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"I'M GOIN' TO SIN CITY" by Shane Buettner You know you've got a great subject when you can start an article with a quote from Bon Scott-era AC/DC! I love that! Las Vegas and the Consumer Electronics Show are not kind to the uninitiated. One has to know where to be and who to talk to. With 100,000 people in town for the big show, that's not an easy task. Case in point: upon arrival at 11pm the night before the show, we were greeted to a line over an hour long to catch a taxi (a theme that would repeat all week.) It was only the next day that I found out from another taxi cab driver that there are two areas from which one can leave the airport and one had a far shorter line than the one we chose. Additionally, there are bell captains who, for a modest tip, will flag down a cab for you immediately. Well, this news came 12 hours too late and so we waited, which brings me to the second misconception: the weather. I know it's January, but I guess I just had this desert vibe in mind and expected weather something akin to Arizona. This was not the case. During the day Vegas' weather was pleasant, in the high 50's. If it was overcast, as it frequently was in the mornings, a sweat shirt or light jacket was required for comfort. At night, however, it was chilly to cold. High 30's low 40's. Such was the case while we waited outside in the taxi line for that hour plus. We just weren't dressed for it, and paid the price, shivering for the duration. Ouch! The Approach You know everything you need to know about what kind of town Vegas is on the way into town as the billboards inform you of entertainment choices such as the powerful combination of David Cassidy (yeah, the Partridge Family guy) and Sheena Easton, who, contrary to popular belief, actually has been doing something since her mega-hit Sugar Walls. If that's not your style, there's Sigfried and Roy (the dark haired one bears an absolutely striking resemblance to SNL's Chris Kattan.) Yes, Vegas is a town where some guy named Danny Gans can be dubbed "Entertainer of the Year," and have "The Show of the Year" in spite of the fact that his show doesn't even get to town until March! And BTW, the big diamond vision type screen that is pumping a preview of his show shows the guy doing a horrible Stevie Wonder impersonation. Yeah, that looks like a lock for "show of the year." And then there are the landmarks, which are all counterfeit. Vegas is not a town that originates anything (not even Danny Gans.) Instead there's a hotel called Paris with a life size mock up of the Eifel Tower out front and receptionists who say "Merci" instead of "thank you." Authentic. New York New York has the Empire State Building. The Mirage has a Volcano out front that erupts every 15 minutes. The Venetian has the canals of Venice without the sewage, and a set of shops lining them in which it's daylight at all hours of the night. Treasure Island has a life size Pirate Ship that floats around and does battle with another ship out in front of that hotel. Think Pirates of the Caribbean on steroids!
As if all of this isn't enough to contend with, my wife and I arrive at the check in desk at the Mirage to see a huge saltwater fish tank behind the desk with (drum roll please) live sharks! Yes, live sharks! Only in Vegas can you stay at a hotel in the desert with live sharks, just down the hall from white tigers, and just across from live dolphins The Big Show Before I get to what I actually saw at the show, I want to share some thoughts on what it's like to be the only guy covering such a big show. Now, I know that when all of you read above that 100,000 people were in Vegas to attend this show, that means big. But that's not all. CES is so big it takes place in no fewer than four hotel/convention center locations. While two of the venues were right next door to one another, the other two were a couple of miles away. Additionally, some other manufacturers decided to exhibit outside of the show at other hotels. Now, that's a hell of a lot of ground to cover especially when you have to wait in a line for a taxi every time you want to hit one place or the other. So, even more so than with CEDIA, I had to make some hard choices regarding what I could and should cover and what had to be left out. Fortunately, that wasn't all that difficult. According to many I've talked to that have frequented the show in the last few years, CES is not the all-important show for home theater and audio it once was as a result of how much of the show is now dedicated to computers, networking, e-commerce and more mundane electronics like everything from telephones and typewriters. Testament to this point of view is the fact that the bigger new product introductions like THX Surround EX and progressive scan DVD as well as the new generation of HDTV and HDTV-ready displays were made at CEDIA, not CES. Despite all of this, the show was a lot of fun. You could be looking at a cool piece of gear and be talking with the manufacturer rep only to be distracted by a guy riding a unicycle twirling a baton! Another time I was walking along looking for one of the exhibits of interest only to find a guy in a penguin suit singing and playing the guitar. If that's not enough, the Y2K bug made an appearance, although he looked like Barney after a cycle of dianabol. Additionally, I got to meet a lot of great people and even got to see a great show of Ray Charles live with a 40 piece orchestra at the Monster Cable party at the Venetian (thanks again for those tickets Robert!) Vegas and a big show like this is truly an experience. Jumping in here, the first couple of things I want to cover are some new technologies that could have a terrific impact on DVD hardware and software. Both are technologies that will be licensed by DVD player manufacturers and could have an impact on the software world as well. DVA - DiscoVision Associates DiscoVision made a name for themselves in optical disc technology quite some time ago, and are poised to do so again. DVA's new product is touted as a "2-Side Access DVD Changer" mechanism that puts a new spin (sorry, I couldn't resist) on existing technology currently available in multi disc DVD players. As opposed to current carousel designs which move the much larger and more unwieldy carousel mechanism, DVA's patented loading mechanism rotates 360° and as a result can retrieve discs very quickly in a carousel machine as well as turning them over for 2 sided disc play. This is a far cry from the clunky auto-reverse mechanisms found in laserdisc players for so many years. This is a very fast and efficient way of manipulating the discs, and if DVD-18 (double-sided, dual-layer) discs are as prevalent in a couple of years as DVD-9's are now, this technology could be huge.
At DVA's suite at the Paris hotel, I saw a prototype player with this mechanism built in and it was indeed impressive, with very fast disc access. The first thing that came to my mind is how awesome this technology would be in carousel player with the kind of programming and disc tracking functionality that a Sony C650D carousel offers with respect to book marking and titling up to 200 discs. Combine that with the DVA technology into a 200 disc machine and you would have a terrific player with terrific library management built in and super fast disc and track access, even with double sided discs! Not bad! DVA plans to work with other manufacturers who wish to license this technology into their players. VM Labs' Nuon Technology What Nuon technology brings to the table with respect to DVD is a bit hard to quantify since it is really a malleable tool that can be made to do many different things and offer many different improvements over current DVD technology. Essentially, VM Labs' Nuon technology allows chip makers to make a very fast, very powerful processing chip that can be used to greatly enhance and broaden the capabilities of a DVD player. In fact, Nuon is so powerful that it may start to change the way DVD software is created by making supplemental material for movies that is more interactive by taking advantage of the extra processing horsepower offered by Nuon enhanced DVD players. To give you an idea of what I'm talking about, Nuon's FAQ states: "DVD players with Nuon built into them are all-in-one entertainment centers that can play movies, videogames, audio CDs, browse the web..." Nuon players would be able to play DVD-Rom based games from their DVD players. Additionally, to the convergence-oriented things that Nuon can facilitate, current DVD features can be greatly enhanced as well. Scanning, slow motion, zooming, track access, and every kind of current processing are much faster and smoother with Nuon processing, as was evident by the Nuon-powered Samsung DVD N2000 DVD player that VM Labs' Greg La Brec demonstrated for me at the show. The zoom in particular was amazingly clear, even at high magnification, and the player could then run at full motion in zoom mode. La Brec also indicated that Nuon could make it possible for DVD-ROM features to be accessed and run directly from the DVD player instead of requiring a computer to run the DVD ROM software. As if all of this isn't enough, La Brec also mentioned a feature called "director script" that would allow a director, in a video commentary, to write on the screen in the same fashion that made John Madden famous as a football analyst. La Brec also said that it could be possible for a director to actually stop the action on screen during his commentary, and during playback of the video commentary and continue talking about a particular scene. This would be much better than the current situation in which the director is stuck in real time and sometimes has to cut him/her self off from talking about one scene as the next begins. While you're watching the video commentary, the director could actually stop the action on screen and continue talking about a particular scene for as long as necessary and then allow the movie to continue again. Neat! Of course, the interactivity of web-related DVD features would also benefit from this additional processing power. Think of something like the Ronin live event actually happening in your home theater instead of huddled up to your PC. So, what you'd have here is a case where the content providers, i.e. DVD studios, would start creating Nuon enhanced DVDs that have supplements and what have that are created with this increased processing power in mind. Powerful stuff. According to the press materials I received, in addition to Samsung, Toshiba and Raite (?) have "already announced their intentions to produce Nuon enhanced DVD players." Recordable DVD- It's Upon Us! Ever get tired of people telling you DVD isn't cool because "I can't record my favorite TV shows, waahhhh!" Well, you're not going to be hearing that guff for much longer, intrepid DVDers, because record able DVD is on the way. Panasonic has the VDR-1000 coming your way, perhaps as early as this Summer. It has variable bit rate MPEG2 recording at three modes, which deliver 60, 120, and 240 minutes of recording time. The higher the number of recording minutes, the lower the quality. The DVD-Ram discs are single layer 4.7GB numbers and it even records in 2.0 Dolby Digital Surround. And, of course, the recording inputs and outputs are analog only, although component outs are included. I didn't hear any pricing information on this piece, but I'll follow up on that soon. Panasonic was running a demo of this technology that showed some outdoor footage that was allegedly shot with a digital video camera, converted to analog and output to the VDR-1000 or a similar machine, and then digitized again. It was the played back on a progressive scan DVD player. I previously said "allegedly" because this demo looked so good it looked like hi-def. Nary an artifact could be seen, even on difficult horizontal line material like an old fashioned park bench. In other words, it looked way too good. And I have reasons to doubt the veracity of the folks running this demo. They also showed a comparison of progressive scan vs. interlace on two "identical monitors identically calibrated." Well, first they weren't identically calibrated, and that was rather easy to see. So then the same material was played back through both monitors with a guy from Panasonic standing next to the interlaced monitor and pointing out all of the artifacts. Just for shits and giggles I asked exactly what we were seeing with the interlaced monitor and the Panasonic rep told me it was S-video to the display, which had its internal line doubler defeated. Artifacts and scan lines indeed! Not exactly an apples to apples comparison to component based progressive scan! Anyway, that leads me to wonder just how honest the DVD-Record able demo was. Pioneer also had a DVD-recorder on display, although I didn't see a functional demo. The unit on display, the DVR 1000 was actually a production unit that is already available for sale in Japan for about $2400 US dollars. Pioneer's Chris Walker indicated they would have a unit ready for the US later this year as soon as the format specs are ironed out by the DVD Forum. Hi-Def DVD- Yeah, You read That one Right, Hi-Def DVD In one of the more interesting pieces of eye-candy at the big show, Pioneer was showing off a prototype Hi-Def DVD player based on the fabled blue laser technology. This 1080i format runs at data rates of 15-32MB per second, and can store a whopping 27.4GB on a dual layered DVD! Of course, this is a prototype and no standards exist at all yet. Also, engineers are getting only 3,000 hours of life from the blue lasers they're using, which is about 1/10th of the life they need to make this technology viable. They are optimistic, however... With all the above in mind, the picture looked great on Pioneer's new plasma displays, showing the usual bright outdoorsy kind of hi-def material one typically sees in the usual hi-def demo material. And this was right out in the middle of a very brightly lit showroom! Impressive indeed.
DVD Audio- It Lives! ... Er, Sort Of Once again, perhaps the most telling thing about where DVD-Audio is right now lies in the fact that Meridian, inventors of the audio format upon which DVD-A is based, was once again not demonstrating DVD Audio in their outrageously outfitted demo room. Such was the case at CEDIA, and now CES. And keep in mind that this product was supposed to rolling out to consumers right about now. Panasonic did have a DVD Audio demo going, but the playback equipment was so poor I really don't have enough to go on to say anything about the format itself. I don't want to go into it too much, because I don't like bashing people, but Panasonic was using all in-house brand gear and it was abominable. Additionally, the demo disc they were using glitched and wouldn't playback despite several repeated attempts. I'm really not certain at this point, as to how much of this formats delays may be due to more than copyright concerns. It seems that demo-ing the technology shouldn't be so problematic as it's so late in the game. I could be wrong, but it sure seems strange.
More Progressive Scan DVD Camelot Technology had a demo of their Round Table Progressive Scan DVD player, which looks to be a terrific piece. On the video side, the Round Table uses Pure Progressive technology provided by DVDO (of Iscan line doubler fame.) The de-interlacing chip provided by DVDO operates in the digital domain and should result in a picture that is outstanding in every way. The Round Table's S-Video output is identical to Camelot's highly regarded Excalibur Powered S-Video Cable which preserves S-Video signal integrity even with long runs of up to 150 feet. Additionally, the Round Table will be truly audiophile quality CD player with a Burr Brown PCM1732 24bit DAC/HDCD digital filter in addition to special circuitry that up-samples standard 16bit/44khz CDs to 24bit/ 96khz. Toshiba has announced two new progressive scan DVD players to debut in 2000. Both players will incorporate what is being called "Super Colorstream Pro" component progressive scan outputs which up-sample 4:2:2 component video to 4:4:4 component video. The video DACs on these new players boast 54mhz bandwidth, compared to the 27mhz bandwidth of the SD-9100 and SD-5109. These improvements result in increased "edge definition and color detail." The SD-9200 will be the new flagship with an MSRP of $1999. In addition to audiophile grade DACs and components the 9200 will also be DVD-Audio compatible (which means it's debut will be dependent upon DVD-A copyright issues being worked out.) The 9200 also boasts very slick exterior design, with solid build quality and a rather sexy drop-down panel in the front over the tray. I had the pleasure of seeing this piece demo-ed on a TW65X81 and the picture was fantastic. Colors indeed looked very good, but without seeing it in my own calibrated system I'll reserve judgment for now on the benefits of the additional color processing of the component video stream.
The SD-6200 is the successor of the SD-5109. It too is a dual tray player as well as having a built in Dolby Digital decoder Strobe picture viewer and all of the fixins. MSRP is $1200. Pioneer will also be jumping on the progressive scan bandwagon with their Elite DV-08, a prototype of which was in action at the Pioneer booth. It has the gorgeous design and monstrous build quality of the current flagship DV-09 and boasts DVD-Audio capability as well. Again, copyright issues associated with DVD-A will determine its release date and no retail price was given. Pioneer also showed a progressive scan DVD player called the DV-AX10, which is also DVD-Audio and Super Audio CD capable! The first of the so-called "universal" players. No pricing or release date info was given. THX Surround EX Equipment with the various methods of decoding Dolby Digital Surround EX soundtracks were proliferating at the show, a trend you can expect to continue. Let's start with the "official" stuff first: the THX Ultra-Certified licensees with THX Surround EX processing.
Denon showed the world's first THX Surround EX receiver, the AVR 4800, which ships in February and fits into their line-up just below the flagship of the line. The current flagship SVR 5700 will be replaced at some point with a THX Surround EX capable receiver, with price, features, and release date to be announced. Denon is taking an interesting approach with their THX EX receivers in that they will not be fully integrated units with the extra channel(s) of amplification for the Back Surround channel(s) in the receiver. Instead, their THX Ex receivers will have Back Surround pre-outs for connection to an outboard amplifier, like the newly announced THX Ultra-Certified Denon POA-5200 stereo power amplifier (120 watts per channel into 8 ohms, $699 MSRP.) The AVR 4800 and POA were used for Denon's demo room, which I was unable to attend due to time constraints. Pioneer showed a prototype Elite THX EX receiver that was fully functional and demonstrated at their booth. There was no price but Pioneer indicated that their next group of receivers will likely carry two THX Ultra-Certified THX EX receivers at the top of the line. B&K had an awesome demo room set up at Cesar's Palace with their new THX Surround EX Reference 30 processor powered by their Reference 7250 (5x200) and 4420 (2x225) power amplifiers. They were using Vienna Acoustics speakers and REL subwoofers to produce a 7.1 channel demo that outstandingly dynamic, detailed and very musical. It sounded great. The amps are available now and the Reference 30 processor will be out in a few weeks. B&K also said they will be producing an upgraded version of their outstanding AVR202 receiver that will be THX EX capable in addition to having the amplification for the Back Surround Channel(s) on board. THX's press materials also indicated that Marantz and and Onkyo both have THX Ultra-Certified THX EX receivers planned as well. 6.1 Surround: Would THX EX by Another Name Sound as Sweet?
Matrix decoding has been around for a long time, and since that's really all that's required to decode the Back Surround channel of Dolby Digital Surround EX soundtracks, we're going to also see a proliferation of products that do just that without being called THX Surround EX. The first such product I saw at the show was Outlaw's Model 1050 A/V receiver which is "6.1 channel" receiver with 6 channels of amplification rated at 65 watts per channel. The 1050 has DTS and DD decoding on board, and Zoran processing which includes a proprietary algorithm for 6.1 processing, i.e., decoding the Back Surround Channel of Dolby Digital Surround EX soundtracks. The Outlaw1050 also offers three S-video inputs, three digital inputs (two optical, one coaxial.) And the thing is built like a tank, especially for a receiver with a $599 price tag. Yeah, $599! It looks like great deal, which Outlaw gets away with by not having a lot of overhead. They're sold only on the internet at their site, www.outlawaudio.com, and will soon be available at www.onecall.com as well. Also jumping into the 6.1 arena is Yamaha, with the RX-V1 receiver. The RX-V1 is a loaded machine with a rear center channel amplifier on board rated at 110 watts, which is equal to the amplifiers for the left, center, right, left surround, and right surround channels. In addition to the scads of DSP modes and tons of digital inputs, the RX-V1 also offers tons of S-Video switching and even component video switching. Looks nice, I haven't got information on release dates and pricing yet, but stay tuned. Display Technology: Plasma and DLP DLP seems to be moving full speed ahead. Texas Instruments has announced agreements with Hitachi and Mitsubishi for development of "large screen, rear projection, HD-capable" displays using DLP technology. Benefits of DLP are touted as "big screen-without all the big." Indeed the prototype RPTV model TI had on display at the show was a very slim profile big screen TV, a 16:9 screen roughly 55-60 inches diagonally, with a very bright and sharp picture. TI's representatives at the show said these rear projection models will likely hit the streets sometime this year and be priced somewhere in the neighborhood of $8000-$10000. While black levels are still compromised compared to CRT based displays, DLP is already producing pictures that will be more than acceptable for most home theater enthusiasts. Also, due to its all-digital nature DLP big screen will allow simultaneous viewing of HD broadcast material and computer graphics. Believe me, there are lots of developments cooking by which DTV broadcasts will include all kinds of extraneous data. Plasma displays seem to really be coming along well also. Pioneer's PDP-505HD hi-def plasma monitor looked very impressive with their hi-def DVD setup. Again, even in a brightly lit showroom-type exhibition. Many of the distracting artifacts I've seen previously seemed to be gone. Black level capability, which will make or break any technology looking to replace the venerable CRT as the high end of display technology, seem to be improving with plasma displays. It is difficult, however, to come to any real conclusions without seeing this technology in controlled circumstances with production material, be it broadcast hi-def or DVD.
Good Old-Fashioned Speakers from Definitive Technology Unfortunately, I only made it to a few full product demos over the course of the show. Fortunately one of the few I did take in was at the Definitive Technology booth. First up was the new BP 2006 TL. This "stealth superspeaker" is a modestly sized bipolar powered-tower design in which each speaker has a built-in 250 watt powered 8" subwoofer. These speakers are fairly diminutive in size (38"H x 11"D x 6"W) but are HUGE in soundstage. I was astounded by the width and depth of the soundstage these speakers threw with music material. Listening with my eyes closed, I just couldn't match the big sound I was hearing to the visual of these smallish speakers. Frequency response is given as a robust 19hz-30khz, and these little babies will be available in May 2000 and will retail for only $599 each. This price seems an absolute steal given the listening experience I had. If this product is in your price range, it seems worth waiting for, even until May. Also new from the good fellas at Definitive Technology is the CLR 2300. This direct radiator is designed to be an audiophile bookshelf system, a superb center channel timbrally matched with the BP 2006TL, or a compact matching left-center-right combination for use in a surround sound system. This speaker has a 150 watt powered 8" subwoofer and its frequency response is rated at 22hz-30khz. This too will be available in May 2000 at a retail price of $599 each. The CLR 2300 demo was a home theater setup in which the three CLR 2300s up front were flanked by BPVX/P bipolar surround speakers. The CLR 2300 in the center was positioned horizontally on top of a big screen RPTV. The trapezoidal shaped BPVX/Ps also have integrated powered subwoofers, with 125 watts powering two 6 _ inch bass drivers. The material played was the legendary demo fare: the tank chase scene from MGM's Goldeneye DVD. There are car crashes, explosions, lots if aggressive surround presence and lots of grinding machine noises. Great slam-bang home theater action. The CLR 2300s handled all of this bombast with great aplomb, rendering superb detail and outstanding dynamics. As the cars careen and the tank swerves all around, these sounds panned seamlessly across the front soundstage, with great lateral imaging. The BPVX/Ps also did a terrific job, filling the rear soundstage with an enveloping sound that was still directional when called for, a trait I most admire regarding bipolar speakers as surrounds.
Personal Video Servers Alright, I know I've got to be about the last guy to get on this bandwagon. You'll have to forgive me, I'm really focused more on movies, i.e., DVD, than television and technologies pertaining to it. In any case, ReplayTV was nice enough to sit down with me for about 45 minutes with one of their new updated boxes and show me what the new features are like. Now, all of you probably know more about these things than I do, but here's a brief rundown nevertheless. ReplayTV allows viewers to "watch television on their own terms." You can record your favorite show digitally in MPEG2 to the hard rive n the box, and watch them on demand at any given time. It's very fast and easy to record a show, or even record a show every time it's on. No rewinding and fast forwarding through video tapes to find what you've taped. ReplayTV's menu will show what it's recorded, when it was recorded, and you can watch it right away. Access is fast. ReplayTV now has one model which has up to 20 hours of record time, depending on compression levels of the recording quality chosen, and will retail for $699. Access to the ReplayTv service is free, so there are no extra charges. The ReplayTV service provides menu systems that are very familiar to those of us who have DSS. The programming guide that is downloaded can work with DSS or cable and will be specific to your area and very precise. With the new software ReplayTV offers a very powerful keyword search that will search program titles and descriptions. When I was at the booth, Jim Plant typed in a search for "Costner" and after less than a minute of searching we saw every movie or TV show with Kevin Costner in it. ReplayZones are also a new feature, which are largely prep-programmed categories of program amterial. For instance, one called "Talk Show" will show you every guest who is going to be on every talk show for the upcoming week, in alphabetical order. Click on the name of the person you want to see and you'll go to the show or shows he/she's appearing on and click again and you'll record it! You can also set ReplayTV up to record every show with a keyword in the title or description. For instance, it would be very easy to set up ReplayTV to record every show with "Star Trek" in the title or description. Of course, another huge bonus with ReplayTV is that everything you watch is recorded and buffered before you watch it. This is great because, lets say you're watching the Simpsons live and at 8:15pm, halfway through the show, you get an important call. Hit pause. Talk for 45 minutes. Hit play and you watch the rest of the Simpsons. ReplayTV will record the channel you're watching live until it runs out of space. Cool or what? Of course, I'm just scratching the surface with ReplayTV's features, but you get the idea. I hope to get a review sample and when I do you'll find out a lot more in my full-length review. I did not get to the TiVo demo, but I know they've got a lot of similar functionality, and when I get specifics I'll pass the info along... Conclusion Well, CES was a big, long, and crazy haul. Nothing so earth-shattering as what CEDIA wrought with respect to new home theater products, but still not bad. 2000 is definitely going to see a lot of new and interesting developments, and we'll keep you informed on those of interest to the DVD/home theater fanatic. |
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