September, 2008 | HD TV PROFESSOR

Month: September 2008

TiVo HD DVR on Your PC

September 30, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

There's at least one dark side to the February 17, 2009 transition to digital TV broadcasts that few people have addressed, and that's the question of what to do about getting a digital video recorder. We have a Panasonic model in our home that we use to watch at least 80% of all our TV content. But it only has an analog tuner, so it won't work next year. We...

Circuit City on the Rocks?

September 29, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

Circuit City has announced a bone-crushing $239.2 million loss for the second quarter of this year. According to various news reports, management has stopped trying to find a buyer for the company, and is trying to find ways to shore up the ailing company. This includes shelving plans for opening up new stores, cancelling all the stores planned for next year. In fact, the company may close more existing stores....

Sony Signs with DISH Network

September 26, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

This week, DISH Network announced an agreement with Sony Pictures Television that will allow DISH to carry their movies and other content on their video on demand service, DISH on Demand. The agreement covers both standard resolution and HD versions of the content, and also includes delivery through the DISH Pay-Per-View service. DISH on Demand requires a digital video recorder. Some of the titles will be available on the same...

LG Puts Holy Text in HDTV

September 25, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

It has been widely reported that LG Electronics is shipping two HDTV models for Middle East markets that contain the full text of the Koran (Quran), the holy book of Islam. This product was created after research indicated that many devout Muslims read the Koran every day, or listen to it on their home entertainment systems. By embedding the content in the 42" and 50" HDTV models, LG hopes to...

Wilmington NC: What Did We Learn?

September 24, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

On September 8, most of the TV stations in Wilmington, NC turned off their analog broadcasts and broadcast only in digital. While most say that the transition went smoothly, there were still plenty of people caught unprepared for the change. This experiment was important so that local, state, and federal government officials could learn from the Wilmington experience, and hopefully maket the transition smoother for the rest of the country...

Reader Question: Scaling HDTV

September 23, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

Q: If a HDTV is limited to automatically displaying 720p what will be the picture results if the signal come at 1080 off air or cable? Curt A: Curt, when an image of one size is displayed on a screen with a different native resolution (number of pixels), then the image has to be scaled. If the image is smaller — a 720p image on a 1080p set — then...

DTV Transition Contest

September 22, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

If you want to get people to do something, offer prizes. That's what the Consumer Electronics Association (the group behind the annual CES mega-show) and the National Association of Broadcasters have done. To help publicize the impending transition to digital over-the-air TV broadcasts in February, the two organizations are sponsoring a "Rabbit Ears Pioneers" contest which you can enter at http://www.antennaweb.org/rep/rep_index.html. The contest is intended to highlight the stories of...

One More Nail in Plasma Coffin

September 19, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

Hitachi has announced that it will cease production of plasma panels, and instead buy them from Panasonic (Matsushita). This mirrors a similar decision made earlier this year by Pioneer. This is good news for Panasonic -- at least in the short term -- as it ensures an increased market for the output from the company's expanding plasma production facilities. On the other hand, it increases the risk for the future...

Top This!

September 18, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

Okay, I'm not shilling for Westinghouse (or any other manufacturer or retailer, for that matter), but I've just noticed another deal that I have to mention. Two weeks ago it was a Westinghouse 42" 1080p model at Costco that staggered me. Now Buy.com is offering a different model at a price that risks causing double-take whiplash. Consider this: the LTV46w1 46" Wide XGA (1,366 by 768 pixels) 720p-class LCD TV....

HDTV Half Full? Half Empty?

September 17, 2008 | Ibex Marketing

Market research firm NPD has stated (according to a report by TWICE) that about 46 percent of USA television households now have HDTVs. 34 percent have only one HDTV, and 13 percent have two or more. So depending on how you look at it, the HDTV glass for US viewers is either half empty or half full. We've had free digital broadcasts of HDTV as well as HD content on...

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