with this usual GPS and Traffic Thingy but also includes a 12Seg (12x1Seg) TV Tuner, with the capacity for you to record TV shows either while driving on its 8GB of internal memory or on a SD Card, as well as allowing to enjoy your favorite Movie on DVD while stuck in traffic Jam. Not interested in DVDs anymore? Don’t worry Mitsubishi also included on this GPS AV System an HDMI (Type E) port to let you plug any external BD player.
The NR-MX50 comes with the usual USB, Bluetooth, iPod Support.. and comes with a 7” 800×480 touchscreen.

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Electronista: At the CEATEC show in Japan recently, Mitsubishi Electric showed off a 155-inch prototype OLED TV that is modular and can be upsized at will.

It is composed of 720 OLED blocks, each sized at 1.5 square inches, but can be made bigger or smaller as necessary.

This could be used in outdoor displays, like in ballpark stadiums and on buildings for advertising. The modular nature also means the large screens can be curved in large installations, to follow the curvature of a building, wall or wherever else it’s installed.

Thanks to the OLED technology used in the creation of this system, brightness is said to be three times greater than in regular LCD TVs. Organic compounds in the pixels degrade over time, however, with the set’s life rated at 20,000 hours of continuous use.

Mitsubishi has not released pricing nor a shipping date for the modular OLED technology.

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Electronista: Mitsubishi Electric recently announced that it plans to bring its single-DIN automotive Blu-ray Disc player to the market. The player is just a third of the volume of the company’s home theater Blu-ray disc player.

The prototype of the unnamed player (shown) will fit into a car’s standard, 1-DIN radio fitting, and the player supports BD-ROM, BD-R and BD-RE discs. Mitsubishi reached the small size by increasing board density by 150 percent and reducing the thickness of mechanical parts while improving the anti-vibration performance.

The unit’s spin disturbance was reduced to 20 percent that of its home products, and a damper was deemed unnecessary after carefully reviewing the mechanical design of the player. The BD player is expected to be part of the Mitsubishi navigation systems in cars, despite it using a Linux operating system in contrast to the navigation systems’ Windows CE OS.

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Electronista: Mitsubishi has recently released the DVR-BF2000 digital video recorder that includes a 500GB hard disk drive and the ability to write to blank Blu-ray discs (BD-R/RE).

Users can record two programs at the same time, or record one while watching another, thanks to a dual digital tuner that supports Japan’s BS/110CS digital and analog broadcast systems. For smaller files, users will be able to burn DVD-R/RW discs, with AVC recording to DVD supported as well.

The DVR-BF2000 is capable of automatically cutting programs, editing out commercials, and playing the new content back. An SD card slot is included for viewing photos and videos captured by digital cameras or camcorders.

It’s unknown when the digital video recorder will be available outside Japan.

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Gearlog: Haven’t you heard? The kids these days are crazy about tiny projectors. Optoma, 3M, Microvision–pretty much everyone seems to be getting on the mini bandwagon.

Mitsubishi, a long time leader in the space, naturally, refuses to be out done. The company announced the release of its Pico Portable XD95U Projector.

At 3.3-pounds, the Pico isn’t quite as diminutive as the aforementioned models, however.

The projector has a 3,000-hour lamp life, projects at 2,200 ANSI lumens, and has a quick-cooling instant shut-down feature. The XGA (1024 x 768 pixels) Pico uses DLP technology from Texas Instruments.

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I4U: You thought plasma, LCD, OLED, DLP and CRT were all the choices you had in HDTV? Think again. Mitsubishi is adding a new color to the palette, in the form of a high-def TV that uses laser technology. Expect to pay a large premium, though, as always, for the increase in picture quality and environmental friendliness.

Mitsubishi’s LaserVue HDTV is slated for release fairly soon, well in time for the holiday season.

The difference over other high-def sets is that it uses an engine powered by laser lights, instead of standard TV lighting technology.

The LaserVue set will retail for $6,999 (nearly 5,000 euro) when it comes out by the end of this quarter. Mitsubishi promises that it offers a sharper picture, more defined colors and greater power efficiency. It will use approximately one third of the power that a similar plasma HDTV would require.

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Crave: Mitsubishi will be joining the rarefied ranks (in TV anyway) of Sony and Samsung in offering wireless television.

Wireless chipmaker Amimon announced that Mitsubishi will use its technology to send high-definition TV signals to its latest LCD TV without wires. It will come in 40-inch and 46-inch sizes.

Mitsubishi’s TV will have the chips embedded in the TV, and will come with a separate receiver unit that can send and receive uncompressed HD video signals up to 100 feet (30,5 meters) away.

That means you can keep the receiver in a room downstairs or in a cabinet–no line of sight necessary.

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TVPredictions.com: Mitsubishi has revealed that its Laser LCD HDTVs will come in 65-inch and 73-inch sized models later this year.

The company, which is now billing the sets as ‘LaserVue,’ said they will revolutionize the high-def industry by offering crisper pictures, more vivid colors and 3-D viewing capability.

The 65-inch set will ship in the third quarter of this year with the 73-inch model to soon follow.

Mitsubishi has not revealed pricing on either set, but considering the screen size, they could run into the thousands of dollars.

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Engadget: We got a first glimpse of Mitsubishi’s brand new rear-projection-ish laser-based TV tech, LaserVue, back at CES, but now the sets are just about primed for action, and should be hitting store shelves, as previously noted, Q3 2008.

LaserVue will debut in 65-inch and 73-inch, with the 65-inch version hitting the scene first. Mitsubishi is still pretty coy about what exactly makes the technology tick — other than the “zomg, lasers” aspect — but is quick to point out the 200 percent color gamut that LaserVue provides, more than twice that of most traditional HDTVs.

The sets also run at 120Hz, and boast 500 nits of brightness. Head to head against LCD and plasma sets we had trouble finding the differences, other than the color depth. Have no fear: the blacks are black, the brights are bright, and the viewing angle puts DLP to shame. That said, we’re hearing price points are going to be more comparable to plasma and LCD than DLP, so Mitsubishi might have its work cut out for it in convincing consumers that these 10-inch thick TVs are the way to go.

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Slashgear: There’ve been a few 3D TVs and displays in the press recently, some requiring special glasses and some not, and today Mitsubishi, NVIDIA and Aspen Media Products have announced their collaboration on a home theatre system offering straightforward access to both 3D hardware and content.  Based on the Aspen Media Server, basically an HTPC with huge storage capacity and 1080p high-def graphics, the new range will use NVIDIA’s GeForce FX Go graphics (and specifically their 3D stereoscopic capabilities) together with Mitsubishi’s 3D-ready Home Theater HDTVs.

Mitsubishi will launch several new HDTVs this year, including three 73-inch models along with 60-inch and 65-inch sizes.  All will feature both 3D and 1080p visuals.  Meanwhile, Aspen will handle the HTPC and on-demand media distribution, including 3D content such as movies, live events, concerts and sports.

NVIDIA’s system, unlike say WOWvx, requires the viewer to don special 3D glasses.  The GPU renders two separate views of the content, each of which is seen with a different eye.

None of the three companies involved have suggested an availability date or price for the technology or, presumably, package of different hardware that they’ll be putting together.

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Statesman.com: Just when you thought you had the world of big-screen LCD and plasma TVs figured out, here comes something new: laser TV.

Laser TV is a form of rear-projection television that uses a mixture of red, blue and green lasers instead of traditional mercury lamps as a light source. The purity of laser light allows for images with far more color.

That is the top selling point for proponents of the long-awaited technology, who note that current high-definition LCD and plasma televisions display only about 40 percent of the color that the human eye can see. Laser TVs promise to show twice as much, resulting in richer images.

The first laser TVs from Mitsubishi’s electronics division are expected to go on sale this year.

“Laser TV technology creates a portal to an intensely real and vivid world, beyond ordinary flat TV,” said Frank DeMartin, Mitsubishi’s marketing vice president. He spoke in January at the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, where the company unveiled a 65-inch laser set.

Mitsubishi has been secretive about its laser sets, revealing few details other than that they will use less power than other TV technologies and should go on sale in 2008.

The sets will likely hit stores before the holiday shopping season, said Matthew Brennesholtz, an Insight Media analyst and projection technology expert.

Rear-projection sets typically have screens of 50 inches or more and are cheaper than comparable LCDs and plasmas.

Many hurdles await new rear-projection technologies in a market dominated by increasingly bigger and cheaper LCD and plasma sets.

Against that onslaught, the rear-projection market has been fading fast, said Paul Gagnon, director of North American TV research for DisplaySearch.

In 2006, rear-projection TVs accounted for more than 56 percent of shipments for 50-inch to 54-inch sets, according to DisplaySearch. That plummeted to about 19 percent last year and is expected to reach 4 percent in 2008.

However, rear-projection sets still rule among the biggest sizes.

They are expected to account for 77 percent of sets 55 inches and larger shipped this year, Gagnon said.

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EngadgetHD: CNET has dished out an updated version of the “top-rated HDTVs regardless of type, technology, brand, or size.”

Taking a respectable fourth is the Samsung LN-T4665F, which was praised for its excellent shadow detail and beautiful styling, while the Pioneer PDP-5070HD (the PDP-507XD in Europe) managed to squeeze into third thanks to its accurate color decoding and impressive array of inputs.

The first loser (or runner-up, depending on perspective) was the Mitsubishi WD-65831, which was dubbed “as good as it gets” in the 65-inch range for those not savvy with high-end plasma pricetags.

Unsprisingly, Pioneer’s stunning PRO-FHD1 (the PDP-5000EX in Europe) took top honors due to its excellent detail with 1080-resolution material, deep blacks, and all around excellent picture quality.

So if you’ve been teetering on how to wisely spend €5,800 or so, the choice seems pretty clear at this stage.

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