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Posts with tag bravia

Engadget

Sony Debuts Waterproof TV, the Bravia XDV-W600

by Thomas Ricker, posted Sep 2nd 2008 at 2:35PMBreaking News


It's round, white, and floats in the tub and goes by the name XDV-W600 -- the latest Bravia TV to numb the mind. The little 1-Seg set features a 4-inch, 16.7-million color, 272 x 480 pixel LCD; AM/FM tuner; 2GB of internal memory to record up to 10-hours of 1-Seg television broadcasts; and up to 23-hours of viewing off the internal rechargeable + 2x AA alkaline batteries. It also carries an IPX7 and IPX6 waterproof rating making it submersible for up to 30 minutes at a depth of 1-meter and capable of withstanding penetration by your Jacuzzi's water jets.

Although it would likely distort the video into a fisheye view, we really wish that advances in curved and circular LCDs had progressed to the point of mass production -- that square display kills the aesthetic on these ovular TVs. Ships in Japan on October 30th for an expected ¥39,800 (about $368). [Via Impress]
Engadget

Sony Unveils World's Slimmest LCD HDTV

by Richard Lawler, posted Aug 28th 2008 at 11:02AMBreaking News


Sony's taken the crown in the race for thinnest LCD HDTV. At just 9.9mm thick the KDL-40ZX1 nearly halves the depth of Hitachi's former champ (likely throwing up in the bathroom right now) and comes within a whisper of Pioneer's ultra thin concept. Featuring a LED backlighting, a 3,000:1 contrast ratio, 120Hz MotionFlow tech, x.v.Color and BRAVIA Engine 2 image processing this is about as close to a 40-inch window on your wall as is likely to arrive soon.

Only one HDMI in is directly on the screen itself, all unnecessary HDMI / USB / component inputs are relegated to a base station, with the option for wired or -- possibly WHDI based? -- 5Ghz wireless (unfortunately limited to 1080i max resolution for now). We'd mention the XMB GUI, AcTVila video on-demand and DLNA support, but at some point it's just piling on. A mere 490,000 yen ($4,474 U.S.) puts the ZX1 on your wall, due at your local Japanese retailer November 10. See you there? [Via AV Watch]

Sony Unveils New LCD-TVs, YouTube-Enabled TV, and Tiny Speakers

by Will Safer, posted Jun 6th 2008 at 5:02PM



Sony revealed a few cool home theater displays and components Thursday, revealing pricing and specs on some LCD displays, free content from YouTube and other online content direct to the TV set and a home-theater-in-a-box (HTiB) setup that features tiny but powerful speakers. All in all, a good day for tech watchers and home theater aficionados.

The seven new Bravia LCD TVs introduced are all HD models and feature Triluminos LED backlight and local dimming, which matches LED color backlighting to the LCD color display. The dimming feature helps reproduce better black levels, something the plasma TV makers have always claimed they're a bit better at reproducing with their technology.

The Web content is delivered by a new module Sony introduced that will fit onto the back of many of its 2007 and 2008 LCD panels, called the BRAVIA Internet Video Link. YouTube, CNET and C-Spot content is added to offerings from Yahoo!, AOL, Sports Illustrated, blip.tv, CondéNet's Style.com, Men.Style.com, Epicurious.com, Concierge.com, Sony Pictures' Crackle, The Minisode Network, Inside Sony Pictures, FEARnet, Ford Models, SingingFool, and VideoDetective. That's plenty to watch. The module costs $299 but since the content is all free we are certainly intrigued. (Note: Sony's not the only company to offer up Web content on its sets. For example, Panasonic's got content streaming on some of its top end units with VIERACast.) Other modules announced include a DVD Link (which attaches at DVD player onto the back of the TV) and and Input Link (more inputs onto the back of the TV. The Internet Link is available now, but the other modules will be out by the end of the year.

Finally, that HTiB with tiny drivers, called the HT-IS100 BRAVIA Theatre Micro System, has five speakers each about the size of a golf ball or a large strawberry (see the image above). It's designed for high-def input with three 1080p HDMI inputs with repeater functionality and support for eight channels of uncompressed audio, which means your Blu-ray Disc player, your PlayStation3 and other HD sources will work hand-in-hand with the system. Look for a price tag of about $700 on this system.

The new Bravia LCD TVs will be shipping this fall but pricing is not yet available. The lot includes the 55-inch KDL-55XBR8 and 46-inch KDL-46XBR8 models, which incorporate the outfit's TRILUMINOS three-color LED backlight technology, 10-bit processing, BRAVIA Engine 2, Motionflow 120Hz and Advanced Contrast Enhancer PRO. The 70-inch KDL-70XBR7 and 40-inch KDL-40XBR7 headline the XBR7 lineup, while the XBR6 features sets range from 32- to 52-inches in size. [Source: Sony Electronics.]
Engadget

Sony's Bravia E4000 Series TV Is Pretty As a Picture

by Thomas Ricker, posted Apr 10th 2008 at 5:41PM


See it? No there, the one that looks like a flat screen TV hanging on the wall. Right, that's Sony's new E4000 TV series. Sony's pushing its new Picture Frame Mode and four "blend in frame colours" hard as its looks to differentiate the 32- and 40-inch Full HD LCDs (and a wee 26 inch of unspecified, sub-1080p resolution) from the competition.

As such, the TVs will display one of six, pre-installed images like Van Gogh's Wheatfield with Cypresses. Really though, why bother pre-loading content when it'll display any image you stuff into a connected USB drive. Oh right, copyright law. Anyway, the top-o-the-line 40-inch model features x.v.Color on a 10-bit panel (vibrant colors), Bravia Engine 2 processing, and 3x HDMI inputs (great for connecting multiple inputs). No price or release date, but you can play along with Sony's hide the 26-incher after the break.

Tech Digest via Engadget

Low-Cost Sony Flatscreens Arrive at Target

by Tim Stevens, posted Aug 20th 2007 at 8:51AM

Low-Cost Sony Flatscreens Arrive at Target

It seems Sony and Target are getting rather cozy lately, first with the big-box retailer offering to market Sony's Blu-ray format over Toshiba's rival HD-DVD format, and now with Sony creating a line of Bravia LCD HDTVs exclusively for sale at Target ... well exclusively at the moment, anyhow.

Sony's offering two sets up to the Target faithful, the $799, 26-inch KDL26ML130 and the $899, 32-inch KDL32ML130. The sets are only available on Target's Web site for now, and arriving at stores in the coming weeks. Unfortunately, few technical details are known about them at the moment. About all we do know beyond size and price is that they are 720p sets, meaning they won't be able to natively display the full resolution of either high-definition disc format, both of which provide video at a resolution of 1080p. The price and 720p resolution makes them comparable to similar budget-priced products from Sharp and Samsung, which also fall within the $799 - $899 price point at Target.

If you'd like to go even bigger for just a little more green, go with a plasma instead of an LCD -- specifically, the sub-$1,000 42-inch Vizio VP42, which does do 1080p and is available at Wal-Mart.

From Engadget

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Sony's Small Box Delivers Big Sound

by Tim Stevens, posted May 24th 2007 at 4:37PM

Sony's Small Box Delivers Big Sound

When it comes to your home theater, the convention has always been that bigger is better. But, Sony's newly announced DAV-IS10 takes the opposite tact. The minimalist 5.1 home theater in a box system (that's everything but the TV) has shrunken a CD/DVD player/receiver combo, subwoofer and five satellite speakers down to miniscule proportions – the satellites are roughly the size of golf balls!

The combined system booms with a total of 450 watts (50 for each of the five satellites and 200 for the sub) and has the ability to up-convert your standard-definition DVDs to high-def 720p or 1080i resolutions (curiously, Sony's favorite resolution of 1080p is not supported). The receiver also plays extra nice with Sony's line of high-end BRAVIA televisions: It's able to switch video inputs and power the sets on and off. Finally, it includes a microphone to automatically adjust speaker levels for you when you set up the receiver, making installation a snap. Now if only it could run its own speaker wire...

Gallery: Sony's DAV-IS10 HTIB



From Engadget

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