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Samsung's latest plasma - the 50-inch PAVV Cannes 450 - will sport several "first ever" features aimed at gamers, including 3D-capability and an unfathomable 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio.

But before buyers put this beast on their wish lists, perhaps they should invest in a pair of bionic eyes. At this point, there's no 3D content available for home viewing, and previous experiments with extreme contrast ratios suggest that at a certain point humans can't tell the difference.

Samsung is working with Electronic Arts to speed up the possibility of 3D online games, but regardless of when the content is available, it will still have to be viewed with special 3D glasses that come bundled with the TV sets. And if you saw Beowulf in 3D last year, you know the viewing experience isn't 100% headache free - and wouldn't be for marathon gaming sessions.

Our eyes can't view 3D content without those annoying glasses, and they can't really process a 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio either, assuming such a thing actually exists.

All plasma owners yearn to see blacker blacks and brighter whites on-screen at home. Samsung says it has solved the problem and achieved a million-to-one contrast ratio with technologies it calls "Cell Light Control" and a Digital Natural Image engine + (DNIe+) chipset. Its contrast ratio implies that a pure white pixel on the screen is one million times brighter than a pure black pixel.

But the actual contrast ratio figure means nothing if Samsung's set can't compete with some of the blackest blacks in the business - such as Pioneer's Kuro line, which when perceived by the human eye looks like "absolute black."

But some consumers still get turned on by huge numbers, so manufacturers will continue to list huge numbers on spec sheets. All eyes will be on Samsung's set when it lands in Korea later this year. -Rachel Rosmarin

Akihabara News