The Consumer Electronics Show is all about the neatest, sexiest, highest-tech products we'll get to see in 2006, right? Well, sort of, because CES isn't just about hardware anymore. Getting all that neat, sexy, high-tech gear to play nice together has become just as important as the gear itself.
You've gotta wonder what Freud would say about all these TV makers trying to outdo each other with the biggest screen. Then again, you also have to admit that an 80-inch plasma TV is never just an 80-inch plasma TV - not when it's the biggest you can get. Taking plasma into the 80s is the (holy crap!) $150,000 Samsung HP-R8082, whose screen has 1,920 x 1,080 pixels.
Sure, the Onkyo CS-V720 minisystem ($400) is willing and able to serve as a DVD/CD player, but this sleek little number doesn't merely spin discs. It's also XM radio-ready, which means that when you get an XM Connect & Play antenna ($20) and a subscription to the satellite service ($12.95 a month), 160 channels of music, sports, news, and more will be at your fingertips.
It's directed by Steven Soderbergh, whose credits include everything from Sex, Lies, and Videotape to Traffic, Erin Brockovich, and Ocean's Eleven. It's scored by Robert Pollard, the former Guided by Voices leader, composing his first film music.
By now, LCD technology has all but taken over the small-screen TV category. You can still buy a small traditional tube set, but most folks looking for a TV to stick in a bedroom or kids' play area will find LCD more appealing. The main reason, of course, is the space-saving flat-panel screen.
Apparently, Dolby isn't satisfied with getting its 7.1-channel Dolby Digital Plus and 8-channel lossless TrueHD technologies into the HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc systems (as requirements in the former, as options in the latter). At the Consumer Electronics Show, Dolby's Audistry subsidiary was demonstrating some new technology intended for the other end of the sound-reproduction scale.
<B>Vidikron Vision Model 90</B>
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The first trade show I covered as an A/V Journalist was a CEDIA expo many years ago. The jaw-dropping, three-dimensional images I saw from 720p HD clips on the Vidikron Vision One 9" CRT projector are still among the best these eyes have ever seen. A lot has changed since then. Vidikron is not only out of the CRT business, the company was out of business entirely until being acquired by Runco International in 2002. As a Runco brand, Vidikron has released a steady stream of digital projection products, the latest of which is the Vision Model 90.
As far as living with top shelf projectors is concerned, I've lived a charmed life over the last few years. Sony Qualia 004, JVC's 1080P D-ILA, premium single-chip and three-chip DLP projectors, I've lived with the best of the best. And yet, in spite of that, some of the biggest thrills for me as a reviewer come from the smaller packages with smaller price tags.
