Well it’s time for the annual CEDIA Expo and once again it’s being held here in Denver.  I actually had a chance to get on the show floor a little early this year to help a couple of manufacturers setup their booths. In doing that I was able to get a sneak preview of a couple of interesting technologies and products that are coming out.  I’ll definitely be reporting on everything of interest over the next couple of days, in the meantime here is a quick preview on a couple of technologies I’ll be looking at and what we might expect.

Blu-ray – still the topic of major discussion even though HD-DVD is out of the picture.   McIntosh has announced it’s new player (due later this year) and several other manufactures have 2nd or even 3rd generation players announced for the show.   I suspect we’ll see a bunch of inexpensive players by Christmas and probably some expensive, high-performance models too.

OLED and SED – these are new display technologies that will change the flat panel industry from thin to very, very thin. This will be an interesting market segment to follow.

Projection – now that the initial wave(s) of 1080p players have reached the market we’re going to see a bunch of high-end projectors hit the market.  So far, the buzz is about Meridian, Wolf, Christie, JVC and, of course, 8250’s personal favorite,  projectiondesign with their new avielo product line.

Whole house distribution – a lot of new products are recently out or coming out which do various forms of HDMI distribution throughout the house as well as some innovative audio products as well

Media servers – another growing market segment is media serving. Obviously 8250 Theaterworks is interesting in Sooloos and their new product offerings as well as Kaleidescape.

If anyone out there is interested in any other technologies, manufacturers or products, let me know and I’ll be sure to check it out and report back.

Kaleidescape Releases Two 1080p Players:

Kaleidescape is pleased to announce availability of the 1080p Player and the 1080p Mini Player. These new Movie Players create beautiful high definition video from ordinary DVDs, providing a viewing experience that rivals Blu-ray.

Sharing a common underlying design, the 1080p Player and 1080p Mini Player offer many new video and audio performance features:

• 1080p Output - The embedded Sigma Designs^™ (Gennum^™) VXP^® video processor upscales standard definition DVD movies to 1080p resolution across an HDMI^™ connection, without the added cost and complexity of an external scaler.
• Content-Aware Video Processing - The 1080p Movie Player adapts its video processing to the type of content being viewed to achieve results that are impossible for an external scaler. For example, the onscreen display (OSD) with its sharp edges and high contrast is processed differently than movies, which contain motion and natural colors. Information in Kaleidescape’s extensive Movie Guide database is also used to tailor the viewing experience, for example, to zoom letterboxed movies to fill a 16:9 display or to relocate subtitles for optimal viewing. A new option provides the ability to automatically detect and expand 4:3 format movies to fill the entire screen of a 16:9 display.
• 10-bit 4:4:4 Color Processing - Greater color resolution and depth and improvements in how shadow detail and color linearity are handled produce accurate color and grayscale, from full white to black. This provides a more authentic movie-viewing experience with natural skin tones, nuanced shadows, and a lack of color artifacts.
• Motion Adaptive Deinterlacing and Reverse 3:2/2:2 Pulldown - The 1080p Movie Player detects whether source content originated as film, and selects the most appropriate deinterlacing method for detailed and clear video and smooth motion.
• Improved Onscreen Display (OSD) Imaging - Deinterlacing improvements result in fewer tearing artifacts and much cleaner cover art motion. Greater color resolution and better scaling create a crisper OSD image, particularly with text. Transitions to and from high definition content are now glitch-free.
• Improved Audio Processing - Whether watching a movie or listening to music, audio fidelity is improved.
• Automatic Video Configuration - Video configuration is automatic, making it easy to achieve the ideal viewing experience with minimal setup. The 1080p Movie Player detects and operates at the highest available resolution over HDMI. The degree of video sharpness can be optimized for the installation environment. Though automatic video settings are appropriate for most installations, the video configuration may be adjusted by the installer if necessary.