Recently in Video Hardware & Software Category

In days of old (actually not that long ago), everybody who had TiVO loved to tell anybody who didn’t have TiVO how great the system was – record TV show, watch them when you want (and skip the commercials!). Ah, those were the days ...

Now, as TiVO faces increasing competition on simultaneous front – cable TV companies, satellite TV companies and consumer electronics manufacturers with their own digital video recorder offerings – TiVO is contemplating the ultimate four-letter word in CE (and any other market, too): free.

Yes, in another version of the “give away the razor, sell the blades,” TiVO is considering pricing options that would include free set-top boxes (with the trade-off being long plans or some such catch.

Will existing customers (some 4 million) get a break?

Never a dull moment ….

If you're into extreme sports (and who isn't -- from the active to the armchair), then you don't want to miss your chance to vote in the 6th Annual Xtremey Awards. (It's sort of like the Academy Awards, but without all of the gowns and other trappings.)

Just take a look at these categories in which you can cast your vote:

• Best Freestyle MX
• Best Freestyle Sportbike
• Best 50' Freestyle
• Best Competition Documentary
• Best Broadcast Competition
• Best Off-Road Truck
• Best Quad/Sand
• Best Rock Crawling
• Best Snowmobile

We've got Travis, Metzger and a whole bunch of others takin' it to the max. 

My favorite -- FMX Riot 2005 -- another awesome Paul Taublieb DVD! It's got my vote in the Best Competition Documentary category.

www.xtremey.net

Set a reminder that three years from today that analog television will disappear off of the globe (at least in the U.S.), according to the budget reconciliation bill that President Bush signed.  Yes, February 17, 2009 is the day.

Am sure much will happen between now and then ...

This is the new Grandstream GXV-3000 H.264 based SIP video phone launched at ITEXPO and which I promised to post a photo. This is the phone I told you about yesterday during my chit-chat with Digium's Mark Spencer. Based on completed interoperability tests conducted by engineers from Grandstream and its partners, GXV-3000 works seamlessly with SIP soft client from Counterpath, IP-PBX or softswitch products from Digium, Netcentrex, and Pingtel.

"With the exciting release of GXV-3000, Grandstream solved 2 critical issues that prevent video communications over public Internet from becoming a mass phenomenon: high cost of hardware terminal and delivery of high quality 2-way real-time video over modest bandwidth," said David Li, Grandstream's CEO. "GXV-3000's DSP optimized implementation of the latest H.264 video codec ensures high fidelity video quality at bandwidth between 64kbps and 1Mbps. Its attractive price point (MSRP $295) and broad interoperability with various 3rd party SIP products further makes this product stand out from the rest of the crowd. "

"The Grandstream product is one of the sleekest and coolest video phone products out there today," said David Michaud, CEO of Netcentrex, Inc. "It combines sound design with features that are fully supported by our market leading video calling VoIP application servers and frequently requested by our growing base of joint customers."

Digium, the original creator and primary developer of Asterisk, the industry's first open source PBX, is currently offering technical demonstrations of video conferencing with the GXV-3000 and its upcoming version of Business Edition, the professional grade version of Asterisk.

"The launch of the GXV-3000 video phone underscores the reality that video and VoIP are here," said Mark Spencer, president of Digium and creator of Asterisk. "We see open source playing an integral role in making VoIP video conferencing an easy and cost-effective method of communicating face-to-face over distances."

"Pingtel's SIPxchange ECS is designed to handle enterprise real time communications and the new Grandstream GXV-3000 just worked out of the box", said Al Brisard, VP of Marketing of Pingtel, Inc. "Standards based SIP is the enabler of interoperability but the real value to the enterprise is ease of use, ease of deployment, and unprecedented choice of end points and capabilities."

"We are excited to provide H.264 communication ability between Grandstream GXV-3000 and CounterPath eyeBeam softphone users. Carriers and businesses now have access to the latest technologies and optimal performance when selecting video communication solutions," said Donovan Jones, Vice President, Sales and Marketing, CounterPath Solutions Inc.

The new GXV-3000 features an adjustable advanced VGA resolution camera sensor (with 1-touch ON/OFF switch for privacy control), a razor-thin 5"6-inch TFT color LCD with stunning picture quality (2-dimensionally rotatable to allow nearly all viewing angles), 5 navigation keys, 3 line indicators (each of which supports independent SIP account), visual voice/video message indicator, hands-free speakerphone with advanced acoustic echo cancellation, dual 10M/100M Ethernet ports (switch or router mode configurable), 2 USB ports, 2.5mm headset jack, and RCA style audio/video output jack to allow simultaneous video output to TV.

In addition, it also supports video call Hold/Transfer/Forward, 3-way conference, audio mute and camera block, video phone book, mirror camera, picture-in-picture, 4xzoom (2xoptical plus 2xdigital), on-screen-display, auto focus and auto exposure, anti-flickering, video capture & save, configurable screen-saver pictures, downloadable music ring tones, and intuitive graphic user interface.

Grandstream is in the process of completing its' interoperability & compatibility tests with other major soft switch vendors. Notification of completion will be given on the appropriate vendors web sites or through their Partner Programs.

The Philips VP5500 WiFi VoIP phone was announced way back in September 2005 and it was finally launched today in the Netherlands of all places. No offense Netherlands, but how come you get first dibs on this cool phone? Anyway, the sleekly styled VP-5500 is powered by Linux and lets users enjoy live video calls using its built-in VGA camera (640x480 resolution) that rotates up to 240 degrees and supports 30 FPS. Video calls are displayed on a 2.2" color LCD supporting 64k colors. The VP5500 features a video out port that lets others watch the video on a TV. Though hooking up a video wire kind defeats the purpose of using a wireless videophone, don't ya think?

You can also zoom in on captured still images stored on the phone's internal 1MB memory. It also features a built-in speakerphone and hands-free headset compatibility.

As previously mentioned, the Philips VP-5500 VoIP Videophone runs on Linux, so they've built this phone around "standards", such as Wi-Fi, WPA, and most importantly the SIP protocol standard. The VP5500 can be upgraded wirelessly and will support applications developed by service providers. No date has been set for a release outside of Holland, however Philips is looking to partner with third party operators.

Is used to be that Japanese companies only made alliances with each other -- while at the same time fighting tooth and nail for competitive advantage.  But now we have a Japanese company -- Sony, no less -- that has gone outside of "the family" with its alliance with South Korea's Samsung over flat-panel display technology.  (It's also funny how Samsung has passed Sony as a favored consumer brand -- something unheard of just a few short years ago.)

Seems both companies are looking at the bright side of this alliance -- better technology for Sony, better marketing and branding for Samsung.

Ultimately who will be the winner?  Maybe both companies, but ultimately us consumers who will enjoy the fruits of their joint labors, some of which is on display the CES in Las Vegas this week.

Slingbox plans on adding a software client to complement their popular Slingbox streaming video content hardware device. According to IP Democracy:

Place-shifting pioneer SlingBox is slated to announce
at CES this week a new software client that allows any Windows Media-capable device to serve as a viewing platform for a customers' multichannel video or PVR service. This is a phenomenal development given that SlingBox is cutting across the top-line business priorities of motion picture studios, TV program producers, cable operators, wireless phone providers and even Apple Computer, which hopes to build a business on mobile video.

IP Democracy hits the nail on the head when it states, "So far, not a peep from the litigious studios, or even a threatened lawsuit from cable or satellite operators. I suspect that it's difficult to come up with a legal rationale against what Sling is doing -- this is not unauthorized copying or transmission of content. It's merely controlling the set-top box from a distance; in some cases thousands of miles. Secondly, Sling hasn't caught on yet and so doesn't pose a tangible threat to the media power structure."

Even though this is "personal & fair use" time-shifting of your own recorded TV content transmitting the video content over IP to your remote laptop/PC instead of directly to your TV, I'm sure the Hollywood lawyers will come up with some loophole to try and block this "fair use" technology. Heck, they're trying to block the "analog" copying loophole. Yep, that's right, not only does the government want to protect digital content from being recorded (perfect copies) but now it doesn't even want you recording analog copies (lossy video) either. Streaming from a Slingbox to your mobile device / phone would be cool.

Of course, what Slingbox is doing is nothing new - Orb Networks has been offering streaming video/live TV/recorded TV and music to any Web-enabled device for "free" for quite some time now. I've used it on my Windows Media Center 2005 PC before and it works quite well.

I don't know about you, but when I'm watching a DVD or playing a video game I want full surround sound with the bass cranked way up so I can "feel" the explosions of a frag grenade or feel the footsteps of the T-Rex as he stomps closer. There's only one problem with enjoying lots of bass and high volume - the people around you; husband, wife, neighbors, etc. might not want to hear it or feel the bass reverberating through the floors, especially late at night which is "prime-time" video gaming time! Sound was meant to be felt, especially when immersed in a video game. So what's an bass addict to do?

Well, no worries, just put on the Audio FX Force Feedback Headphones ($49.95) which will let you "feel" every explosion and every impact due to its unique force feedback characteristics - all without disturbing the neighbors or waking up the kids or "significant other". Massive force feedback from powerful bass vibrations let you literally feel the gaming action. The Audio FX's bass amplifier interprets frequencies below 20Hz (human ear cannot hear, but can feel these frequencies) and transforms them into vibrations that you can feel through the headphone earpiece. Although these headphones are designed for gaming, you can certainly use them for VoIP applications such as Skype or Google's Gtalk.

The headset features a circumaural earphone design, an adjustable noise-cancelling microphone, and an inline controller for adjusting both the volume and vibration. In addition, There are also multicolored LED level meters on the outside of the ear cups that are synchronized to the sounds coming through the headphones. The headset uses the USB port to power the lights and vibrations, but interestingly enough it also connects to the sound card's analog ports for the microphone and headphones. I'm surprised they didn't run both the audio and power for the vibration over the same USB connector, but perhaps there isn't enough USB power one one port to do both and have effective vibration force feedback.

The headset is a bit bulkier than usual but this is necessary to to accommodate the force feedback capabilities. If you have ever pondered whether to play a video game at 10pm and thought to yourself, "It's not the same without being able to crank up the sound and feel the explosions" then you need to pick up a pair of AudioFX Force Feedback headphones - you won't be disappointed.

Much buzz yesterday afternoon about Pioneer’s announcement to unveil a Blu-ray Disc drive at the International Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas in early January. According to the announcement, the first Blu-ray Disc format optical disc drive for personal computers will go on sale in Japan at the end of January -- pending licensing issues.

This is the first announcement of a shipping date from any optical disc drive maker. Blu-ray, also known as Blu-ray Disc (BD), is the name of a next-generation optical disc format jointly developed by the Blu-ray Disc Association (BDA), a group of the world's leading consumer electronics, personal computer and media manufacturers. This group includes Apple, Dell, Hitachi, HP, JVC, LG, Mitsubishi, Panasonic, Pioneer, Philips, Samsung, Sharp, Sony, TDK and Thomson.

While current optical disc technologies such as DVD, DVD±R, DVD±RW, and DVD-RAM use a red laser to read and write data, the new format uses a blue-violet laser instead, hence the name Blu-ray.

The format was developed to enable recording, rewriting and playback of High-Definition video (HD), as well as storing large amounts of data. A single-layer Blu-ray Disc can hold 25GB, which can be used to record more than two hours of  or more than 13 hours of standard-definition TV. There are also dual-layer versions of the discs that can hold 50GB.

Despite the different type of lasers used, Blu-ray products can easily be made backwards compatible through the use of a BD/DVD/CD compatible optical pickup that would allow playback of CDs and DVDs. The benefit of using a blue-violet laser (405nm) is that it has a shorter wavelength than a red laser (650nm), which makes it possible to focus the laser spot with even greater precision. This allows data to be packed more tightly and stored in less space, so it's possible to fit more data on the disc even though it's the same size as a CD/DVD.

Initial plans by Pioneer call for it to initially offer the drive directly to Japanese PC makers for their desktop computers, with sales later expanding to other countries. This translates into PCs with Blu-ray Disc support appearing on the market in the first half of next year.

Wrote about Muvee when they made their debut at DigitalLife 2005.  Just received clever promo from them -- "Video Editing Is Dead" (www.muvee.com/dead).

Let me know what you think ...