Wol

I have to say that I have been very impressed with the quality of the 3D TV images - both animation (which always looks much crisper) and sport. Some demos of football almost (almost) made me interested in the game!

Obviously it would require a critical number of viewers to make it worthwhile for the production companies to convert everything to 3D equipment - do you think this will happen or is it just another flash in the pan like it was in the cinema in the fifties?

Gems

Well I will not be buying one, they have already said it will make a certain % of the population ill if they watch a 3D tv.
Have you seen the huge list of possible side effects?

Ive got a child with Epilepsy so reckon a 3D tv will be a no no in my house.


J

Wol

Yes - but they are only covering themselves.

Just imagine if an airline published a list of side effects that might occur when flying - everything from headaches through jetlag to death!

Amazulu

How do you make out with having to wear the specs? This is the only thing that puts me off these TVs.

Wol

I've only worn them for a few minutes at a time in a few stores - over my own specs. I think they could be better even though they seem to be designed to be worn over glasses. I would have made a couple of types = one type for people who have good vision and one for those with glasses - a bit larger and with the LCD panels a bit further from the face.

I remember seeing similar 3D TV in Japan some 20 years ago and that *did* give you a headache, because the frame rate was the same as ordinary TV so each eye was being shuttered 13 times a second alternately - slow enough to give you the shakes. The ones in the shops now are IMO bloody good! But if there's no content you will be wasting your money, and since probably the majority of the population has invested in flat screens fairly recently it might be that the critical user base isn't going to happen.

Broad Shoulders

Buying any first generation technology is foolish in my opinion. Not only will you pay through the tooth for it but it will be full of little bugs and idiosyncrases that tend to get fixed up and improved with future generations.

I think Google's recent statement that they will be entering the TV advertising domain will be the most interesting development in this area. Real internet TVs will be, IMO the biggest change in the living room in the next 10 years.

Wol

BS - you could be right - but if everyone went to it the bandwidth requirements would be astronomical, especially since no-one would any longer want SD quality. I don't see the bandwidth being supplied in the medium term.

Broad Shoulders

I see what you're saying, but I reckon you would find there are a lot of people already out there in Aus doing the majority of their TV watching on the internet. I think this technology will change a hell of a lot for the media business, whether it's the ISPs, online news services, interactive, live and personalised consumer advertising, TV programming. You name it, I think a lot will change because of this new medium and I think a lot of people will embrace it very quickly.

3D TV is a gimmick in my opinion. I really don't see the point other than the initial wow factor, which I am pretty sure would disappear after a few weeks. I am struggling to understand why people will want to sit in their living rooms looking at their TV screen to watch a 3d display. Surely if you want the real wow factor you would go to the movies where you get a whoop-arse big screen and very good surround sound to suit?

Amazulu

Including me! Now that I have found at effective and affordable VPN, we have started using BBC iplayer, Hulu, NBC etc, and along with downloads we virtually watch no terrestial TV apart from the news and a few documentaries. I am slowly building my home network, and all this content will be available anywhere in my house. I have Foxtel but will be getting rid of it soon as we don't watch it - it's a total waste. As for terrestial TV, I recently got a new antenna which ended uo costing me $750 (it was a lot of hassle) and now have a fantastic HD signal, but when I think about it, I reckon what was the point in spending all that money? We don't watch it. iinet have got some good ideas in internet TV coming up. It will be interesting to see how they develop.

Wol

...together with all the ferals eating their takeaway curries, crisps and texting their mates all around. We have a good 4 or 5 screen cinema in our little town but the "experience" gets more tedious each visit and we now prefer to buy the DVDs! But that's by the bye.

I'm not clued up on the tech side of internet TV but I would have thought the bandwidth necessary for "the majority" of punters to watch HD on the internet would be unavailable using present systems?

Broad Shoulders

I already do watch some shows in HD via the internet and I was doing that before I got ADSL2. You will find that as long as you have over a 1Mb download ability then you should easily be able to stream most HD content.

Wol

Amazulu - I used a VPN for a few months but with the internet speeds we can get it was buffering all the time and I gave up after a while - plus, every few days the providers cottoned on to the VPN addresses and blocked them!

Amazulu

Gold Class sorts this out! It's the only way to go to the cinema now.

Broad Shoulders

I probably should fess up to my issue with 3D TV. I cannot actually see the 3D effect. I have seen a fair few recent 3D movies and everyone of them has been a complete blur to me. If they are still images, I can see them fine, but as soon as there is any movement it becomes a complete blur. I've had my eyes checked and there are no issues there, it just more or less looks the same with or without the glasses on for me

Wol

You are one of the minority that doesn't see the effect so spending all that cash isn't much use!

Do you have "proper" stereoscopic vision normally, or is it just TV?