A Billion Colors

Imagine a billion colors. Now imagine a computer monitor that can display a billion colors.

Behold the HP DreamColor LP2480zx. It’s the result of an unusual collaboration between HP and DreamWorks Animation. The 24-inch LCD monitor can handle 30-bits of color (that’s 10-bits per primary color), which translates to more than a billion different colors. Previously, you had to pay as much as $23,000 for a comparable monitor.

The big news for people working in video/film production, animation, 3D rendering, game development, graphic arts, product design, and other color-critical industries is the price of this new monitor. It has a surprisingly low list price (given what you get) of $3,499.

The other specs include a native 1920×1200 resolution, wide 178-degree viewing angle, and extremely deep black level for an LCD screen (0.05 cd/m2). It can cover 97 percent of the stringent DCI-P3 color space standard — that’s the full range of colors possible for a digital cinema theater.

I had a chance to test drive the DreamColor display last month while visiting the DreamWorks studios in Glendale, California. I was very impressed with its performance. Keep in mind, you’ll need a 30-bit compatible graphics card, graphics card driver, and application software in order to take advantage of the 30-bit color gamut. You’ll also need to connect the monitor via its DisplayPort 1.1 or HDMI 1.3 input if you want to view your 30-bit content in its full billion-color glory.

Mars Color Controversy

Have you heard? NASA is hiding the true colors of Mars from the public. It’s all over the Internet. Pass it on.

Search for the “color of Mars” on Google, and you’ll find a host of conspiracy theories about NASA covering up the true colors of the red planet.

Some suggest NASA is deliberately trying to make the planet seem less hospitable for human life. Others argue NASA is secretly removing any evidence of vegetation. They point to the wide differences in hues found in various images of Mars.

Here are links to two sites that raise this issue: www.libertythink.com/totalinformation/BlueMars.htm and www.enterprisemission.com/colors.htm.

Could NASA really be engaged in a massive cover up? Not likely. Then what’s going on? Why is there such a disparity in the Mars images?

The best explanation can be found here: www.badastronomy.com/bad/misc/hoagland/mars_colors.html. The photographic filters onboard the spacecraft weren’t designed to mimic the human eye. The filters were designed for scientific measurement. In addition, the color balance on Mars can shift for a variety of reasons, as it can here on Earth.

In short, there are technical explanations for the color differences that are far more believable than conspiracy theories where hundreds, if not thousands, of people are sworn to secrecy.

Rugged Earware

With so many different Bluetooth headsets available, how would you design one to stand out from the others? Here’s an idea. How about building it to withstand the rigors of an active outdoor lifestyle?

That’s the reasoning behind the Plantronics Explorer 370 Ruggedized. If you’re fashion conscious, the bulky appearance could be a non-starter, but if you’re fashion agnostic, you’ll likely appreciate that it doesn’t call attention to itself.

The 370 is manufactured to the MIL-STD 810 military-grade standards issued by the United States Army’s Developmental Test Command. Besides being water, dust, and shock resistant, it filters out wind noise, so you should be heard clearly even from a mountaintop or speeding bike (signal coverage permitting). I found the call quality be very good (I didn’t try it from a mountaintop or speeding bike, however).

Though it’s quite a bit larger than the smallest headsets, it does weigh less than an ounce. It felt reasonably comfortable for hours at a time. If you’re especially sensitive to the weight of a headset, it may take some getting used to. I didn’t try dropping it onto concrete or rocks, but it was clear from examining the unit that it should be able to take more than its fair share of abuse.

The Plantronics Explorer 370 Ruggedized has a list price of $79.95.

Fit for a Cartier-Bresson?

Of all the cameras I saw at the recent PMA tradeshow, the most impressive was Leica’s M8.

It’s the first digital camera from Leica that’s built from the ground up to resemble the famous M-series 35mm rangefinder cameras. The M-series cameras are renowned for their small size, precise engineering, and razor-sharp lenses. They’re ideal for street photography. Henri Cartier-Bresson used a Leica with a 50mm lens throughout his career.

The M8 doesn’t come cheap. The body would set you back roughly $5,500, while the 50mm f/1.4 Summilux-M manual focus lens would add another $3,000 to the tab.

What happens when it becomes out-of-date? Would you have to trade up to a newer, more expensive model? I spoke with Christian Erhardt, Leica’s director of marketing, about this. He said Leica will offer hardware upgrades for a flat-rate of 1,200 euros. Leica picks up the camera at your home or business, sends it to the factory in Germany, replaces or adds new parts, and delivers it back to your door. The two-year warranty starts over again after each upgrade.

I asked if an upgrade might someday replace the 10.3-megapixel sensor with an improved sensor? Erhardt didn’t answer directly, but he did say that potentially any part could be replaced. There are no plans for an M9.

Is the Leica M8 and 50mm f/1.4 lens worth $8,500? If you want the best quality photos in the smallest possible configuration — and can afford the high price tag — you won’t find a better camera for discreet street photography.

If price isn’t an issue, you might consider opting for the Leica 50mm f/1.0 Noctilux-M manual focus lens. The lens is about $5,500, but you’ll be able to capture incredible photos from the light of a single candle. An F/1.0 lens sees the world approximately the same as a human eye in terms of illumination and perspective.

I had a chance to play around with the camera at the booth. Though the focusing system takes some getting used to, the M8 is clearly a big step up from other digital cameras. It really does have the remarkable feel of a Leica 35mm rangefinder.

Robot Guitar

There were all kinds of electronic devices at this year’s CES, including devices you wouldn’t normally think of as being electronic.

At the Cherry Picks event on press day (Sunday), Gibson showed its Robot Guitar. The name is a bit misleading, as it conjures up images of a self-playing guitar. That isn’t the case. The Robot Guitar is a self-tuning guitar, which is still impressive. You strum the strings. It analyzes the degree to which each string is out of tune. And it mechanically adjusts the strings to the correct tuning.

Six factory presets are provided. You can also manually tune the guitar to any other tuning and save that tuning by overwriting one of the presets. The owner’s manual provides instructions for restoring the factory defaults in case you want to go back.

Color LEDs provide user feedback during tuning operations. A solid red indicates a string is not tuned. A flashing yellow indicates the Powerheads are tuning the strings. A solid green indicates an individual string is in tune. And all LEDS flashing blue three times indicates all the strings are in tune.

Based on the demo I saw at CES, the process appears to be easy, fast, and accurate. For guitar players who like to switch back and forth among various tunings, the Robot Guitar should prove especially valuable. The retail price is $2,499. Even with that high price, there’s a waiting list of eager buyers.

Currently, there’s only one body style, though we were told at Cherry Picks that — once they catch up with the orders — Gibson will introduce different designs with the same technology.

Electronic Copilot

I had a chance to try out HP’s iPAQ 310 Travel Companion at CES. It’s a first-rate GPS device with excellent graphics and a fast processor. The bright 4.3-inch LCD touch screen has an 800×480 pixel resolution with a 16-bit color depth. In addition, this is the first GPS product to use the SiRF Titan 600MHz ARM11 dual-core processor. As a result, the maps are detailed and shift quickly to stay in sync with your car’s movements. The text-to-speech directions worked well with a minimum of oddly funny pronunciations.

Unlike with some competing GPS products, you won’t be stuck with out-of-date maps and points of interest. Connect the 310 to your PC via a supplied USB cable to update the on-board data via the Internet. You can use the touch screen to explore areas outside your field of view. Use the side-mounted dial to incrementally change from a close-up 3D perspective to a bird-eye 2D perspective. Currently, 40 cities have low-resolution 3D buildings that look very cool as you drive by them. Otherwise, the streets are limited to a ground-level 3D perspective that’s still effective for providing a sense of scale and direction.

Other features include an SDHC-compatible SD-card slot for playing video and audio files, several games, and Bluetooth for using the 310 as a hands-free answering system for your cell phone. The 800×480 resolution screen is great for video, though it’s fairly picky about which types of AVI files it can play. Even with the fast processor, it became bogged down with video saved at a high bit rate. Those limitations aren’t a deal breaker, mostly because the media player is an add-on, not the main attraction. It’s the GPS capabilities that make the 310 really shine.

Ultimate Keyboard

It may sound like name of a Roman General or twist-toy Transformer, but Optimus Maximus is actually a high-tech computer keyboard. There’s a tiny OLED screen embedded into each of the 113 programmable keys.

A software utility lets you associate each key with a 48×48 pixel image, so you might use a logo for a corporate website, desktop icon for a popular application, or friend’s photo for an instant messaging program.

The keyboard is ideal for switching among unusual character sets, such as Cyrillic, Ancient Greek, Georgian, Arabic, or Quenya. Musicians might use musical notes, mathematicians could embed math functions, and programmers may favor HTML codes.

Before you rush out to buy one, you should know the price. It’s roughly $1,500, depending on the exchange rate between Russia and the U.S. Check out the website of Art.Lebedev Studio, the designer of the keyboard, for other interesting products — most with more down-to-earth prices.

Is There a Doc in the House?

You could hardly turn a corner at CES without seeing some sort of iPod docking station. One model stood out from the others for its practical design.

The Philips DCP951 Docking Entertainment System is a portable DVD player that can also play video from your iPod. It features a docking shelf that slides in and out from the unit. When slid in, it houses an iPod-sized remote control that works with both the player and iPod. When slid out, you remove the remote control and put the iPod in its place. The shelf functions as an iPod battery charger, in addition to routing the iPod’s audio and video to the player.

You can also use the DCP951 as a digital picture frame, bringing in photos from the iPod, a photo CD, or the built-in SD slot. The SD slot works with video, as well as photos. Compatible video formats include DVD, DVD+/-R, DVD+/-RW, SVCD, VCD, DivX, and MPEG4. The 9-inch LCD screen has a 16:9 aspect ratio, and battery life is rated at 2.5 hours. An AC adapter, car adapter, and AV cable are included.

The DCP951 has a manufacturer’s suggested retail price of $199.99 and should be available sometime this month.

The Dancing Rolly

One of the coolest gadgets at this year’s CES was the Sony Rolly. It’s a robotic MP3 player that moves its six moving parts — arms, shoulders, and wheels — in time with the music. It also has two light-rings that pulse to the music through a range of 700 colors. The built-in stereo speakers are designed for 180-degree coverage.

The best part about the Rolly is the software that ships with it. A timeline-based editor will let you sync the movements and light pulsing to specific points in the music. The Sony rep I spoke with at the booth said the script is then saved with the music file, so you could create as many choreographed songs as you like.

It has 2GB of memory for music storage and supports the MP3 and non-secure AAC formats. It also has Bluetooth with the A2DP profile, so you could stream music to the Rolly from a Bluetooth-compatible cell phone or laptop.

Sony hasn’t announced a price for the Rolly. It should be available this Spring.

Researchers Abuse Discs

Surprise! Some brands of DVD-R, DVD+R, DVD-RW, and DVD+RW discs may be unreadable in less than ten years.

“We found that some media are capable of lasting several tens of years, though we don’t know what several tens of years actually is, but certainly longer than five or ten years,” explains Oliver Slattery, a researcher with the Digital Media Group at NIST (National Institute of Standards and Technology). “Other discs would probably be dead in under ten years. Our results tell both stories.”

How are consumers supposed to know which discs will last for decades and which ones won’t? To resolve this potentially sticky situation, a coalition of disc manufacturers announced on July 2 that they had agreed to a standard set of stress tests for recordable and rewritable DVD discs. Based on the test results, they could rate a disc’s longevity and provide a label that certifies an approximate life expectancy. Like an expiration date on a carton of milk, the label could indicate the effective lifespan for a particular brand of discs.

Since we don’t want to wait 50 years to determine whether a disc will really last 50 years, researchers use accelerated conditions to extrapolate longer periods of time. In short, they severely abuse the discs to find out how they’ll hold up under ordinary conditions. The discs are subjected to extremes of heat and humidity you wouldn’t wish on your worst enemy.

The challenge is to maximize the environmental stress — but not to a point where you alter the physical properties of the disc. Apply too much heat, and the disc begins to melt. Approach the boiling temperature of water, and the moisture inside the disc reacts in an uncharacteristic manner.

It’s a delicate balance. “If you do the temperature or humidity too quickly, you’ll start causing condensation,” says Slattery. “If a drop of water falls on the media, that could lead to a different effect than you’re trying to monitor.”

“There’s also the stability of keeping the equipment going at certain temperatures,” says Fred Byers, a researcher with the Digital Media Group at NIST. The test chambers are often quite large. “Some companies have walk-in chambers, where you walk in and set things on shelves,” he explains.

A full test procedure could take six months to two years to complete and require hundreds of discs for each brand tested. So next time you buy a recordable DVD disc and wonder how long it might last, consider the discs that are stuck in the lab and the abuse they endure, all for the sake of progress.

Ribbon Worthy

I had read about the new ribbon interface in Microsoft Office 2007, but didn’t have a chance to try it until my meeting with Microsoft at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES).

At first glance, I felt lost. Like a complete novice, I had to ask how to load a saved file because the traditional pull-down menus have disappeared (hint: the file options are tucked under the oversized Office button on the far left).

Why take away the familiar interface we’ve come to love (and hate) over the years? We tend to think and work visually, so having functions grouped intuitively with visual cues encourages us to explore the hidden capabilities of the software.

Using the context-sensitive tabs, I experimented with features that were new to me, but have probably been available since Office XP or Office 2003. At this point, Word and Excel have essentially all the features you’ll ever need, so it makes sense that Microsoft would concentrate on making those features more easily accessible (think Microsoft Bob on steroids).

The biggest benefits will come to users who are new to Office. The rest of us will have to relearn and adapt, while wondering why it took Microsoft so long to break free from the confines of a one-size-fits-all interface.

Creature Comforts

You know you’re getting older when the high-end gadget that inspires your techno-lust at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) is a massage chair rather than a large screen TV or cutting-edge audio system.

The Inada chairs aren’t ordinary massage chairs. They first scan your body with optical sensors in order to find your Shiatsu pressure points. Then they use a combination of rollers and airbags to intelligently tap, scoop, and knead your aching body.

I was able to test-ride the Inada ROBO Chair ($5,999 list price) on the last day of CES, and it provided some welcome relief. This particular model features a newly introduced “3D roller mechanism” and is configured to message your feet, calves, ankles, legs, back, buttocks, neck, arms, and hands.

Once you get over the notion that this powerful machine has you trapped in its grip, you’ll find it surprisingly similar to a professional massage therapist. It was amazing how the chair was able to hone in on the knots in my back and apply just the right amount of pressure.

The downside — apart from the lofty purchase price — could be your ability to have it repaired for a reasonable fee once the limited five-year warranty lapses. It could also be so addicting, you might never want to leave your house.

Update: Want to try out an Inada ROBO Chair? Here’s a list of dealers and showrooms throughout the U.S.