Live From Las Vegas – and the CES

Here we are…

Las Vegas - January 7, 2002: The Consumer Electronic Show has opened its doors to the public. This world-renowned event is yet again the annual shop-window to the Home Entertainment market. On the slate are the biggest manufacturers and the wildest players in the one sector that interests us the most – Home Cinema.

Having the privilege of sporting press passes, we were already able to take a first peek yesterday, among the aisles of this show that takes place over four days and hosts more than 100,000 professional visitors.
The first trends are oriented in majority towards a democratisation of the sound formats that are to be found today on the mid to entry range machines.
In addition, while, during November, Dolby had cut a swathe with their Car Audio sound format, this time it was the turn of the lads from Lucas to launch their THX Ultra Premium Car Audio label as well as Lexicon with their proprietary "Logic 7" format (an option in the new 7 series BMW). Enough to have car audio buffs shuddering in their lounge-like bucket seats, but at the speed the technology is moving ahead (about the same as that BM mate!) when will the next format come out, and what will really be its use when it all boils down to it.

DVD has made even more in-roads, with massive world-wide support. After Panasonic, Sony and Pioneer, it’s the turn of the Taiwanese lads and others from down in South East Asia to attack the consumer market, with, for some of them, the presentation of up to a dozen different machines.

To conclude, for the time being, it’s worth noting that Dreamvision, again at the show along with JMLab, are presenting a large number of brand spanking new products, including a premiere: the first DLP with an HD1 matrix of just 0.8 inches in 19/9 format. Check out the photos in the report section…