Panasonic claims improved 24p plasma playback

The ability to properly deal with native 1080p24 content is a big deal to some videophiles, because it guarantees that a display can capture the correct cadence of film. Panasonic tried and failed to implement 24p with its plasmas last year, but, according to the company, it has improved its processing for this year with the V10 series.

The four-model V10 plasma lineup includes the 50-inch TC-P50V10 and the 54-inch TC-P54V10, both due in June in the US, as well as the 58-inch TC-P58V10 and the 59-inch TC-P65V10, due in August. As expected, prices were not announced.


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Panasonic rolls out two new Blu-ray players

Panasonic had a stand-out 2008 on the Blu-ray front, with the DMP-BD35 earning the first Editor's Choice award for a standalone Blu-ray player. After mastering most of the basic Blu-ray functions, like BD-Live and high-resolution audio decoding, it looks like the two new players, the DMP-BD60 and DMP-BD80, are mostly incremental updates to the existing Blu-ray players, with the biggest new feature being Viera Cast support.


Key features of the Panasonic DMP-BD60:

Profile 2.0 compatible

Onboard Dolby TrueHD and DTS-Master Audio Essential decoding

SD card slot and USB input

Access to Viera Cast Internet content, including Amazon Video On Demand

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THX, Internet content grace Panasonic plasmas

Last year, the Panasonic TH-50PZ800U earned a good portion of its praise by virtue of excellent color accuracy, which we lay at the feet of THX display certification. For 2009, Panasonic has included THX in two series of plasma TVs, of which the most-affordable will be the G10s.

The company's G10 series of plasmas comes in four screen sizes. The 42-inch TC-P42G10, the 46-inch TC-P46G10, and the 50-inch TC-P50G10 will ship in the US in March, while the 54-inch TC-54G10, a new screen size for the company, will ship in May. As expected, prices were not announced.


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Samsung's gameplan for 2009

Having announced its slew of new panels and media players at CES, Samsung gave us an inkling as to what its main focus would be this year.

Jongwoo Park, president of Digital Media Business in Samsung, said the company will be emphasizing on providing consumers a seamless experience between the Web and its devices. This is part of its Medi@ 2.0 implementation, which online content providers such as Yahoo! and Netflix are involved.

Patrick Barry, vice president of Yahoo!, said that with "the philosophy of openess", the search engine giant aims to let third-party developers create new widgets for this platform. This will mean that consumers will get access to richer content.
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Panasonic SC-TZ1: Wireless, ultra-slim speaker system

Panasonic released a bundle of home theater systems at CES 2009, but the SC-TZ1 is easily the best of the bunch. The SC-TZ1 is a wireless home theater system that uses the 2.4GHz band to send uncompressed audio to all four speakers. Like all wireless systems, you'll need need to run a power cable for each speaker--so it's not completely wireless--but you won't have to deal with long speaker cable runs all over your living room.

The SC-TZ1 is somewhat unusual as its technically a 4.0 system--there are just the four, spindle-like speakers (Panasonic calls them Sound Slim Speakers), pictured in the image. These four speakers each have four vertically aligned speakers within them, which the SC-TZ1 uses to create a virtual 7.1 surround sound effect. Sure, it probably won't sound as good as a real 7.1 system, but you'll be dealing with a lot less wires. You'll also notice that the SC-TZ1 lacks a dedicated, separate subwoofer. That's replaced by integrated subwoofers in each of the speakers, filling in the low end. Again, it won't match the rumble of a dedicated unit, but it's definitely less hassle and looks better in your living room.

The SC-TZ1 is slated to be released in the US in spring, with pricing to be determined. We don't expect the unit to wow audiophiles, but for decor-minded buyers that still want surround sound, it looks like an attractive compromise.

Via CNET.com

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