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Not to be outdone Panasonic has jumped on the 3D bandwagon claiming the 3D TV is just round the corner. Speaking at CES 2009 the Company’s CEO has said that there is a need new national standards for the delivery of 3D content to TVs. He also announced a portable Blu-ray player and new compact camcorders.
Chief executive and Chairman Yoshi Yamada said “We are at the start of another phase change that will have an impact on Panasonic’s business.”
Central to that plan will be the development of a standard for both consumer and broadcast devices to encode and decode the picture. The company said that it had been working with both studios and standards groups to develop the proposed format.
“3D in the home will never flower unless we have a national standard,” said Bob Perry, executive vice president of Panasonic consumer electronics. “But we’re very excited because we believe 3D changes the world from watching TV to an immersive experience.”
The company said that they would propose a standard for the system at Cebit in Japan later this year.
In the Blu ray market Panasonic is taking a punt on a netbook type device to facilitate the viewing of Blu ray movies on a portable device. The screen resolution is more notebook than HD TV at 1024 x 600 resolution.
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The DMP-15 features all the same technologies and processing chips that are found in Panasonic’s larger players. These include Viera Cast, Panasonic’s new networked content platform, and its much lauded PHL Reference Chroma Processor Plus.
The new device can also be connected to a home theatre system, AV receiver or directly to a TV.
Users can also view photos and videos via an SD Card slot.
Panasonic like several other TV vendors has said that they are slashing power use in their screens by up to 33% and that their new neoPDP and neoLCD technologies will dramatically increase the efficiency of each of their respective screen formats. For plasma displays, the picture will require a third of the power used by Panasonic’s 2007 models.
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Panasonic’s screens will not only be more efficient, they will be thinner. The new Z1 model will be just one inch thick and will wirelessly stream all connections from a separate set-top box.
Finally the Company announced two new camcorders including The SDR-SW21 which is a small, rugged camcorder along the lines of Kodak’s just-announced, rugged Zx1. Panasonic says its camcorder is waterproof up to 6.5 feet and drop-proof up to 4 feet.
The compact camcorder records to SD/SDHC cards and will be available in silver, orange, and an as-yet-unseen-in-a-camcorder lime green. With a retail price of $400, it’s a bit pricier than other standard-definition pocket camcorders such as the Flip Mino. The SDR-SW21 is slated for availability in April.
