Samsung has revealed over at CES that it’ll be matching rival LG’s 55-inch OLED TV… when a 55-inch OLED TV of its own. Not surprisingly, the outfit’s trumpeting its terrific color reproduction, the virtual absence of motion blur and face recognition. Sadly, there’s not even a model number to mark down, and a price estimate should be even harder to find. It is, however, expected to ship in the latter half of 2012. There’s no color filter needed here, either, as the self-emitting RGB sub-pixels take care of themselves; since light output on the Super OLED is controlled on a pixel-to-pixel basis, you can rest assured that your blacks will be deep and your whites bright. Other specs include a dual-core processor and 3D support, and more will be revealed when the product is ready for launching.

Back in late November last year, Lenovo’s Chinese folks teased a certain IdeaTV or LeTV for launch this year, and now we finally get to see it in its full glory. Dubbed the K91, we’re looking at a 55-inch IPS 3D HDTV running Android Ice Cream Sandwich (a first for smart TVs, yet not quite a Google TV), and inside it sits a 1.5GHz dual-core Snapdragon APQ8060. Dig a little deeper and you’ll also find 1GB of RAM, 8GB storage, SD card expansion, 802.11b/g/n WiFi, 10M/100M Ethernet, HDMI and USB 2.0 connectivity (which is much needed for an external hard drive to store video content). As you can see in the pictures, the K91 will come with some Lenovo cloud services, including an app store (but the TV will have over 100 apps preloaded, anyway) and video-on-demand, along with voice control and facial recognition (mainly for child lock, we presume) using its five-megapixel webcam. As always, we’ll get back to you as soon as we get information on dates and prices.

LG let us know at CES 2011 that it had 4K LCD televisions in the pipeline, but unfortunately they didn’t make it out this year. Expect for that to change in 2012, as the company just announced it’s bringing an 84-inch “ultra-definition” (3840×2160) TV to Las Vegas to go along with its 55-inch OLED. It has all of LG’s Cinema 3D and Smart TV features built-in, including support for that upgraded Magic Motion remote and voice control. There’s no official word yet on when we’ll see these on shelves or at what price, but it certainly looks production ready compared to other prototypes that have been displayed over the years. While we don’t have easy sources of 4K-res video content yet, one of the reasons LG is making the jump first is for 3D. Its Cinema 3D tech uses a Film Pattern Retarder (FPR) screen and passive glasses that result in lowered resolution, but with those extra pixels there’s no question about whether viewers are still getting at least an HD picture. So far 4K at home is the domain of Sony and JVC’s high-priced projectors, but we’ll see if any other companies show off upgrades in size and resolution of their HDTVs this year.

Samsung, Sharp and others have offered to pay $539 million to settle an antitrust lawsuit over alleged LCD panel price-fixing. Earlier this month, Samsung, Sharp and six other LCD manufacturers agreed to pay $388 million to settle price-fixing claims made by direct buyers. The settlement was part of a series of antitrust cases brought by Arkansas, California, Florida, Michigan, Missouri, New York, West Virginia and Wisconsin which were consolidated in federal court in San Francisco.

In late 2006, a probe into price-fixing allegations made by direct and indirect buyers was initiated by authorities in Japan, Korea, the European Union and the United States. Eventually many companies and executives stepped forward and pleaded guilty to criminal antitrust violations. Among them were LG, Chunghwa Picture Tubes and Sharp who reportedly agreed in 2008 and 2009 to pay $585 million in criminal fines alone. A total of more than $890 million in fines was paid out from all guilty parties.

A class action lawsuit thus followed in 2007, claiming that the companies allegedly fixed LCD panel prices, thus driving up prices for direct buyers of LCD panels and related gadgets (HDTVs, desktops, notebooks etc) from 1999 to 2006. Sharp paid $105 million, Samsung paid $82.7 million and Chimei Innolux paid $78 million — the other five paid a total sum of $122.3 million.

However now six LCD makers must pay an additional $539 million to settle antitrust claims made by indirect buyers.

In court papers filed in San Francisco on Friday, Samsung has proposed to pay indirect buyers $240 million, Sharp $115.5 million and Taiwan-based Chimei Innolux Corp $110 million. The rest of the $539 bulk will be paid by Hitachi, Chunghwa Picture Tubes, and Epson Imagine Devices. These companies have also agreed to establish antitrust compliance programs regarding the pricing and production of LCD panels, and to help prosecute other defendants.

Meanwhile, the six settling companies are now disputing the allegations. Other defendants have also yet to settle including AU Optronics, LG and Toshiba. The case is In Re TFT-LCD (Flat Panel) Antitrust Litigation, 07-01827, U.S. District Court for the Northern District of California (San Francisco).

We only have a few more days left until the festivities truly kick off at CES 2012 in Las Vegas, but LG has already tipped its hand with a press release promising the “world’s largest” OLED panel for the show. We’ve seen smaller screens from LG before and it had already promised a 55-inch OLED HDTV for mid-2012, so this news is just another sign the company is ready to take its technology mainstream. LG’s tech uses white OLEDs overlaid with colors, which it claims makes for a lower error rate and clearer “ultra-definition” screen, with more colors than standard LCDs. Check after the break for one more promo pic of LG’s super skinny 5mm prototype, we’ll get a better look at it (and the inevitable competition from Korean rival Samsung) at the company’s booth January 9th.

LG’s FPR 3DTVs already featured lighter, cheaper passive 3D glasses than their active shutter competition, but next year the company will push its advantage even further with these new models. The three options available include the F310 (at right, above) which it says weighs 20 percent less than last year’s default and are curved more for a better fit, the F320 (left) clip-on design for glasses-wearers and Alain Mikli-designed (the guy who made Kanye’s shutter shades, among other high-end eyeglasses) F360 half-rim frames (middle). It also rolled out a press release trumpeting new Smart TV features for 2012, but beyond the updated remote and confirmation of Intel WiDi integration, it’s pretty short on details. We’re not seeing any Google TV tie-ins here, LG is focusing on its homegrown ecosystem which it says now offers 1,200 apps. There’s no word on pricing for the glasses, but after this and announcing a 55-inch OLED prototype, I’m sure we’ll see more stuff from the South Korean giant.

A Chinese company throwing French around in its product names? Right, that’s Lenovo for you. Oddities aside, it looks as if the LePhone will soon have LeCompany — Lenovo will be pushing out its first smart TV in the first quarter of 2012. The simply-titled LeTV will be an internet-connected display, but outside of that, hardly anything else is being made public. There are no launch regions specified, nor a screen size. We’re presuming it’ll attempt to tie into the greater “Lenovo Cloud,” which will purportedly be similar to services already offered by the likes of Apple and Google, though users will be granted access to 200GB at first. Can’t imagine too many folks opting for a Lenovo desktop, laptop, smartphone and television, but hey — ecosystems are indeed all the rage these days.

SOURCE via Wall Street Journal

We’ve officially entered the silly season of pre-CES rumors, so take this with a grain of salt, but the Wall Street Journal reports Sony has approached “several big media companies” about distributing their channels over the internet. This comes on the heels of its report on comments by CEO Howard Stringer about significant R&D efforts going into a “different kind of TV”, and the four screen strategy Sony would like to implement. According to the report, Sony’s idea is to offer small bundles of channels over the internet to its TVs, Blu-ray players, and the PS3. Still, cutting deals with companies like CBS, that doesn’t want to jeopardize its cable and satellite TV-based revenue, could be difficult. As for the competition, similar rumors about Microsoft turned into an effort that mostly works with partners like Comcast, U-verse, and FiOS, while Google is also pursuing a route of adding to, but not necessarily replacing, cable TV. Sony has positioned itself well, adding IPTV services including sports to the PS3 and live TV tuning capability, and its tested the waters of going over the top before, but so far whether it will actually pursue this new plan is unknown.

SOURCE via Wall Street Journal

Sony denies a recall but admits that there have been reports of overheating. Sony has confirmed issues with several models of its Sony Bravia TV line, but contrary to early reports, insists that it’s not issuing a product recall affecting 1.6 million television sets. In an announcement posted to its television and projectors support pages, the company said it is beginning a free inspection and repair program following reports of over-heating components in its TVs.

“We have recently become aware of a potential issue affecting a very limited number of BRAVIA LCD TV models, which have been available for purchase in Europe since June 2007,” the company said. “The issue came to our attention through reports in Japan that a limited number of products might contain a component affected by a quality issue, which in a rare number of cases might over-heat and ignite inside the television and possibly result in the melting of the upper casing of the television.”

Sony says that there has yet to be any reports of injury or further damages. Still, if you purchased your Sony Bravia TV in Europe post-2007, you might want to check out the model number and consider getting it inspected. The following models are affected:

KDL-40D3400, KDL-40D3500, KDL-40D3550, KDL-40D3660, KDL-40V3000, KDL-40W3000, KDL-40X3000, KDL-40X3500.

If you own one of the products listed, you should contact your nearest Service Centre to arrange an inspection of the TV.

SOURCE via Sony

Sometimes gigabytes aren’t enough. With movies going Full HD and 3D and stuff these days, you have to start talking terabytes. That’s the case with Toshiba’s new Regza Server, more numerically known as the DBR-M190. The just-announced home media server boasts 5TB of storage, enough for 15 days of MPEG4AVC-compressed digital TV — from six different channels. Of course, that “server” in the name means you’ll be able to stream captured content as well. The sad news? “You” means only Japanese consumers. But if you’re one of the chosen many, this media-slinging behemoth will cost you 200,000 yen, or around $2,600.

SOURCE via Toshiba