After LG, which announced the first hybrid DVD format player was sure to have others following its lead. Now, Warner has announced a hybrid format disc hi-def disc that
can be played both in HD DVD and Blu-ray players.
Warner’s “Total Hi Def” disc (”THD”) is yet another proprietary format; however, it does combine HD DVD and Blu-ray on one disc. According to Warner Home Video, it does not compromise any Hi-Def features of either HD DVD or Blu-ray. The physical structure of the disc is 1.2 mm the same as DVDs, HD DVD and Blu-ray discs. The Total Hi Def disc has the ability to contain both single layer and dual layers for both formats enabling either 15 GB or 30 GB on the HD DVD side and 25 GB or 50 GB on the Blu-ray side.

Dell is looking to telecom companies to deliver fiber-optic broadband links in order to spearhead PCs into media hubs. Dell Chairman Michael Dell said in his keynote address - “Customers say they want to use their PCs for digital home entertainment, but it really hasn’t caught on because of two things: Broadband isn’t where it needs to be for reliable performance, and the industry hasn’t made it easy for devices to work together.”

Dell unveiled a Home Media Suite desktop PC that offers vast storage capacity and a 27-inch wide-screen display. The Home Media Suite will launch in the United States this month, as soon as Microsoft releases the Vista OS.

Are you a Zune owner? If you are you’ll be playing games on your Zune by July 2008 according to Microsoft VP, Peter Moore. Though everyone felt the Zune may have gaming capabilities when it was announced first it was not to be.

But, Microsoft’s planning along these lines though now the Zune functions mainly as a portable music player, like Apple’s iPod. Zune desperately needs to gain dominance with the huge popularity of the iPod being still intact. The iPod continues to rule as the main music player in the business and recently expanded its functions to include video playback and gaming.

Zune has a new competitor and this time it’s from SanDisk called the Sansa Connect. The Connect accesses online music services without a PC, and users can both stream or download content. It has an internal speaker and the ability to expand the internal 4 Gbytes of memory.

Like the Zune you can send songs out to your friends and get this - If you are on the same music service as your pal and you want to send him/her the hottest new track, a Connect owner just needs to ping him/her with the player, and your pal will be humming the new tune immediately, said SanDisk.

Which is the largest LCD TV available? Answer - the Sharp 65-inch Aquos unveiled at the CES two years ago…Not any more, Sharp has out did itself this time at the CES and unveiled the biggest LCD TV – a Whopping 108 inches!

Sharp is continuing the Aquos line with this giant LCD TV and Toshihiko Fujimoto, president and chairman of Sharp Electronics Corp., said at a news conference that LCDs are finally coming of age and ready to be the dominant TV set model.

A PC that is about 6 inches long, four inches wide and weighing 14 ounces and this is going to be the next generation computer it seems. Touted to replace laptops this PC was unveiled at CES by a Nevada company, Seamless Internet (called the Seamless NeXt Generation, or S-XGen for short).

It runs on Windows Pocket PC software, includes a foldout keyboard and runs eights hours on one battery charge. This device is smaller than a laptop yet more powerful than most PDAs and is able to plug into the growing number of Wi-Fi networks. At a suggested retail price of $1,395 with Windows Office Suite, the S-XGen will likely first appeal to people on the move.

Here it is - the 1 Terabyte hard drive and it’s from Hitachi! The company’s 1TB hard drive meets the needs of consumers who want to create, share and store their digital information, and lots of it. Hitachi’s Deskstar 7K1000 will begin shipping to retail customers in the first quarter of 2007 at a suggested retail price of $399 (USD), or 40 cents per gigabyte (GB).

Now that is still economical with most of us having stashes of digital things to be stores and I’m thinking of my picture files and thousands I have in different CDs and pen drives and memory sticks. Hitachi has also announced a CinemaStar version 1TB hard drive, for digital video recording (DVR) applications.

Imagine this traveling in your car you access the net download stuff, play games, check e-mails and communicate via any Wi-Fi device…Broadband in your car and that’s what’s being promised by Autonet Mobile a start-up firm from San Francisco.

Autonet Mobile plans to unveil its Internet service provider for cars at International CES, the consumer electronics show that runs Jan. 8-11 in Las Vegas. The company is also aiming to announce an agreement with Avis to offer a portable, wireless Internet service by the end of the first quarter.

LG to the rescue of the consumers stumped by the confusion of HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc formats. The company has decided to adopt both thus hopefully pitting an end to Sony and Toshiba’s Campaign to make consumers adopt either one.

LG says in the press release that it expects “this technological breakthrough to end the confusion and inconvenience of competing high-definition disc formats for both content producers and consumers.”

HD DVD is the next generation to the DVD format and is capable of storing 3-4 times the capacity of a DVD format. Though the blue-violet 405 nm laser is what both HD DVD and Blu-ray Disc there are technical differences and hence the highly partisan war.

Microsoft may soon direct you to the nearest cheapest gas station with 3D maps in your car! Ford and Microsoft will jointly announce Sync, an in-car navigation and infotainment system built on Microsoft’s platform at the Detroit Motor show this month.

Sync is designed to let drivers navigate better, download and listen to music, talk by cell phone, and even get e-mail without using their hands, according to reports. Powered by Bluetooth — the same technology that powers wireless cell phone headsets — Sync will debut in two Ford models, the Focus and Five Hundred series, in 2007, then expand to all Ford models in the 2008 model year.