Posts from — May 2008

Looks like Mitsubishi Electric has a plan to release its new 24.1 inch LCD Monitor branded as Visio MDT242WG-SB starting from June 6th at an MSRP of ¥118,000 in Japan.

The new LCD’s display boasts brightness 500cd/square m, features a A-MVA panel with MP Engine function, color number approximately 1,677 ten thousand colors, speed of response 16ms, contrast ratio 1,000: 1, and 178 degrees side-by-side viewing.

As for connectivity, the MDT242WG-SB loads DVI-D (HDCP correspondence), mini- D-Sub15 pin, two HDMI ports, D5 terminal, and RCA stereo.

Impressive features indeed for a new LCD Monitor.

Turn your PC or Laptop into an HDTV. Interesting eh?

Now you can satisfy that high-definition dreams with the Pinnacle PCTV HD Pro Stick. Plug this smart little gadget into a USB port on your computer, hook up an antenna or cable feed to the other end and you’re in on meat of the action — HDTV in a window on your desktop, or full-screen if you prefer.

The bundled software includes a digital video recorder (DVR) so you can record your favourite shows while you’re not there. This comes with a tiny remote control so you can watch without getting out of your chair.

The Pro Stick also has an intriguing feature called QAM circuit which brings in unscrambled digital broadcasts, including some in high-definition, directly from a cable company feed — without a cable box, high-def or otherwise. QAM is also built into most new digital sets. Amazing eh?

Getting your cable company’s whole digital menu is a challenge as most of them are scrambled unless you rent a digital box. But you’ll generally see the same digital channels you would pick up with an antenna. You may even pick up some video-on-demand channels if your neighbour is watching them.

However, there’s only so much TV you can expect from a hundred-dollar PC gadget. The Pro Stick generally gives you the bang for your buck. But its hard for a picture processed through software by a PC and displayed on a monitor that’s not optimised for television to look as good as it would on a stand-alone HDTV set — or on even a monitor driven by an internal PC tuner.

To set expectations straight, quality was fine and better than analog TV tuner cards. Not bad for a 100 bucks don’t you think?