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INFOCOMM 2005: (YAWN…) NOTHING OUT OF THE ORDINARY |
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Coming hard on the heels of the NAB and SID trade shows, this year’s edition of InfoComm was long on applications and “ me too” technologies, but short on new products and “buzz”. Need proof? All you had to do was visit the look-alike companies in the Streaming Media and Residential Installation booths, or count all of the look-alike LCD monitors and digital signage content delivery systems, or spin the wheel for a chance to win a Ford Mustang in the NEC booth, or visit the private showrooms full of sub-$2K, 2000-lumen XGA LCD and DLP projectors. According to ICIA, pre-registered attendance for the Las Vegas Convention Center event was over 25,000, up significantly from last year. But the show never seemed all that crowded – just busy as usual. And while it was true there were more booths than last year, many of the long-time exhibitor’s booths were noticeably smaller. That’s because many of those long-time exhibitors are taking on more of an OEM business structure, choosing to buy from other manufacturers while aggressively pushing their own brand on a wide range of projectors, plasma and LCD monitors, and rear projection displays. And where they once touted their technology, now they are playing up channel strategies and street prices. Attendance at seminars and workshops was definitely up this year, and running the T3, EduComm, and Projection Summit conferences concurrently helped bring more faces to the show. The Super Tuesday seminars were particularly well attended, as were the numerous display technologies seminars. My own seminars drew in excess of 100 attendees, and even my RF Workshop filled to capacity quickly.
Figure 1. Sure, anything can happen
in Vegas.
While there were many products to see at InfoComm, few of them warranted a double take or closer look. Is that a sign that the market has matured for many display and interface products? Perhaps so, when the biggest news that came out of Extron’s booth was their entry into the speaker (that’s right, speaker!) business. The plethora of cheap 1024x768 front LCD and DLP projectors is clearly aimed at the education market, which frankly has no excuse anymore for continuing to purchase SVGA (800x600) projectors to save money. Several models I saw from Toshiba, BenQ, NEC, Optoma, Epson, Sharp, Dell, and Mitsubishi will be tagged in the $1299 to $1399 range (list) and with aggressive discounting should come closer to a thousand bucks. Just how hot is this market segment becoming? After a l-o-n-g walk across the LVCC parking lot to the Renaissance Hotel, Dell rewarded me with a private demo of some neat new projectors including their first super lightweight DLP projector, the 3400MP. It weighs in at 2.4 pounds, has XGA resolution, and is targeted at a list price under $1400.
Figure 2. projectiondesign’s
10K DLP demo was way over the top,
But that was a market price shift anyone could see coming. What I didn’t expect was the number of SXGA+ (1400x1050) projectors that made an appearance at the show. In this regard, projectiondesign easily outclassed all other manufacturers as virtually every projector they showed had SXGA+ resolution. The compact F1+ (under 8 pounds) and installation-grade F3 attracted quite a crowd, not to mention their 10K single-chip demo. Hitachi has also taken the SXGA+ plunge and unveiled the CP-X1350, a 3500 lumens installation LCD projector that builds on their popular 1250 chassis. Canon had the Realis SX50 out for inspection, and this SXGA+ LCoS projector continues to be the market price leader for now (although at least one non-disclosure demo projector I saw at the show will provide stiff competition in the near future). In the oddities and eclectic designs category, Optoma had their MovieTime all-in-one DLP projector/DVD player/amplifier on prominent display. This SVGA (848x480) product had its debut at CES and is supposed to be a cinch for the casual movie viewer to set up and operate. (Radio Shack also sells a version known as CineGo.)
Figure 3. Optoma’s MovieTime projector looks like something from War of the Worlds.
Figure 4. BenQ’s PB6240 turned more than a few heads with its price.
Optoma also had a poster in their booth extolling the air purifying capabilities of their H27 compact projector. (Apparently the projector cooling system uses ionized air and removes particulate matter from nearby spaces.) While BenQ’s projector demos made no such claim, their six-pound PB6240 is claimed to be the brightest DLP projector under $2,000. It has XGA resolution and is spec’ed at 2700 ANSI lumens. To put that last number in perspective, a 2500-lumen projector with XGA resolution would have tipped the scales at just under 10 pounds and set you back over $3,000 two years ago, and a 3000-lumen model would have cost over $4,000. Now, projectors are priced well under a dollar per lumen – more like 75 cents per lumen, to be exact! In the world of digital signage, there are more network-ready products than ever. Samsung announced the SyncMaster 460PN, a 46-inch LCD monitor with built-in IP connectivity. It’s joined by the SyncMaster 400 PN, a 40-inch version. There are also upgraded non-network versions of both monitors. To make sure attendees were awake, Samsung brought along their 82-inch LCD and 102-inch plasma monitor demos.
Figure 5. How serious is Samsung
about networked digital signage?
Figure 6. LG’s 55-inch LCD
monitor was a beauty.
Across the way, LG showed a few flat panels, too. The L5500C is a 55-inch, general-purpose LCD monitor with 1920x1080 resolution that makes some beautiful pictures. There’s also a 42-inch product, the L4200A. In another part of the booth, LG had its MW-71PY10 71-inch 1080p plasma monitor under the spotlight, although it doesn’t appear to be shipping yet. Sharp is the 3rd member of the “Big 3” in LCD and pulled the wraps off its PN-455, a 45-inch 1920x1080 LCD monitor for a wide range of applications. Right now, this is the smallest size LCD glass available with full 1080p imaging. In the booth, it was upstaged by the 65-inch Aquos LCD TV, a product previously seen at CES and currently the largest production LCD TV available. 65 inches must be a popular screen size in Japan, for that’s the measurement of Panasonic’s TH-65PHD7UY plasma monitor. It’s now available with the TY-TP65P7S touch screen sensor system, which works with a special pen or your finger. Panasonic has also upgraded its industrial plasma monitor line with two new 42-inch models, the 42” TH-42PWD8UK and 37” TH-37PWD8UK. While there wasn’t too much news from the interfacing crowd of significance, a few products stood out. Kramer Electronics’ VS-30 FW is a three-port DV/FireWire repeater/hub that supports an 800Mbps data rate, while the FC-20 is a bi-directional SDI/FireWire converter with embedded AES/EBU audio conforming to SMPTE-272M-A. Last but not least, Kramer’s VS-66FW is a 6-port FireWire Switcher/Matrix.
Figure 7. Analog Way’s Di-Ventix
seamless switch and
Analog Way continues to upgrade their line of seamless switching products. The latest entry is the Di-Ventix DVX8022, an 8-input. 2-output box with dual soft edge switching, main, preview, and PiP windows. There’s an all-new remote control console to go with it called Axion (ARC100) that includes a 6.4” LCD monitor and joystick for setting up windows and layers. Barco Folsom had a couple of interesting black boxes in their booth. The LED-PRO, first shown at NAB, is specifically designed to seamlessly switch and mix video and RGB sources for tiled LED walls and offers 64 preset memories. Next to it, I found the MatrixPRO Digital, an all-digital high-bandwidth matrix switcher available in 8x8 and 16x16 configurations. One of the 16x16 models is specifically designed for HD-SDI (SMPTE 292M) signals. The PR battle between Texas Instruments and the 3LCD group continued at InfoComm, with the 3LCD camp putting up an attractive display that showed off Fujitsu’s DW711 home theater LCD projector (1920x1080) and Hitachi’s new CP-X1350. Momentum seems to be building for LCD technology with the new .9” 1080p panels coming from Epson’s factory, particularly in the home theater space.
Figure 8. LG’s AN110 wall-mount
DLP projector vaguely resembles a
Down the opposite end of the same row, the TI booth showcased such unique DLP inventions as LG’s ‘hang on the wall’ AN110 home theater projector, the Optoma and Radio Shack all-in-one projector/DVD player combos, and Mitsubishi’s super-tiny LED projector which would be a big hit in upscale toy stores. TI and Mitsubishi also showed a new color wheel arrangement that adds yellow and white segments to the red, green, and blue segments for ‘brilliant’ color (and it worked too!). While it wasn’t one of the more exciting InfoComm shows, attendees could clearly see that all of the exhibited technology was “mainstream” and ready to be used in a wide variety of applications across almost every market. Those in the education market should be particularly happy as prices continue to plummet for the latest and greatest displays and interfaces, particularly models with LAN interfaces. |
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