It’s not just tablets that are getting column inches these days, oh no. 3-D is still knocking about, demanding to be looked at when really, nobody cares all that much.

In fact, the confidence that manufacturers are showing in 3D is almost enough to turn me against my 2D tv, but I just can’t do it. Even if Panasonic are the latest to get aboard the 3D train.

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Sky has confirmed it will launch Sky 3D later this year. The channel will be Europe’s first 3D TV channel and will beam into thousands of homes across Ireland on 1 October this year.

Bertie Ahern enjoys 3D TV coverage in between the odd pint of Bass.

A press release from the company tells how 3D TV demonstrations will be available in 13 Sky shops across the country over the coming weeks (full list below). The channel is very excited about showing the overblown nonsense that is Ryder Cup in three dimensions, while 3D movies like ‘Bolt’ and ‘Monster vs. Aliens’ will also get their “international 3D TV debuts” on the channel as well. Continue Reading

Now, it’s not that we’re a sucker for all things 3D – in fact it’s becoming slightly tedious that barely a day goes past without outlandish industry predictions of how many 3D TVs will be sold this year or pretty pointless 3D gaming peripherals hitting the market – but news that Panasonic is about to unveil a consumer-level 3D camcorder definitely sits in the cool column.

Slashgear reports that  Panasonic is yet to provide details about the new model, but has confirmed a Tokyo press event on July 28th and that it will be far more in line with their current, 2D range in terms of bulk, than their existing AG-3DA1 professional 3D camcorder. Continue Reading

Released last year to almost uniformly good reviews, the ultra slim-line 12.1-megapixel Canon IXUS 100 IS is the kind of unobtrusive, light, high-spec option the majority of people are after when choosing a new digital camera these days. You want it for holidays, you want it for weekends away, you want it for taking pictures for insurance claims… y’know the usual usage. Well the 100 IS ticks all those boxes, it’s “a gem” in fact as CNet puts it.

Initially pegged as a model that might be more about style than features – and it does look good to be fair to the people at Canon – a glance through the reviews that have crept out on the 100 IS since it began selling last spring thankfully reveals that while the you get a slimmer, lighter model than previous Canon digitals, there’s no sacrifice on the overall quality of the product.

Hairy arms, slimline cameras - the unveiling of the Canon Digital IXUS 100 IS line last year.

Camera.co.uk summed up the general mood of the reviewing public calling the 100 IS a very good, pocket sized option that “scores highly for picture quality, style and features”. Continue Reading

There’s no confirmation as to whether any similar moves will be happening on this side of the Atlantic but it appears that Panasonic may be just a tad worried that take up of 3DTVs won’t be all they expected;  and with this in mind it’s been announced that they will be cutting some 3DTV set prices by up to 50% in a deal with US shopping giant Best Buy.

An image from Panasonic’s CES2010 marketing blitz on their 3DTVs, will prices tumble for Europe too?

The Wall Street Journal reports that Panasonic will offer US consumers big discounts (when compared to prices on the same products in the Japanese market) on its sets in order to push adoption.

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Panasonic has unleashed a new super thin range of LCD TVs, adding LED technology and a whole host of other imaging features to the range. Keeping away from the temptation of any 3D offerings in their LCD offerings, Panasonic will keep that for the plasma market. This new batch includes the V20 series, where LCD tech is used for 42-inch and 37-inch sizes.

Panasonic’s new range – out just before the summer – might have a few good choices for World Cup viewing.

A TechRadar report tells how both models have “200 backlight blinking Intelligent Frame Creation Pro, a dynamic contrast of 2,000,000:1 with intelligent scene controller, and an advanced IPS panel that is meant to give out better quality at a wide viewing angle”.

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Panasonic has added to its Toughbook range today with the introduction of the hardiest looking tablet you’re likely to see anywhere. The new Toughbook H1 Field is billed as the world’s most rugged handheld tablet computer and it certainly looks the part. Indeed, we’re pretty certain it will find itself being used by some form of high-tech criminal mastermind in an average action movie starring Jason Statham within months.

Targeting “field sales personnel, first responders, supervisors, inspectors, maintenance workers and other highly mobile professionals” a Panasonic release today stated that, “with optional SmartCard, RFID, and barcode readers, camera, GPS and Qualcomm’s new Gobi2000TM mobile broadband technology, the device helps to maximize mobile worker productivity”.

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Speaking as someone who, due to circumstances beyond my control (I’m poor), presently watches TV on a late ‘80s Panasonic behemoth that has outlasted Governments, wars, Glenroe and the Police Academy franchise, looking through the types of TV tech that will make a mark over the coming year became just a rolling series of me finding a product, going through the specs, and screaming ‘I want, I want, I want’.

For now, I’ll have to stick with the Panasonic (a machine so sturdy I’m nearly certain it could survive a nuclear attack ala that fridge in Indiana Jones), but for those with a little change in their back pocket there’s some great options out there. For one, we can start well away from enormo-screens or 3D hype and take a look at the Kula TV, announced last week by US-based Sungale and available in March.

The little fella delivers up TV treats via a modest 4.3-inch LCD screen and Wi-Fi connectivity “The Kula is the next big thing that will revolutionize the way people watch TV,” enthused Sungale vice president of sales Gary Bennett. Though he remained tight-lipped over any model for usage fees, TheTechHerald did report however that, “Content will be offered to prospective users through a number of different packages, which include Basic, Kid and Grand. While both the Basic and Kid options provide free access to between 20 and 30 channels, the fee-based Grand package will have more than 300 channels to choose from.” A similar system should be reasonably easy to set up this side of the Atlantic.

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Panasonic has followed Toshiba’s trailblazing lead and introduced a new 64GB SDXC memory card, released today in conjunction with their new 48Gb SDXC memory card. Billed by the company as “Panasonic’s largest-sized GOLD cards with Class 10 speed specification,” they come with a maximum data transfer speed of up to 22Mb/s.

The 64GB version can record up to eight hours and 30 minutes of video

One Panasonic PR rep took a deep breath in before telling the world… “The Panasonic 64Gb SDXC is ideal for recording AVCHD High Definition video, high-resolution, or even raw still photos. It can record up to eight hours and 30 minutes of video, and when recording in 1920 x 1080i in HE mode the SDXC Memory Card can hold approximately 27 hours and 30 minutes of footage. The 48Gb SDXC Memory Card and can hold 6 hours and 20 minutes of HD video content recorded in HA mode and 20 hours and 20 minutes when recorded in HE mode,” added the press release.

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There was a time when innovation and TVs didn’t seem to quite mix, with the tried and tested old models reigning supreme for years – the ones that weighed a tonne, took up a few square metres in the living room and were tough enough to last a few generations. Innovation seemed to be confined to just having more TVs in the room than normal.

What's the next big thing for TV? Clue, it's not just stacking them on top of one another

If the movies are anything to go by, powerful executives (or drug dealers) from the 1980s liked to have a wall of TVs in their offices showing various images across a selection of news channels like one enormous Rubik’s Cube of information. The past decade has been different though with one new idea following another, from LCD to DLP to OLED and all manner of promises preceded by the letters H and D.

So after several years of rampaging progress, what’s next?

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Skype has announced today that, as part of a partnership with Panasonic, it wil be adding its voice over internet protocol (VOIP) software to Panasonic’s line of Viera HDTVs.

Panasonic’s new line of Viera cast-enabled tellies is set to hit during the still-vague “2010″, and with Skype coming pre-installed the company will be able to boast free Skype-to-Skype video calling out of the box, which is no mean feat at all. It’ll also be attractive to those who’ve been looking to ditch their house phones but can’t quite get around to it or for some reason or another don’t like the idea of a physical Skype-phone.

In a market with an atmosphere like the current HDTV market, where many products appear (to the casual observer, at least) to be fairly similar, the ability to make calls directly from one TV to another for free could well be a big selling point for the folks at Panasonic, to say nothing of the positive effect that broadening the software’s userbase will have for Skype, which essentially trades on the fact that it’s so widely used and relatively cheap.

Naturally, a wider userbase increases the likelihood that people will use some of Skype’s fee-based services too. While the option to call or videocall other Skype users is a pleasant one, the real bonus is, of course, in the ability to call other phones for less than the normal charge. It might well be a bit of a hard sell for some, but it’s not bad if it’s something that just comes as an add-on for a TV.

We’ll be curious to see how well Panasonic does out of the deal; it certainly won’t hurt the company to be able to offer something that others aren’t though, and cheap phone calls are a big draw.

Sony and Panasonic have managed to bump up the maximum amount of storage space on a single layer of a Blu-Ray disc, leading to a disc that can store up to 33.4GB on one layer.

At the moment, the limit on capacity for a single layer is somewhere around the 25GB mark, which means that dual layer discs have just jumped from an already respectable 50GB or so right up to 66GB, an increase of more than 20%. Of course, having researched the kit and actually being able to sell it are two very different things indeed, and we’ll be curious to see just how long it takes to push so significant a storage increase out to market.

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