Is 3D TV the next big thing for 2010? - Page 13

From My JVC link:

Thanks. Does the Blu-ray 3D standard support either of these modes? I say that thinking it must surely. My original question was more rhetorical than revealing of any real doubt.

Who here has actually read the Blu-ray 3D standard? If you have, how did you get a look at it? Where can it be downloaded?

That JVC 3DTV came out August of last year so it isn't going to have 1.4 inputs.


AFAIK (???), the BDA does not freely publish tech specs. You have to be a member to get access.

Naturally only 3D sets that were designed to accept native stereo images according to the HDMI 1.4 3d spec will be assured that they are able to receive and properly handle those signals. But that issue is separate from the *technology* that the set uses to display the 3D (polarized/shutter etc.)

the HD standard over HDMI transmits two images. It's up to the display to figure out what to do with them. In the case of Mitsubishi, it's the *TV set* that's not playing the game, because they implimented a checkerboard system on their own before the HDMI standards were in place and so they didn't include the ability for their set to receive and recognize real stereo dual-images to then process (downconvert if you will) into checkerboard for the DMD chips. Therefore, you need to use a HDMI 1.4 -> checkerboard converter to get that set to work with the new 3D systems.

However, any 3D display produced *after* the HDMI 1.4 3D spec has been finalized should be designed to receive the stereo image. That makes no difference whether they are polarized or active shutter. If they need to do conversions of any sort, they can do that internally and the HDMI 1.4 spec doesn't have to be affected.

Had those Mitsubishi 3D DLP sets been designed after the HDMI 1.4 protocols were in place, they too would accept the native dual-stream stereo images and just do the checkerboard conversion internally.

As long as you have dual stereo images, any display can convert them to any other type of system as the rest are all reductions in one way or another from the original full-resolution 1920 x 1080p stereo. The 1/2 res top/bottom and side-side 3D provision added to 1.4 late in the game was only to appease the TV folks like DSS, and 3D sets will probably take those signal and internally separate them and expand them into two full-resolution 1920x1080 streams before display.

That's obvious and something I certainly understood. Note that my original question was mostly rhetorical. (Need I say that yet again?)


I think most of us here understand that. The issue in that specific case is the BDA's apparent decision not to require explicit support in a 3D Blu-ray player for an existing and reasonably "popular" (est. 2 million TVs) format for inputting half-res 3D images. HDMI 1.4 supports it as well as several other half-res formats, as you say. Unfortunate. (I don't myself own a DLP RPTV, btw, so I have no personal stake in the issue either way.)

I assumed as much. Which is why I asked the question. Someone here might work for a company that is a member of the BDA or they've perhaps obtained the specification "through the back door": I'd like to know who those people are. Wouldn't you? Everyone else who speaks specifically about what is or is not in that specification, unless they are quoting a source who has read the document or the few details that have been made public, is speculating. I'm just being frank, no intent to offend anyone (certainly no one specifically - no one in the current thread has, AFAIK, made any such _specific_ claims about what is in that spec.)

True.

The BD player is probably only required to output one particular kind of 3D signal. But that's because all HDMI 1.4 spec displays would be able to use that signal.

Other types of 3D protocols could be built in to a 3D blu-ray player as optional. Even on-the-fly color-filtering to create a composite red/blue mono signal for old-fashioned anaglyph glasses! Perhaps checkerboard could be an option that some BD player might include as well. But any television that opperates outside of the HDMI 1.4 3D spec should also be able to benefit from some sort of converter, like the Mits sets. Maybe the best solution would be for a *receiver* manufacturer to build 3D conversion options into the processing of the recevier... so no matter what type of 3D signal goes in (stereo, left/right, top/bottom etc.) you could output it to the desired type for your display (like checkerboard).

Since the population of legacy 3D displays that aren't HDMI 1.4 compliant is pretty small, and will get proportionally smaller as new HDMI 1.4 3D sets come into use, eventually it will be a moot issue and a given converter box solution should do the trick for anyone with a legacy 3D set.

(p.s. not trying to be condescending or anything rest assured. The original notion asking if blu-ray would work with "polarized" 3D as opposed to active shutter was a natural point to generate some good clarity about the nature of the 3D spec and what it means)

most of this talk about the details of the "spec" is based off of conversations from CES with manufacturers etc. Hopefully we'll get some better clarity on all these points as 3D nears release.

That's actually more of a problem than the data format itself. The 1.4 spec specifically says that "an HDMI source shall not send any 3D video format to a sink that does not indicate support for that format." It's the "indicate support" part that causes the problem. Even if the display accepts a particular 3D data format that the player can output (e.g., line interleaved), if the display can't tell the player that fact in the expected 1.4 protocol, the jig is up. Of course, an adapter would take care of that but how likely is one for anything other than the Mits/Samsung DLP sets, which have a large enough installed base to justify development?

I expect you are right.


Yes, that may be possible, assuming the Blu-ray 3D spec doesn't for some insane reason prohibit that. I'd buy a player that supported optional output formats such as these over one that did not, all other things being more-or-less equal. (Are you listening, CE manufacturers??)


Good idea!

You are referencing the EDID?

I was thinking of EDID, yes. Over EDID, players & graphics cards have always been able to read the video resolutions supported by the display. I'm assuming something similar is also be available for 3D information. That's the way I intrepreted the spec, but maybe I'm wrong. The spec also mentions 3D information flowing from the source to the sink (EDID data travels the other way) in an "HDMI vendor specific infoframe packet" and an "AVI infoframe." In any case if the display isn't 1.4 then 3D information won't be communicated or won't be used, whichever way it flows.

+1

My uncle wants to buy a 3D TV. I told him I would not if I were him. I do not see the 3D becoming a big thing. He thinks 3D will be the future. He said we will see camcorders, digital cameras, etc. in 3D also.

So, when I was at the mall yesterday, I checked out the Sony store. I put the not so comfortable glasses and watched the 3D demo. Very nice, especially real life pictures, like soccer, etc. Still though, I do not see myself watching 3D programming all the time. Especially when I have to put the 3D glasses. I guess it is cool to watch some stuff but for everything, I don't know.

I am thinking 3D will not make it.

I guess my uncle and I will see the results, in few years.

I still think what people fail to realize is the 3D TV's are their respective companies BEST 2D TV's.

Appears it is going that way with the 3D feature being available in the higher bracket models.

Even if (when) more content becomes available, having a hard time believing that the general public (not the people on this forum) will flock to 3D and wear glasses to watch TV in their family rooms.

And those with dedicated home theaters for movie or major sporting events it is hard to fathom that this audience would view 3D materials that often. Could be wrong but with the economy the way it is just can't project how fast this will ramp up or play out....

With 2010 almost gone, believe we have our answer....

What Happened to That 3-D TV Bonanza?
By DAWN KAWAMOTO

Posted 10:45 AM 12/21/10

Manufacturers of 3-D TVs are getting a lump of coal this holiday season. High expectations for frothy sales have failed to materialize, and price cuts of more than 40% continue during this critical selling period.

Such lackluster sales have been a huge disappointment for the industry, which rolled out a plethora of 3-D sets at the Consumer Electronics Show earlier this year, after offering a sneak peak of the technology in 2009. Research firm DisplaySearch, in October, lowered its 3-D TV shipment projections to 1.6 million in North America for this year from its previous summer forecast of over 2 million.

And prices for the new technology remained compressed even as the sets first appeared in stores en masse, which doesn't bode well. Typically, manufacturers hope to capture their fattest profits right after a new product is introduced.




See full article from DailyFinance: http://srph.it/hKqaJD