HDTV Almanac

If you don’t know about Redbox, you probably should. They have more than 17,500 kiosks that look like bright red soda vending machines, except they deliver DVDs instead of soft drinks. A rental costs $1 per night, and you can return it to any kiosk — not just the one where you rented it — which is great for travelers. Redbox partners with major retailers including Walmart, McDonald’s, and Walgreens, as well as many grocery store chains. You can even reserve a movie online at your local kiosk, so you’ll know it will be waiting for you when you get there.

When you sign up, you get a promo code good for one free night. You can also sign up for an email service from Redbox that will send you a code for a free night once a month.

With all these free codes flying around, you might think that someone would come up with a way to game the system. And you’d be right. Search the Web for “Redbox promo codes” and you’ll find sites that post codes for you to use. And now Neese Products has come up with an iPhone app that provides you with the latest promo codes.

My guess is that these services aren’t hurting Redbox by giving out the codes for free nights. I expect that it may get people to try Redbox who might not do so otherwise. And even with the $1 per night fee, it takes a lot of rentals to add up to a movie channel or mail-in DVD rental subscription. At just $1 a night, it is an appealing deal, especially since the kiosks are right where many people go on a regular basis. Maybe that’s why Redbox has already made more than half a billion rentals already.

Market researcher InStat has released the results of its survey on holiday shopper’s plans for consumer electronics purchases this year, and the interesting news is that high definition products take the first and fourth positions on the top five product category list:

• HDTVs
• Notebook PCs
• Digital cameras
• Blu-ray players
• Desktop PCs

One interesting point is that while HDTVs also topped the list last year, this year consumers apparently are less likely to purchase one. The company press release states what may seem obvious to many observers: “In-Stat believes the economy is continuing to take a toll on consumer spending.”

Early reports from Black Friday sales indicate that the models smaller than 40″ are selling briskly, but there is less interest in the larger sizes. That’s not too surprising, given the difference in price between a 32″ and a 42″ model. So while retailers may have smaller inventories than last year, you may reasonably expect to be able to find plenty of products to choose from if you’re shopping for something 40″ or larger. I don’t think you’ll save much by waiting, however, and you do run the risk of some models selling out. So if you are serious about getting a large flat panel TV this year, you’ll probably do best to shop for it in the next week or so.

I’m not here today. I’m skipping breakfast and working out and trying to make a personal commitment to refrain from second helpings this afternoon, in hopes that I can manage to keep the scales from finding a new all-time high on Friday morning.

However you plan to spend the day, I hope it provides you with many happy high-definition memories. And remember to rest up; Black Friday’s coming!

Thank you for your support of the HDTV Almanac. I enjoy writing it, but it is made even more rewarding by the reader feedback that I receive. If you get a chance, write me at alfred@hdtvprofessor.com and let me know what you like about the Almanac, and what I could do to make it even better for you.

All best wishes to you and yours,

Alfred

An article in Advertising Age reports that the latest Video Metrix results from comScore show that Hulu traffic jumped by 47% in October, mirroring a similar gain last year. The article attributes the gains to the advent of shows for the new fall season on the major networks: NBC, ABC, and Fox.

The reported figures show that Hulu delivered 856 million video streams to 42.5 million unique viewers. Average viewing time per viewer for October also jumped from 92 minutes in September (about two hour-long TV episodes) to 123 minutes in November (nearly three hour-long shows). According to the Advertising Age article, Hulu is also close to selling out all its available ad slots on its programs for this quarter. There is still question, however, about whether the service can survive based on minimal advertising per show, and whether it will be transformed into a subscription-based service instead.

These October numbers probably are good enough to keep Hulu in second place for online video, but Number One still is so far ahead that it’s nearly out of sight. Google’s YouTube served more than 10 billion videos in September with a 40.2% overall share compared with Hulu’s 2.2% share.

Rovi announced yesterday that it has a TV Guide widget for the Yahoo! Widget Engine platform that is now available on select Samsung HDTV models. The utility provides listiings of programs on 28 of the most popular networks. The widget shows what’s on now, as well as what’s on next. The selections are also listed by category, such as Sports or Movies.

This just one more clever use for NeTVs (televisions that are connected to the Internet). Instead of having to change to your subscription TV service’s program guide to see the channel listings, you can just pop up this widget. It should be quick and convenient.

The one problem I foresee with this is that it only helps you watch programs as they air. With more and more people watching programming that has been cached on a digital video recorder (DVR) or their cable company’s servers, this widget may lose some of its utility. If you look up a show that’s about to air, you’ll presumably have to go somewhere else if you want to set up your system to record it.

Eventually, we’ll have a unified interface where you can do everything: schedule recordings, watch programs you already recorded, watch live programming, and access streaming video services on the Internet. It won’t be easy and it won’t be this year, but we’ll get there eventually.

It’s a small problem, to be sure. A pair of penlight batteries in a typical TV remote control will last for years. But when you add up the millions of TVs (and DVD players and set top boxes and other devices that use remotes), that means an enormous number of batteries still end up in landfills. A French company, Arveni, has a diffferent vision for remote controls.

One of the hot technlogy topics these days is “energy harvesting“. In most cases, this means taking existing motion and converting it into electricity. Tiny generators in the heels of your shoes that can recharge your cell phone as you walk are one idea. Others are working on ways to put these tiny generators inside roads so that passing cars and trucks can generate electricity. In general, this is done using piezo electrical components. These clever devices can turn motion into electricity (or electricity into motion). It’s the technology behind the “clicker” that you may use to light your barbecue grill.

Arveni has developed a prototype remote control that lets you press a single button (like the clicker on your grill) and it will generate enough power to send 2 to 10 remote control commands before you need to press it again. The company hopes to create a next-generation version where every button on the remote will generate enough electricity to power the next button press.

Assuming that the components can be made inexpensively enough, there are all sorts of ways that energy harvested from keypresses could help power electrical components, from notebook computers to cell phones. They wouldn’t replace batteries, but could make a charge last longer. It’s a clever idea that could help make many devices more energy efficient.

Okay, if you want the coolest bargains on HDTVs, you probably will have to spend all your time just tracking the deals. In addition to the sales circulars and online specials posted at the retailers’ Web sites, you can also check out the various Black Friday sites or monitor the year-’round bargain aggregators such as AntiRebate.com. I could write about such deals every day from now until the new year and still not cover it all. So for the most part, I leave it to the other sites.

But sometimes I just can’t resist flagging a couple deals that catch my eye, like these two.

Walmart is selling a SanyoDP50749 plasma TV for $698. Yes, it’s only 720p resolution, but it’s a 50″ model. That’s the “ship-to-store” price; apparently the in-store prices may vary. (Maybe they could be even lower?) In any case, 15 of the 16 stores within 25 miles of me show it as being in stock, so it’s apparently not one of those “one to a store” deals.

That sounds pretty impressive, but how about this? An LG 50PQ30 50″ plasma HDTV. Yes, this one also is only 720p resolution, and it costs even more at $799 at BuyDig.com. Ah, but if you scroll down on the page, you’ll see that they have a bundle with a Panasonic DMP-BD60K Blu-ray disc player, as well as a “hook up and maintenance kit” that includes two HDMI cables, component cables, an optical digital audio cable, cleaning solution, and a microfiber cloth. And the whole bundle is selling for the same $799. Does that get your attention?

It’s easy to play “top this deal“, and I’ve no doubt that you’ll find some that are even better than these. Let me know at alfred@hdtvprofessor.com or leave a comment on the forum at HDTVMagazine.com, and maybe I’ll include them in a future entry.

Yesterday, the California Energy Commission (CEC) made it official, and unanimously adopted new energy requirements for televisions sold in the state. It sets electricity consumption limits for sets up to 58″ diagonal. The first level takes effect January 2011, at which time one source indicates a 42″ must not consumer more than 183 watts. In January 2013, more stringent requirements will take effect; that 42″ set will have to consume 115 watts or less.

Unlike the federal Energy Star logo program which is optional, California’s limits will be required. This prompted an outcry from many television manufacturers as well as the Consumer Electronics Association. One of the major concerns is that these limits could stifle advancement of new features. For example, incorporating non-television features such as Internet access or digital video recording (DVR) functions in the same housing as the TV might push a model over the limit. The alternative would be to build these functions into a separate box, and the two devices in sum might consume more energy than the single integrated device.

My take on this is that it is a typical, ham-handed California approach to environmental issues. (Does anyone remember when San Francisco briefly banned pregnant women from working at CRT monitors?) All this effort and money spent on establishing limits is puzzling, since at least 1,000 current television models already meet the 2011 requirements. I expect that the energy consumption will drop even further in the next year, and won’t be at all surprised if most sets meet the 2013 limits well in advance of that date. The market is going to do a good job of rewarding energy-efficient TVs on its own, as manufacturers are making this a significant part of their sales pitch these days.

On the other hand, I also wonder about the industry’s strong objections to the CEC’s action. Yes, I see the danger of a Balkanization of rules and regulations among different states, but California has had separate car emissions requirements and that doesn’t seem to have ruined the auto industry’s creativity and development of new features. And I don’t think any other state has followed suit by developing their own emissions requirements for new cars. I think that the industry objections are a bit over the top, especially since so many models already meet the requirements.

On balance, I expect that it would probably have been better if California had not taken this action, but I don’t think it will cause any great harm to the industry or cost consumers a lot of extra money in any case.

UPDATE: Paul Semenza and Paul Gagnon of DisplaySearch have also written about this decision, and provide an excellent graph showing how many existing models are already below the 2011 limits, and a significant number already meet the 2013 requirements.

An evil sorcerer tricked Aladdin’s wife into giving him the magic lamp by offer to swap new lamps for old. It’s no trick this time around, however, as Warner Brothers has launched a campaign that lets you trade in your old WB DVDs in exchange for the same titles in Blu-ray format. They have set up a new site, www.dvd2blu.com, where you can make the exchange. Just select the titles online that you want to swap, then mail back the DVDs, and you’ll get your Blu-ray discs in about a month.

No, it’s not a free exchange. It will cost $7.95 or more per disc, and you can only swap one disc for a given title. You’re also limited to 25 titles. If your order comes to more than $25, shipping is free (instead of $4.95 per order). And Warner Brothers will recycle the DVDs that get returned in this program, and the components will be reused.

Okay, so it could cost you almost $15 to swap a single title, but less than $32 to exchange four titles is not such a bad deal even with the lower prices of Blu-ray titles these days. And with some Blu-ray players going for as little as $100, maybe this will help encourage people to start switching over their libraries of favorite movies to the new format.

Unfortunately, I still think that most people see standard DVDs as being “good enough“, and are not likely to buy a new player to get high definition movies at home.

The HDTV world is flat and turning green. Plasma and LCD panels dominate, and now manufacturers are fighting over who can make the most environmentally-friendly televisions (since there are relatively few other meaningful differences among their features). And one of the key focal points for these efforts is to use less power. The good news is that many of them have been quite successful in their efforts.

Consumers can find energy efficient flat panel TVs by picking one with an Energy Star label. This certification program is a joint effort between the U.S. Department of Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency. The program estimates that if all televisions in the country met the current standards, we would save $2.5 billion a year in electricity, while reducing greenhouse gas emissions equivalent to about 3 million cars.

And today, 3M launched a campaign to encourage consumers to buy sets certified by the Energy Star program, and to pay attention to energy consumption figures; it is possible for one Energy Star set to use nearly twice as much power as another one the same size. (Note that Energy Star requirements will become tougher in May 2010 when the version 4.0 specifications take effect, and more strigent yet with version 5.0 in May 2012.)

Why does 3M care? They don’t make televisions, after all. The answer is that they make some special plastic films that are used in LCD panels. LCDs require a backlight that shines through the liquid crystal layer so you can see the image. The problem is that light from the backlight gets scattered, and not all of it makes it through the panel. 3M makes some very clever films that will actually capture much of this “lost” light, and direct it out through the panel. Less lost light means that the backlight doesn’t need to be as bright in order to create the same brightness at the front of the screen. Lowering the backlight’s brightness means that less power is used, making the whole set more energy efficient. So if you buy a very efficient LCD HDTV, you may well be buying a 3M product. And that may encourage manufacturers to use more 3M products in their sets.

In spite of their self-interest, I think it’s great that 3M has chosen to make an effort to educate consumers about TV energy consumption, and the choices that are available. It’s unusual to have a component manufacturer get involved in marketing programs about end products like this; 3M is doing something good for themselves and for consumers with this campaign.