PlayTv

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SNicolle

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#24244 18-Jul-2008 20:56

Not until Jan/Feb?

http://www.engadget.com/2008/07/18/sonys-playtv-begins-european-rollout-september-10th-in-uk/

Could be time for an iDTV

old3eyes

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#149432 19-Jul-2008 11:43

What happened to Sony NZ statement that it will be available here for the launch of Freeview HD?? Bassed on the UK price and Sony's NZ Playstation3 pricing expect it to be around NZ$300+ here..

Regards,

Old3eyes

sub

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Ultimate Geek
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#149441 19-Jul-2008 12:40

old3eyes: What happened to Sony NZ statement that it will be available here for the launch of Freeview HD??

That was back before they announced that our Freeview DVB-T system would use H.264/HE-AAC. They were probably expecting a system similar to Freeview in the UK, with MPEG2 video, with AC3 or MPEG-1 Layer2 audio.

NZtechfreak

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#149449 19-Jul-2008 13:20

$99 euros is what I saw, around $200.

I'll definitely just wait. PS3-based freeview is just too good to pass up, especially since I have a PSP for remote play.

I suspect the previous poster is right about NZ throwing a spanner in the works with its unusual choice of standard.

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old3eyes

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#149512 19-Jul-2008 19:08

sub:
old3eyes: What happened to Sony NZ statement that it will be available here for the launch of Freeview HD??
That was back before they announced that our Freeview DVB-T system would use H.264/HE-AAC. They were probably expecting a system similar to Freeview in the UK, with MPEG2 video, with AC3 or MPEG-1 Layer2 audio.

I don't think so. It was well know by the middle of 2007 what sort of DTT HD we were going to use so I suspect it's a Sony thing . Maybe they have issues with the technology or the marketing hype is running way ahead of technical reality..

Regards,

Old3eyes

SNicolle

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Ultimate Geek
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#149517 19-Jul-2008 19:53

Surely the underlying technology isn't different from the idtv technology in the new Bravia LCDs

sub

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Ultimate Geek
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#149575 20-Jul-2008 06:57

old3eyes:
sub:
old3eyes: What happened to Sony NZ statement that it will be available here for the launch of Freeview HD??
That was back before they announced that our Freeview DVB-T system would use H.264/HE-AAC. They were probably expecting a system similar to Freeview in the UK, with MPEG2 video, with AC3 or MPEG-1 Layer2 audio.

I don't think so. It was well know by the middle of 2007 what sort of DTT HD we were going to use so I suspect it's a Sony thing . Maybe they have issues with the technology or the marketing hype is running way ahead of technical reality..

No, thats not true, the choice of HE-AAC audio was not known until long after the PlayTV announcements. I'm in the industry and keep a pretty close eye on this stuff and remember this clearly.

Its not that Sony couldnt implement HE-AAC support if they wanted, but rather tthat this choice of audio format could have changed NZ from "a good small country to trial the new PlayTV service before releasing it in the bigger European markets" to "a small country using different standards to the bigger European markets, that we'll come back to later after we've got it working in countries using the more common standards"

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lchiu7

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#149601 20-Jul-2008 10:58

sub: ..

Its not that Sony couldnt implement HE-AAC support if they wanted, but rather tthat this choice of audio format could have changed NZ from "a good small country to trial the new PlayTV service before releasing it in the bigger European markets" to "a small country using different standards to the bigger European markets, that we'll come back to later after we've got it working in countries using the more common standards"

The choice of LATM audio is a strange one and one of the many (unintended) consequences is this - no PlayTV for us yet. Also extreme frustration for HTPC people and Popcorn Hour owners. I had anecdotally (perhaps sub you confirm this) that the Kordia engineers who chose this format felt that they had a blank sheet of paper and opted for what they felt was the best standards out there, whether or not the incremental advantages over say more common AAC variants (as say used by the BBC and others) would be offset by increased ease is getting the hardware out here to play the formats.

I guess we will never know....

But TV manufacturers have risen to the challenge by releasing TV's with in-built DVB-T tuners how so, including Sony I understand, so in that marketplace, they felt it was was worth doing.

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