Sony has launched a range of home cinema systems in time for the holidays, so if you've got a bit of money to spare and want an all-in-one package, these are worth considering.

First up is the HTP-BD3iS, which combines Sony's BDP-S350 Blu-ray player and HT-IS100 5.1-channel surround sound system that features subwoofer, powerful S-Master digital amplification, surround sound processing, and automatic audio calibration.

Okay, I'll have to admit I asked for this a bit. In my last post about Denon Blu-ray players I demanded to know what Denon would describe as 'high-end', after their 'entry-level' player cost £600.

Well, this is it. It's the catchily-named DVD-A1UD, and it'll play back Blu-ray discs, Super Audio CD (SACD), DVD-Audio, DVD-Video and plain old CDs. The DVD-A1UD is the replacement for the Denon's previous universal DVD player - the DVD-A1XV. Full specs are over the jump.

It costs a massive £3,300. I can safely say that I don't know anyone who'd splash out £3,300 on a DVD player, but someone must, or they wouldn't make the damn thing. It's going to show up across Europe in March 2009, in either a silver or black finish. Who knows, perhaps by then you'll be rolling around in pots of money. Denon can only hope.

If you really, really must have a PlayStation3 right now, you might want to buy yourself one via Sony's online shop SonyStyle.co.uk - as it's currently offering a £40 discount on its cheapest model.

The deal takes the RRP of the Blu-ray-playing "entry level" 40GB machine down to an almost reasonable £249 including free delivery, with a nearly tempting top-of-the-range 80GB PlayStation3 and a copy of LittleBigPlanet going for £279 - although that bundle's not in stock just yet.

The cheapest we can find PS3 elsewhere online is a pretty decent £259 via Play.com, so you could save yourself a tenner by going direct. Or you could save yourself £150 by waiting about three years until it's £99 and might actually have a few games on it worth playing.

(Via Spong)

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Sharp has added another size to its range of D65 high definition LCD TVs. The 46 inch version, the largest yet released, features a full 1080p panel, 20,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, 450cd/m² brightness, and a reasonable 6ms response time.

Three HDMI inputs will enable you to connect up all your high-def gear, and there's a built-in Freeview digital tuner plus two SCART ports for connecting other equipment and a USB slot for memory sticks or cameras.

Featuring two 10W speakers, the set shouldn't embarrass itself if you don't plan on hooking it up to an audio system. Sound features include automatic volume control and clear voice technology.

One in five Americans can't tell the difference between high definition and standard definition TV according to a recent piece of research.

In fact, that's probably a little misleading. More people probably would be able to tell the difference if they were shown a standard definition broadcast and a high definition broadcast (or, better yet, a Blu-ray film) side-by-side. What's actually happening is that viewers aren't sure when they're watching normal TV and when they're viewing higher resolution TV.

There are likely many reasons for this problem.

Here's an amusing little faux pas to add to the 2.4MB, 124-page-long document I carry around with me at all times on a memory stick documenting all of Sony's errors regarding PS3.

At a recent employee meet, the bungling company apparently told its staff that PS3 would start to be "more competitive in price" from March of 2009, telling everyone the expensive Blu-ray console will be a little more affordable next Easter - and damaging sales from now until then, we'd imagine, as credit-crunched gamers beneath the fuel poverty line hold out for a price cut...

Onkyo, which made its high definition disc player debut on the HD DVD side last year, has finally launched its own Blu-ray player.

Focusing far more on video and audio quality than on the newer interactive features of Blu-ray, this Profile 1.1-compliant player offers full 1080p playback including 24fps "film mode", Deep Colour via HDMI, Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio formats including direct bitstream output via HDMI or 7.1-channel audio output, and superb audio quality thanks to a 192kHz/24-bit DAC from Burr-Brown.

If this is 'entry-level', then I'm mildly terrified to see what Denon would describe as 'high-end'. Oh wait. Now I'm scared. Anyway, back to the DVD-1800-BD. It's a Blu-Ray player. It's got HDMI 1.3a, full bit stream output of Dolby and DTS-HD audio, and 1080p upscaling of DVDs and 2-channel audio. It's also got a stereo output, if you want to use it as a very expensive CD player.

There's an SD card slot, too, and it incorporates a secondary audio and video decoder for picture-in-picture functionality, if you can handle watching two things at once. It's going to be available at the start of December, and cost a whopping 'entry-level' £600. It'll be available in Black and Silver.

Denon

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Ladies and gentlemen! Roll up! Roll up! The gadget freak show is in town! Here, behind a wall of steel for your safely, is the Silicon Mountain Allio - a 32" or 42" HDTV that also squeezes a Core 2 Duo PC and Blu-ray player into its case.

It even manages PVR-like recording features thanks to its PC bit's hard drive. Plus you can split the screen if your brain's capable of multitasking and you want to watch TV, browse the internet and play video games simultaneously because you're THAT CONNECTED. Here's a look at the beast...

Careful, she's hungry! The 42" model does the full 1080p spec, with the 32" version maxing out at 720p. The Allio is available in America right now, with the 32" one going for $1599 and the 42-incher costing from $1999. Bigger hard drives for the PC part and larger chunks of RAM up the price, which is a thrillingly novel fact to take into account when buying a telly.

(Via VisionMan)

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Pioneer's all-in-one Blu-ray and surround sound option for the common man has launched in Europe, with shoppers able to experience its "3D" sound charms from today. Here's what all the bits look like when photographed under laboratory conditions and without any messy cables in shot.

As well as a Profile 1.1 Blu-ray player, the LX01BD comes with "compact dodecahedron technology derived satellite speakers that generate sound fields in all directions," with that sound being sprayed toward any ears in range by an integrated 5.1 channel amplifier capable of managing both DTS-HD and Dolby TrueHD soundtracks.

It also comes with a lovely LCD touch screen remote control, a separate picture of which we've uploaded here for all you remote control fans out there.

(Via Pioneer)

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Pure White and Beige Grisé are the exciting names of two new colours Pioneer has invented to jazz up its KURO range of HD Ready plasmas a little. Pioneer's home business product manager Jim Catcheside offered us the following explanation about why white and beige TVs are best...

"With these Limited Edition KURO TVs we want to offer our customers the opportunity to customise their viewing environment even further by harmonising their TV with their interior design. The minimalist White and luxurious Beige Grisé KUROs are an excellent means to express one's individual taste and style."

The KRP-500AW and KRP-500ABG both use Pioneer's media receiver technology to "outsource" cables and connectors to a separate unit, which then connects to the KURO through a single cable - making the display a mere 64mm thick.

If you thought standard Blu-ray players were still a bit pricey, wait 'til you see Denon's DVD-3800BD, which comes in at a cool £1,600.

For that, you do get some superior technology, including reference-standard Blu-ray disc playback offering Denon's best pictures to date, with fantastic audio reproduction to match.

Denon is the first manufacturer to use the 10-bit Silicon Optix Realta chipset, as well as HQV video processing, digital noise reduction, and 12-bit/297MHz video DAC.

Sony has announced that its VAIO TT Blu-ray notebook, which it claims is the lightest portable PC containing a high-def optical drive, is now available in the UK.

It sports a modest 11.1-inch widescreen LED-backlit display offering 1,366 x 768 resolution, Intel Core 2 Duo SU9300 processor, Mobile Intel Graphics Media Accelerator 4500MHD, 4GB of RAM, 160GB hard drive, plus WWAN technology offering 7.2Mbps HSDPA and 2Mbps HSUPA where service is available.

A DVD superdrive comes as standard with the laptop, with the option to add Blu-ray. A 128GB solid state drive can also be fitted instead of the hard drive. Prices start at £1,399, with availability from mid-November.

Sharp will launch a range of high definition LCD TVs with integrated Blu-ray recorders in the Japanese market next month, claiming a world first.

While it's not uncommon to see flat panel TVs with built in DVD and Blu-ray players, this is the first time a Blu-ray recorder has been added to a production TV.

The AQUOS DX range will come in a range of screen sizes from 26- right up to 52-inch, all full 1080p high definition, and ranging in price from around £1,100 to £2,900 (at current Yen to UK pound exchange rate). Though the integrated drive will allow playback of Blu-ray, and recording TV programmes directly to disc, there won't be a built-in hard drive -- so no DVR functionality.

To this end, Sanyo is promising to boost the capacity of Blu-ray discs to 100GB and maximise write-speed of burners to around 12x.

It's all thanks to clever and more powerful new blue laser diode technology, which allows up to four data layers - each packing in 25GB of deleted scenes and staggeringly dull interviews with the leading man - to be stuck into a single Blu-ray disc at TWELVE TIMES writing speed, twice the current 6x maximum.

Sanyo has only given a vague "2011" delivery date for this next-generation laser device, so it presumably just wants to get us excited and give the internet something to write about today. Although we're not particularly excited about there being another kind of blank Blu-ray disc. The last thing Blu-ray needs right now is some extra confusion about the already quite lost-at-sea HD format.

(Via SP)

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Sony has introduced its new range of Vaio hardware, with a focus on high definition and Blu-ray.

Vaio AW

Sony describes its Vaio AW as a "new class" of portable, because it boasts a range of advanced features including a 1,920 x 1,080 resolution 18.4-inch widescreen using 3LED backlighting similar to that found on Sony's high-end BRAVIA TVs, integrated Blu-ray drive, Dolby Home Theatre audio signal processing and 2.1-channel speakers with integrated subwoofer.

It features an Intel Core 2 Duo T9600 processor, NVIDIA GeForce 9600M GT, and 128GB solid state disk and 500GB hard drive working together in a RAID array. It also comes with Adobe's Photoshop Lightroom, which should appeal to photographers and artists using the Vaio AW for image processing.

Hitachi has announced its new DZ-BD10HA high definition camcorder, able to record directly to Blu-ray disc, internal 30GB hard drive, or SDHC.

It features a seven megapixel CMOS image sensor offering full 1080p high definition recording, a dubbing feature which allows footage to be transferred directly from the hard drive or memory card to the Blu-ray disc, face detection, and image stabilisation.

The unit has launched in Japan, and will arrive in the US during September, priced at $999 (£500). UK availability and pricing to be confirmed.

(Via Trading Markets)

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Only last month we were heralding Pioneer's development of a 400GB optical disc, and just a month later its researchers have popped on another four layers and 100GB of storage to create a half terabyte disc.

In actual fact, to be fair, Pioneer has simply confirmed the "viability" of such a disc, which may or may not exist in a laboratory somewhere. The company believes that the technology, based on the same techniques used to make current 25GB and 50GB Blu-ray discs, is easier and cheaper to produce than holographic discs.

After a long wait from Sony's first announcement, its two latest Blu-ray players are finally available to buy in the UK.

We're probably all well aware of the specifications by now, but as a quick run down, the slim BDP-S350 offers 24p True Cinema mode, HD upscaling of standard definition content to 1080p, and is BD LIve ready, meaning that in October the latest enabling firmware will be available. Its quick start up mode means you can be watching a disc in just six seconds from powering on the machine. Wow.

Xbox isn't the only device buddying up with the US's largest DVD rental / online movie streaming service; in autumn, the LG BD300 Network Blu-ray Disc Player will hit US shelves bringing Netflix streaming to Blu-ray players for the first time.

Netflix account users will still need to add movies and TV shows to their list from a web browser as with other Netflix streaming boxes, but once they're queued up, you'll be able to access your selection instantly from the player. Playback should begin within thirty seconds. With the LG BD300, the Roku box and the Xbox 360, Netflix is setting some pretty high benchmarks for other rental services to live up to.

The player itself offers all the usual niceties of Blu-ray playing, including DVD upscaling to 1080p, and will cost something "well under $500". So then, Microsoft has Netflix streaming, Blu-ray players have video streaming... over to you PlayStation 3.

(via Gizmodo)

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