Best Buy to Begin Selling Panasonic 3D TVs This Month
Best Buy has announced plans to begin selling Panasonic 3D television sets at its Magnolia specialty stores this month. Dealerscope reports that Best Buy and Panasonic will be hosting a media event in New York City on March 10th. Panasonic unveiled four 3D Plasma HDTVs at the Consumer Electronic Show in January. Panasonic's TC-PVT25 series won the 2010 Best of CES award at the 2010 CES show. You can read more about Panasonic 3D TVs here.
LG to Start Selling 15-inch OLED TV in U.S. Later This Year
Gizmodo reports that LG is going to start selling its 15-inch EL9500 OLED TV in the U.S. later this year. The small television should go on sale this summer with a steep price tag of $2,500. OLED televisions were expected to be expensive when they first started going on sale. LG will have 40-inch offerings in the U.S. in 2012.
You can view another image of the LG's 15-inch OLED tv here.
Dealerscope reports that TV and blu-ray player manufacturer Vizio had strong sales during the Black Friday shopping period. Sales for Vizio jumped 40% as it sold 280,000 HDTVs.
The company announced that of the 280,000 TVs sold, 20,000 were 50" and larger- a tenfold increase. Vizio also sold 7,000 high-definition sound bars.
"We consistently strive to offer consumers more and are pleased to see the great success of our high performance products which allow us to continue to grow and expand VIZIO products to a wider range of consumers seeking the latest technology at a great value," the company's co-founder, Laynie Newsome, said as part of the announcement.
Those are very strong sales during a weak economy. Dealerscope says Vizio ran specials through Costco, Sam's Club, Walmart and Target.
Vizio is adding to small thin LED televisions to its Razor TV line. The TVs are each less than one inch thick. They can be used as a large digital photo frame when not being used as a TV. The 19-inch Razor LED TV (VM190XVT) retails for $349.99 and the 23-inch Razor LED TV (VM230XVT) retails for $399.99.
CNN reports that 3D television sets will hit the market in 2010. Sony and Panasonic have sets coming out next year. CNN says Mitsubishi and JVC are working on 3D television systems.
"TV finally becomes real" in three dimensions, said Robert Perry, an executive vice president at Panasonic. "You're in it. It's the next frontier."
Perry compared the 3-D transition to the switch from black-and-white to color television and the shift from standard- to high-definition images.
The TVs may be available but the content is lagging. The article does say ESPN is working on recording some of its sports footage in 3-D.
ESPN is test-recording some sporting events in 3D, using cameras with two sets of lenses, which would make football players appear to jump out of home television screens during live 3-D broadcasts.
Consumers probably are going to wait until there is lots of interesting content available for the 3D tvs before they spend the money. You do have to wear special glasses when you watch the tvs for the 3D effect to work. Here is an over-the-top video presentation by Sony about its plans for 3D tvs. Take a look:
The Wall Street Journalreports that Sony is postponing plans to launch OLED televisions. The buzz about OLED tvs has been very good. OLED tvs have a very high resolution, are incredibly thin and use much less energy than other types of tvs. Unfortunately, the tvs have not proven to be cheap to make and Sony is concerned that starting to mass produce the OLED displays "would exacerbate losses at its TV division."
The company had been targeting a 2009 release for a larger successor to a model with an 11-inch screen released in late 2007, which is the first and only OLED TV to reach stores so far. That model's screen is three millimeters thick. But Sony has decided to push back the new model until at least next year, these people said.
The decision sends a message to Sony's engineers that returning its TV business to profitability is a priority. The business is on track to lose money for the sixth straight year. In the past, Sony's engineers could push the company to roll out products that were technological marvels but struggled to turn a profit.
The postponement opens the door to competitors such as LG Electronics Inc. and Samsung Electronics Co. to assume leadership in a promising technology, touted as a potential replacement to liquid-crystal displays.
The promise of OLED tvs is exciting but it will be at least a couple years before a large OLED tv will be available and it will be a couple more years after that before they are affordable.
Hannspree is launching a line of adorable televisions which are set inside a stuffed giraffe, elephant, polar bear or panda. Thanks to these cute animal-shaped TVs, parents' long struggle to get their kids to watch more television should finally come to an end.
Switch Leaves Many Portable TVs Useless as Hurricane Season Begins
The switch from analog to digital will render many portable televisions useless. Naples Newsreports that this is happening just as the 2009 hurricane season is beginning. A lot of residents in hurricane-prone areas rely on the little portable tvs.
Among the many images brought to mind by the start of hurricane season, it's one of the more endearing; the whole family huddled together in the dark, watching the flickering light of the weather report on a black-and-white battery-powered television as storm clouds rumble overhead.
Unfortunately for the people who have grown attached to them, those little rabbit-ear emergency televisions are rendered useless by the digital transition, along with all other sets that still receive analog signals through the air.
Other articles about the loss of the handy rabbit-eared portables can be found here, here and here.
CNET reports that Soyo, the manufacturer of Honeywell TVs, has field for Chapter 7 bankruptcy protection.
Soyo makes LCD monitors, portable hard drives, and Bluetooth ear pieces, but is probably most recognizable since it owns the license to sell TVs under the Honeywell brand name. It's unclear how customers who recently bought Honeywell TVs are to deal with repairs or warranties issued by the company.
While Honeywell wasn't one of the top brands of TVs, its exit from the TV market is yet another sign of the ongoing shakeout taking place in the consumer electronics business. Syntax-Brillian, maker of Olevia brand HDTVs, filed for bankruptcy last summer, shortly after Philips turned over its North American TV operations to Funai.
More recently Pioneer has said it will no longer produce TVs after March 2010
HD Guru discovered the Chapter 7 information in a Soyo Group Inc. SEC filing. Soyo's website can be found here.
Honeywell is entering the LCD tv market with a huge 82-inch LCD TV that weights over 300 pounds. You can see the specs for the Altura LE LCD here on Honeywell's website. Honeywell is known to many for its air purifiers but they also have an electronics division that makes monitors, portable storage drives and now LCD televisions. Wired says the giant Honeywell LCD TV plus four smaller versions will be released in a few months. Prices for the TVs are not yet available.
The recession didn't keep people from buying high-definition television sets so they could enjoy the Super Bowl. The Consumer Electronics Association projected a couple days before game day that the Super Bowl would help drive sales of 2.6 million HDTVs. They also expect this year will set records for HDTV sales.
This year is expected to be another record-breaking year for HDTV sales with 29.8 million HD sets expected to ship, out of a total of 34.5 million digital televisions sold in the U.S. in 2009. This is up from 26.8 million HD sets sold in 2008. In addition to key sporting events like the Super Bowl, another factor driving this demand is the drop in the average wholesale price of sets. In the past five years, the average wholesale price for an HDTV has fallen nearly 50% to $849 in 2009.
"Even in this tough economy HDTV growth has remained strong and steady," said Jason Oxman, CEA Senior Vice President, Industry Affairs. "Since the early days of HD, sporting events have lead the way in high-def broadcasts. Sixty percent of consumers said the Super Bowl is one of their favorite sports to watch in HD. It is no surprise that most Americans would not think of hosting a Super Bowl party without watching the game in HD."
All categories of digital television (DTV) sales are on the rise. CEA projects that more than 34.5 million DTVs will ship in 2009. The 26.8 million LCD TVs expected to ship will make up the bulk of these sales. Plasma displays will account for 10 percent of total sets sold in 2009. Overall digital displays remain the primary revenue driver for the industry with dollar shipments representing 15 percent of total industry sales in 2009.
People who went out and upgraded their tv for the big game must have been pleased watching the new game on an HDTV. The game was a great one that wasn't decided until the final minute.
Overall Super Bowl spending was forecast to be down in all categories except food.
Sony's 11-inch XEL-1 television (pictured above) with a contrast ratio of 1,000,000:1 is the first OLED tv to go on sale in the United States. The ultra-thin tv has the width of just three stacked credit cards. It retails for $2,500 and can purchased here on Sony Style. Sony is also demonstrating a prototype 20-inch OLED at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES).
Engadget has a post about a 15-inch OLED tv from LG that was on display at CES and is expected to be out this summer. Engadget writes, "Nothing else compares to the incredible contrast achieved by these OLED displays."
You can see a very skinny OLED tv in the clip below. There's also a clip here where Samsung discusses OLED technology. LED stands for organic light-emitting diodes. With OLED technology comes the promise of ultra-thin video screens that can folded or rolled up.
Consumers Plan to Reduce Electronics Spending in 2009
The Wall Street Journal has a report that cites data from Forrester Research that found people are planning to cut back on their electronics purchases in 2009. Some highlights of Forrester's findings include:
66% of respondents less likely to purchase satellite radios
62% less likely to buy a portable GPS
63% of respondents said they are less likely to a smart phone
62% less likely to buy a new video game console
45% have post-poned plans to buy a new PC
Things are a little better when you starting talking tvs with 44% of respondents saying they haven't changed plans to purchase a new set. But overall it is clear that electronics are not going to be immune to the recession.
Reuters reports that Costco is selling bundles of two flat screen TVs. Costco is bundling two of the same size tvs or a larger and a smaller one together.
How quickly thing change, especially in the world of electronics.
This year, as TV makers confront excess supply and shoppers show a reluctance to splurge on big-ticket items, Costco is selling bundles of two flat screen TVs, pricing two for basically the price of one.
Right now on Costco.com, consumers can buy a 52-inch Sharp LCD TV bundled with a 32-inch Sharp LCD TV for $1,799.99. Or shoppers can get two 42-inch LCD Sharp TVS for $1,499.99.
The bundling is smart because consumers often want more than one tv, maybe a large one for the family room and a smaller one for a bedroom. Costco's current tv bundle offers can be found here.
Here's some of the latest news about Black Friday (11-28-08) and holiday deals.
Kim Komando has a great summary of some of the deals and prices to expect on electronics on Black Friday in her article on USA Today. She says Blu-ray Disc players will sell for about $150. She sees the price for 42-inch HDTV sets in the $600 range. You can see some more price targets for HDTV's this holiday here. Kim also expects good deals on digital frames with 7-inch frames gong for $30 and 9-inch frames about $50. However, she says not to expect discount on Wiis or iPhones.
PSXExtreme reports that this Saturday Wal-Mart is offering a $100 gift card with a purchase of the 80GB PlayStation 3. The 80GB PlayStation 3 is listed at $399. Reuters is also reporting this deal as well as a basic Compaq laptop for $298.
BlackFriday.info has posted the Black Friday ads for Lowe's. (via I4U News)
The oddest Black Friday deal we have seen yet. The Journal Sentinelreports that free Jockey brand pajamas will be given to the first 500 shoppers who show up wearing pajamas at Prime Outlets at Pleasant Prairie which is near Milwaukee, Wisconsin. Does that make it worth it to wear pajamas? Maybe.
K-Mart is also offering early Black-Friday special according to a Dallas Morning Newsarticle.
Some current deals: eToys is offering free shipping on $50 Lego orders (ends 11-10-08). White House Black Market is offering an additional 25% off already reduced styles (ends 11-12-08).
Dealerscope 
CNN 
The switch from analog to digital will render many portable televisions useless. Naples News 
CNET 
The recession didn't keep people from buying high-definition television sets so they could enjoy the Super Bowl. The Consumer Electronics Association 
Reuters 
Here's some of the latest news about Black Friday (11-28-08) and holiday deals.
