The Future of Sound and Vision

We are now on the horizon of a coming new sound and vision era….and its the era of high resolution, high contrast, high definition imagery which will change the face of home entertainment for ever.

We are now taking a step into the unknown.

The dawn of High Definition is upon us……

Over the past few years we have seen the word popping up here there and everywhere. The days of 720p are now over and we are well and truly in the realm of Full HD 1080p and True Cinema 24p.

From Digital Cameras to Camcorders and from LCD TV to Plasmas to HD Projectors, it seems the home enterainment industry has gone well and truly High Definition crazy.

Most of the latest Digital Cameras now have the ability to record video footage in Full 1080p HD. And the Camcorders available at present will truly astound you with there crystal clear pictures and stunning contrast. You can well and truly be your very own Steven Speilberg these days.

So whats next? Well, firstly we have the new technology in TV. We now have LCD and Plasma TV, but there is a new technology called OLED. Available from April 2009 the OLED TV will revolutionise the TV as we know it. Current LCD and Plasma TVs have to have backlights to illuminate the screen. This restricts the depth of the TV and although TVs are now nice and slim, OLED will take this to a whole new level. OLED is a self-illuminating material, meaning that OLED TV will be as thin as 6.5 mm!!!! Absolutely incredible.

Then we will also shortly see the dawn of 3D TV in the home. Boffins in Korea have found a way to make a 3D picture without the need to where them stupid spectacles reministent of JAWS 3D in the 80s. There is so much more to come.

So the High Definition world is in its infancy. Get yourself prepared for a world of digital imagery you can only imagine. A world where a directors imagination will become almost reality in the comfort of your own living room….Here at Elite Gadgets we feel like a kid before Christmas……

The future is Bright…the future is HD

HD Projectors – Have The Days Of Closing The Curtains During The Day Finally Gone?

We are entering a new era in sound and vision, the “High Definition era”. Everything these days is HD, 1080p, 1080i, High Contrast….etc, etc. But what does it all mean? And what does this mean for the future of the age old projector?

If you look back in history the Projector was here first, before the TV, the Games consoles, the HD this and that…it was first. It was how man first learnt to project moving images onto a viewing platform. And it is still here today. Albeit in it new improved, all singing and dancing versions.

So you’re ready to move into the HD era; you’ve got your Playstation 3, your Xbox 360 and/or your Blu-Ray player. You plug it into your TV, and “voila!”… or maybe not. The picture is fuzzy, unclear, or not what you had been expecting. Why? Because the TV set you are using is not HD Ready. What does this mean? Well, it’s a bit like putting a Ferrari engine in a Ford Fiesta. The Playstation 3 is producing a powerful flow of information (images and moving picture) and passing them down the cable to your TV set. But your TV set doesn’t have the capability to handle this amount of information. So it discards 90% of it and does it’s best to produce a half decent image. This is why you need a HD Ready TV, or even better a HD Ready projector to produce a High Definition image in its full glory.

Gone are the days of closing all the curtains to be able to wince at a feint image on the living room wall. These days, HD projectors have power, clarity and precision. They are capable of producing images which are equivalent, if not better than the best HD Ready TV. The projected image is clearly viewable on any white surface. No need for closing the curtains or dimming the lights!

So your ready to take the HD plunge, you have cash in hand, and your ready to buy your HD projector…..hmm…which one?!! There are so many choices!!

Ok, we are going to try and make it as straightforward as possible.

The first and most important factor is the native projector resolution. The most common resolutions are 480p (WVGA), 720p (WXGA) and the latest 1080p (UWXGA). The “W” means widescreen. Basically the higher the resolution, the sharper and clearer the picture is. Also a higher resolution ensures future compatibility with the latest products, such as the Playstation 3 or HD TV broadcasts. This is an important issue when making such a large purchase.

It is recommended to purchase a HD projector with at least a 720p resolution or if you can afford it a full HD 1080p projector as this will last for years into the future. Having said this, if you only intend to watch a DVD player on the projector, then a 480p projector is perfectly adequate and is much cheaper!

The next thing to consider is Contrast Ratio. This is the difference between the White and Black parts of the images. So, if you have a contrast ratio of 20000:1 - then the black is 20000 times darker than the white part of the image. Again, this will make the image clearer and more life like. The best way to explain this is this….imagine you sit down to watch the latest All Blacks Game, but the All Blacks Kit is actually a slight grey rather than a sheer black. This would mean the TV or projector has a low contrast ratio, the black is not completely black, you get the idea?

Another very important factor is the life of the lamp. Typically the lamp life will be between 2000 and 4000 hours. And Lamps are expensive, around £100-£250 depending on the model of the projector. The stated lamp life is actually its half-life not its full life to the point of failure. The lamp is tested to the point where it starts to lose brightness (usually half way through its life) and this is stated on the specifications as the lamp life. Also, you can prolong the life of the lamp by good usage. Powering down the projector, rather than just removing the power, and cleaning the filters regularly all help in prolonging lamp life.

Another thing that most people don’t consider is screen size.

How much size do you have available? Bigger is not always better. There is nothing worse than proudly setting up your HD projector and then realizing that the picture engulfs the whole room! Check the screen size you have available and the throw distance (how far you have from the front of the projector to the wall) and you can then decide which projector is best for you.

Also, you will get the best from your investment with a projector screen. They are specifically made for the job and with return a clearly sharper and all round better picture than any wall will no matter how flat or white the wall may be. There are a full range of electric retractable screens available today, which, with one click of the remote, you can look like James Bond in the comfort of your own home!!

We hope that we have gone some way to explaining the complexities of the High Definition revolution. Prepare yourself. It’s going to be an enjoyable ride.

Canon HF100 Camcorder – Canon’s first attempt at a Flash-based Camcorder

Today at Elite Gadgets we unwrapped the Canon HF100 Camcorder with a little hesitance. The first flash-based camcorder from Canon. Now, this isn’t a new technology but it is Canon’s first stab at a flash memory camcorder. And from what we have seen, they have hit the nail on the head.

Unlike it partner, the HF10, it doesn’t have any built-in memory, all footage is recorded straight to a removable SD Card.

Apart from this and the colour (the HF10 is Black and the HF100 is silver) it is exactly the same camcorder.

It is tiny for a horizontal based camcorder, weighing in at a measly 380g and measuring 73mm x 63mm x 129mm in size. Being a flash memory based camcorder cuts down drastically on size as it doesn’t have to house an internal hard drive or tape mechanism.

It packed with features. Camcorder enthusiasts will value the 25p cinema shooting mode, a microphone input and a headphone input. It also utilizes a very nice 1/3.2inch, 3.3 mega pixel image sensor to provide full HD 1920 x 1080 resolution images. These images are recorded directly to the memory card thanks to the new AVCHD compression system. We hooked this up to our Samsung Full HD 1080p LCD and the footage was quite simply breathtaking.

As with all HD camcorders we wanted to know how big a memory card we would need. Well, we managed to fit 2hours of HD footage on a 16GB memory card, so it’s not too bad at all. But is you are desperate for space it has three lesser quality record setting to get the most from your storage space albeit with a compromise on picture quality.

All in all, we were not disappointed with the HF100 in fact we were very impressed. It is as good as you can get in the camcorder market at the moment. The HD footage is superb when viewed on a Full HD TV, or even on a CRT monitor via the AV Connectors. The 2–channel Dolby Digital sound is brilliant, its looks and feels just great.

This new boy from Canon gets the thumbs up from Elite Gadgets!!!

The Panasonic HDC-SD9 – Possibly the best camcorder on the market?

There’ a new guy in town, it’s the HDC-SD9 from Panasonic. Very similar to its younger brother the HDC-SD5, the all new HDC-SD9 has got everyone here at elite gadgets very excited.

Although the HDC-SD9 has the similar basic specification to the HDC-SD5, Panasonic have come up with some groovy new features to keep all camcorders aficionados keen.

Sporting Panasonic’s Trademark 3 CCD’s which in the case of the HDC-SD9 are in 1/6 units with 560,000 per unit. These have a fantastic effect on colour fidelity. Panasonic have also partnered with Leica to provide the Leica Dicomar lens. The HDC-SD9 also has a full image optical stabilization system rather than an electronic one which you would usually find in a camcorder of this size.

The new HDC-SD9 records in the AVCHD Mpeg-4 H.264 AVC format, which is the same as its sibling the SD5, however, Panasonic have now included a new video processor so the HDC-SD9 can records in FULL HD, unlike the HDC-SD5 which provided a 1920x1080 image but in an interlaced signal. The SD9 is superior in technology advancement as it can shoot this same resolution but this time with a progressive signal. Furthermore it offers two compression schemes in this mode – 17Mbits/sec HA and 13Mbits/sec HG. The HA Mode boasts the highest bit rate of any AVCHD camcorder currently available.

The HDC-SD9 is firmly aimed at more novice camcorder enthusiasts by providing an intelligent shooting mode which provides handy tips to improve the quality of your footage. For example, if you move the camera to fast it will tell you….which we thought was a nifty little idea. It will also tell you if the low light mode has be enable when it does need to be.

However, it will also keep the veteran enthusiasts happy to with its myriad of functions and superb picture quality.

Another new function of the HDC-SD9 is Face Detection Technology. The HDC-SD9 can detect faces and will adjust exposure accordingly. This mode is available when shooting video as well as still shots.

There is also a fantastic Digital Cinema Colour recording mode which gives your footage very very vibrant colour intensity, however, you do need a Panasonic Enable TV to benefit from this.

Now lets hear about the Panasonic HDC- SD9 – or what does the SD9 hear?? It records in 5.1 surround sound which is very unusual for a camcorder of this size. How does it do this? It utilizes five separate microphones which are arranged in a way that it can calculate noises coming from in front of you and behind you. Also, quite amazingly, it has a Zoom Microphone Function, where the sound recording is focused to whatever is in your frame at that particular time. Wow!!! Dont you just love technology!!!

We’ve had this camcorder in the Elite Gadgets office for over a month now, and we are still astounded at what it can do! It’s a perfect camcorder for all occasions and will keep all camcorder nuts happy whether they are new to the hobby or seasoned professionals.

Review by
Craig@Elite