Seasons Greetings from Foss-AVI

We would like to take this opportunity
to wish you and your family the Merriest of
Christmases and a Prosperous New Year.

Best Wishes from the Foss-AVI family.

Universal Remote KP-900

This from the CEPro  New Product Showcase

Introducing the KP-900 Wireless Keypad Remote Control from Universal Remote.

No wires to pull—the KP-900 Keypad Remote is completely wireless. Powered by four easy-to-replace AAA batteries, it can be easily removed from the wall bracket for convenient handheld use as an IR and RF remote control. The keypad can be mounted on any surface—brick, sheetrock or plaster—using the included four small screws. And the built-in magnets allow it to stick to metal surfaces—even most refrigerators. It features backlit, laser etched buttons and a bright backlit LCD for easy text-based control.



No More Wires 
The KP-900 is a powerful keypad remote that controls all audio and video equipment in a home, simplifying and automating the operation of even the most complex Home Theater system to achieve an extraordinary combination of power and flexibility. It can be mounted on a wall and used as a handheld remote, making it ideal for retrofitting into homes with existing entertainment systems, as well as for new homes.



Perfect For Retrofit Installations
Four simple screws attach the KP-900’s bracket to a wall, eliminating the expense and inconvenience of running new wires or opening the wall to add new wires. The keypad can be mounted in any room, and anywhere in a room. It can be used on the wall in its bracket, independently as a handheld, or affixed to a refrigerator or other metal surface thanks to a built-in magnet. The keypad is compatible with iPods and other portable music players, and comes in three decorator-friendly finishes — white, light almond and black.


You can see the KP-900 for yourself at the Foss-AVI design center in Sioux Falls, SD.


New From Crestron

This from the Crestron E-News Letter

Crestron introduces the TPS-6X, the next generation in touchpanels. Built for speed, style and extraordinary versatility, the TPS-6X streamlines the Crestron family of touchpanels, combining features from all nine SmarTouch™ touchpanels. The SmarTouch line was truly groundbreaking when it was first introduced, and it is only fitting that an equally distinctive touchpanel carry on that tradition of innovation.

Foss-AVI is a dealer for the complete line of Crestron products for your home and business. You can see this technology in action at our Design Center in Sioux Falls, SD.

Revel Concerta On-Wall Speakers

This is excerpted from CEPro Online by Bob Archer.

Revel Concerta On-wall Speakers
"Revel has quietly introduced a new flagship line of products with the launch of its Ultima2 line and addressed the architectural side of the speaker category with its IC15 in-ceiling loudspeaker. Adding to its affordable Concerta line of products, the company showed a new series of on-wall speakers at CEDIA Expo 2008 that should meet the price point and lifestyle considerations.

The M8 two-way speaker, the M10 2 1/2-way speaker, the C10 2 1/2-way center channel and the LCR 8 three-way loudspeaker can be mixed and matched to fit many in-room application needs. All of the speakers benefit from the trickle-down developments done by the company’s engineering staff for products like the Ultima2 line."

Foss-AVI in Sioux Falls, SD is a dealer for the complete line of Revel Loudspeakers.

Product to watch for 2009 from CEPro Magazine

Runco CW-95HD

This is excerpted from CEPro Online by Bob Archer

"Among all the plethora of audio products, Runco’s CW-95HD in-wall CineWide 2.35 system provides lifestyle consumers with a solution that integrates within a home’s interior and rids them of those pesky black bars." And if you haven't been a reader of this blog, Foss-AVI is the exclusive dealer for Runco in South Dakota.

New From Integra - The DTR-9.9

DTR-9.9
THX Ultra2 Plus, 3-Zone, 7.1 Channel Surround Receiver

Exquisite engineering. Practical functionality.

Designed and engineered with over 60 years of experience behind it, Integra receivers, processors, and amplifiers are the most technologically advanced in the industry. The DTR-9.9 is certainly no exception.

With the latest in technology from isf, Audyssey and THX combined with HDMI 1.3a, Ethernet and RS-232 capabilities, video upconversion and scaling, as well as the most user-friendly on-screen menus and ample connectivity and switching, this is the only receiver you need to consider.

Custom installers like Foss-AVI agree: Nothing integrates easier. Nothing is as simple to control. And nothing sounds better.

Integra. Built upon a legacy of excellence, and available at Foss-AVI in Sioux Falls, SD.

If your interested in the specific features of this component click here.

If you want to know more about the specs click here.

Integra Ships DBS-6.9 Blu-ray Player

This post is excerpted from CEPro Magazine 10/06/08
an article by Steve Crowe.

Integra is shipping its first Blu-ray Player — the Profile 1.1 DBS-6.9.
The Profile 1.1 Blu-ray player also offers DVD upscaling to 1080p.
The DBS-6.9, which was quietly introduced at CEDIA Expo 2008, delivers full 1080p HD at 24fps and features an HDMI v. 1.3a output with the Deep Color. It also delivers bitstream output of both Dolby TrueHD and DTS-HD Master Audio for decoding in compatible processors or receivers.

Other features:
▪ A front-panel SD card slot
▪ Bonus View picture-in-picture
▪ DVD upscaling to 1080p

The DBS-6.9 can play CD, Video CD, CD-R/RW, DVD±R/RW, DivX, WMA, JPG and MP3 files.

Integra says,"We are very pleased to mark Integra's first entrance into the
Blu-ray disc player category with the DBS-6.9. Our dealers have been eagerly
anticipating it's arrival and we are very confident it will deliver on what they
have been anticipating."

Along with everyone else, we here at FOSS-AVI have been anticipating this release as well. We will be testing this unit just as soon as we get our hands on one and expect that it will be a hot item for our customers.

Runco Shows Off new products at CEDIA 2008

Excerpted from CEPro Magazine.

Runco unveils seven TVs, the new OPAL technology (optical path alignment) and projectors. Just follow the link to the slideshow.
And in case you were wondering, Foss-AVI is the exclusive South Dakota dealer for the Runco line of displays and projectors.

The thinest mounts on the planet from Chief

This post excerpted from CEPro Magazine an article by By Julie Jacobson.

The patents are filed, and Chief Manufacturing is now poised to launch the thinnest thin TV mounts ever.
The company previewed its new family of Thinstall flat-panel mounts called Thinstall Universal, available in tilt and fixed models. Chief's original Thinstall mount – the one you see in the advertisements with a penny shown for reference – were pretty thin, with a depth of only .49 inches. The problem was that the product was made for a single display, the Hitachi Ultra Thin TV. The new models are universal, which is a good thing given all of the ultra-flat TVs now on the market.

FLATTER THAN THE ORIGINAL
The new Thinstall Universal trumps Chief's original mount, made famous by this ad. Plus, they're even thinner than the originals, leaving only a .39-inch gap between the back of the screen and the wall. Chief product manager Seth Baker thinks it's the "thinnest universal mount on the market." It isn't easy making a flat mount, says Baker, who credits Chief's Paul Smith for designing the ingenious product. It's tough to support a heavy TV with so little hardware, he explains, and then there's the cabling to account for.To accommodate the cabling, Chief's PAC520 in-wall box has ample space for the stuff.

Lots of Tech in Such a Small Space

Then the company has a slew of little innovations that can make all the difference in the world when it comes to stabilizing a TV and getting behind it. Let's start with the "kickstands." (Chief calls them "cable stands" but kickstands makes sense)
How on earth can you get behind an ultra-flat TV that's stuck on an ultra-flat mount, say, if you need to get to a cable?
In the case of Chief (as well as sister company Sanus), you simply lift up the bottom of the TV, and kickstands on each side of the display flip out behind the screen. They hold the TV in place several inches away from the wall, leaving enough room for even the thickest hands to get to the connections. To retract the kickstands, simply tug the tabs at the bottom of the mount, and the TV resumes its normal flush position against the wall. Now, how to keep it there. At the top of the mounts are two latches – fold them down to lock the TV in place; flip them up to adjust the TV's position. Baker indicates that some other flat mounts on the market are secured with little more than Velcro.

Tilt and Fixed Models

Chief is developing several models in the Thinstall Universal line.
The fixed mounts have a depth of only .39 inches; the tilt mounts, just .75 inches in the home position. It tilts down 15 degrees. "It's the lowest-profile fingertip tilt mount ever displayed," says Baker. Mounts will be available for both medium- and large-screen TVs. The mounts will support at least 100 pounds – and probably more in the case of the fixed mounts, Baker says.
The products are expected to ship in October. See the slide show here http://www.cepro.com/slideshow/image/3395/

These would appear to be a great addition to the Chief product line. As usual you can learn more about all the Chief products by contacting Foss-AVI in Sioux Falls, SD

New Construction at our Custom Design Center

In our continuing effort to provide our customers with the latest and greatest Audio/Video experience, we are rebuilding our in-house theater room from the bare concrete up. This will really be a state of the art theater and quite an experience for customers that have never seen and heard A/V in an acoustically tuned room. Here is a link to our web site where we are posting construction pictures as the work progresses. Sometimes it's slow going because the technicians doing the work must also attend to our ever expanding customer base. We like to tell people that what you see being built is the same as we'll build in your home and the people doing the work will be the same too.

Design Center Theater Project

We decided that it was time to do some remodeling. We are building a state of the art dedicated theater room in our Design Center in Sioux Falls. As you would expect it will have all the latest in A/V gear and a few extra bells and whistles for good measure. We thought it would be entertaining to document our work in progress with a photo slide show. You can view our work by clicking on this link. We should also point out that all of the work from the bottom up is being done by our staff and design team. The very same people who would be working in your home theater. So stay tuned, these are exciting times.

LG Unveils LED-Based LCD

Article Excerpted from CEPro Magazine
By Steve Crowe

LG, at its Summer Line Show in New York, introduced its first LED-based LCD the 47LG90.

The 1080p LCD, formerly called the 47LG75, has a 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio, according to the company, and TruMotion 120Hz processing.

The 47-inch LCD uses 1,536 white LEDs that are divided into 128 blocks of 12 LEDs. The LCD has a teardrop design, blue accents and a black finish.

It features three HDMI v1.3 inputs, Invisible speakers, a USB port to support digital photos and music and LG's SimpLink technology, which allows it to integrate with other LG A/V products. One of those products could be the BD300 Blu-ray player that streams Netflix.

The 47LG90 is ISFccc calibration ready and has Intelligent Sensor technology to adjust the lighting for maximum viewing.

They also announced their 2009 HDTVs will support tru2way technology.

LG says the 47LG90 will ship in September.

Product Review from CEPro Magazine

FROM CEPro SCREENING ROOM by Robert Archer

Integra ushers in affordable high-res audio I’ll be the first to admit that I love the allure of high-performance A/V. This segment of the custom market is truly the playground of the rich who desire the latest in eye candy, sonic nirvana and status. Back on planet earth, however, most people (myself included) want the benefits of home theater, multiroom audio or whatever else that offers convenience and entertainment — but we are limited by what we can afford. That’s where the Integra DTC-9.8 Controller comes in. This new pre/pro bundles just about every option an installer or consumer could ever want in a package that’s approachable, both in terms of price and usability. Features The DTC-9.8’s list of features is long and encompassing in that it provides installers with the flexibility to cover just about any installation scenario. The THX Ultra2 certified pre/pro incorporates the latest in home theater technologies. Some of those technologies include HDMI 1.3a with video switching and Silicon Optix’s HQV Reon-VX video processing, Dolby True HD, DTSHD, Audyssey’s MultiEQ XT room acoustics software, Crestron E-Control, AMX Device Discovery, 12-volt triggers, bi-directional RS-232, Remote Interactive over HDMI (RIHD), three zones of audio, Neural THX processing for surround content on satellite radio broadcasts, XM and Sirius satellite radio options and a built-in AM/FM tuner. In addition, the DTC-9.8 sports a plethora of inputs and outputs, the company’s Vector Linear Shaping Circuitry (VLSC) to reduce output distortion, Burr Brown D/A converters and a choice of XLR and RCA outputs to enable the unit to integrate with any amplifier.

Final Thoughts - I was pleasantly surprised with the performance of the DTC-9.8, which was highlighted by its playback of Dolby True HD and DTS-HD Master Audio discs. One of the first things I did was to verify the price of the unit because I thought it was much more expensive than it really was. With all of that said, I would not hesitate in installing the DTC-9.8 in my system. I’m sure the growing number of A/V enthusiasts out there will agree once they demo it. Integra

And as you might expect we here at Foss-AVI are your local Integra Dealers. Come in for a test listen and hear what you've been missing.

Power - It's not just the on-off button

Furman/Panamax Merit-x Power Conditioning Series
Furman/Panamax’s Merit-x line of rackmountable power conditioning products has three new models: the M-8x, with eight filtered and protected rear-panel outlets, the M-8Lx, with pull-out light tubes for discreet rack illumination, and the M-8Dx, which has a laboratory-grade front-panel digital voltmeter to monitor incoming voltage.

Excerpted from CEPro article by Lee Distad

07.14.2008 — Power management devices like surge suppressors, line conditioners, and uninterruptible power supplies are now standard fare for custom installations.

From rack mounted units to ones small enough to hide behind a flat-panel television, they've established themselves as a major product category in their own right.

One innovation that has come down the pipe in the last couple of years has been single units that incorporate surge suppression, line conditioning and UPS, as opposed to having different units for each.

More importantly, many power centers are now Ethernet enabled, making them part of the home's network.

With remotely switched outlets, this means that now your installer can "hard boot" a  locked-up PVR remotely, instead of having to make a service call.

Foss-AVI is a supplier of Panamax Power Products.

Paradigm Electronics is one of the worlds largest speaker manufacturers.

This article by Robert Archer is an excerpt from CEPro Magazine

Loudspeaker Design is a Natural Science to Paradigm

The suburban Toronto-based manufacturer emphasizes value, performance and reliability throughout its engineering and manufacturing processes. You'd never know it by looking at its Web site or by visiting its various trade show booths, but Paradigm Electronics is one of the largest speaker manufacturers.

The Canadian company, known for its value and performance in freestanding and architectural loudspeakers, is driven by a quiet state of motivation. It wants to prove it can build affordable products that perform to the highest standard without sacrificing industrial design.

The company factory is located in Mississauga, Ontario. The engineering, industrial design and manufacturing department, which includes the use of internal machines, wood shops and production lines, are all housed in that one building.

Mark Aling, marketing manager for Paradigm, says the facility recently grew from 235,000 square feet to support the company's growing product line.

Because nearly everything is done in-house, Paradigm has complete control of its entire manufacturing process to support its quality control (QC) procedures. The QC procedures mandates checks of manufacturing tolerances against its reference designs throughout every step of production for every product. Paradigm, as part of the QC process, checks everything from inductor windings and soldered leads, to more advanced elements such as crossover network specifications that have to meet the reference within a .25dB tolerance.

And while CEPro won't tell you this, we certainly will…you can audition an array of Paradigm speakers at the Foss-AVI Design Center in Sioux Falls, SD. Give us a call or visit our web site.

What a no brainer this was

Home Depot has discovered that customers don't buy home automation/integration and security systems in the same way they purchase garage doors and siding. Duh !!! Here's the link to the article from CEPro. As usual you get what you pay for from the big box store. If you want quality, service and real choices for your money, see a custom integrator like Foss-AVI

News from CEPro Magazine

Results from CEPros Top 100 Integrators brand survey

Once a year CEPro Magazine surveys the top 100 Integrators in the country and asks them to rate the manufacturers that they recommend most often to their clients. The categories are broken down to include everything from home theater screens to structured wiring and cable. We bring this to you attention because while we are not yet one of the top 100 integrators, we do share their opinions about the manufacturers and their products. You can see the entire survey by clicking on this link
Here are a few of the product lines that we offer our clients and how they rate with the top 100.

Plasma Screens - Pioneer 56%, Runco 39%
Home Theater Amplifiers - Integra 23%
Audio/Video Receivers - Integra 46%
CD Players - Integra 42%
Projectors - Runco 42%
Lifts & Mounts for displays - Chief 58%
Home Automation - Crestron 70%
Component Display Cabinets/Furniture - Salamander Designs 28%

Again, these are all brands that we offer and highly recommend to our clients. It's nice to know the good company we keep.

This from CEPro Magazine - New Custom Install Products from Pioneer

05.07.2008 — Pioneer is announcing a ton of new products, including two new Blu-ray players, two new Kuro plasmas, and four new A/V receivers. The BDP-51FD and Elite BDP-05FD are Profile 1.1 Blu-ray disc players, offering BonusView capabilities (but not Profile 2.0 BD-Live connectivity).

Check out the products in this slideshow

Features include:

HDMI 1.3a
Dolby Digital Plus/Dolby TrueHD/DTS-HD(a)/DTS HD Master(a)
7.1 Channel Analog Output
Advanced Audio Bitstream
4 Wolfson Professional Audio DACs
The Elite player comes with gold plated connectors, an aluminum front panel and capacitance touch key buttons.

Pioneer is reaching out to the custom installation market with four new Elite Kuro monitors, the 50-inch PRO-111FD, 60-inch PRO-151FD, 50-inch Signature Series PRO-101FD and 60-inch Signature Series PRO-141FD.

“We identified a core need in the custom installation market to deliver unmatched KURO performance to a unique subset of discerning entertainment purists with a passion for entertainment,” says Russ Johnston, EVP of marketing and product planning, home entertainment business solutions group, Pioneer.

“Our Elite monitors are hand-selected to ensure the most pristine picture and premium performance associated with the KURO name and our Pioneer brand.”

All four monitors are 1080p models. The Elite units will be available in June, while the Signature Series models will ship in October and August (101-FD and 141-FD, respectively).

Kuro Plasmas, Projector Unveiled
Pioneer’s Kuro plasma TVs, with the goal of offering the deepest black levels possible, have two new models: the 50-inch PDP-5020FD and 60-inch PDP-6020FD

Both units are 1080p models. The new TVs are 3.7 inches thick, DLNA compliant and feature Pioneer’s Home Media Gallery functionality for networked connectivity. The 50- and 60-inch editions will be available in June.

Pioneer recently outlined its partnership with Panasonic, who will be providing panels for Kuro sets because of the high cost of in-house manufacturing.

The company also officially announced its Kuro projector, designed specifically for the custom installation market. The 1080p LCoS unit will support two HDMI 1.3 connections.

The projector will ship in June only through dealer channels. And if you didn't already guess, Foss-AVI handles Pioneer Electronics.

Revel Loudspeakers

The Revel Ultima Salon2 is the highest expression of Revel technology and performance in loudspeaker design and achieves previously unmatched performance. Offering an elegant, designer-friendly appearance and unparalleled sound quality, the Salon2 is a four-way system with three 8-inch woofers, a 6½-inch mid-woofer, 4-inch midrange and 1-inch tweeter. Its sophisticated design even extends to the cast aluminum input and control panel, which is hidden from view, yet easily accessible. The smoked access panel continues the elegant shape of the cabinet, even when viewed from the side or rear. Be sure and click on the link to the Revel site to see and learn more about these great speakers.

A/V Receivers For Your Next Home Theater

This from CEPro

 A roundup of the top rated A/V Receivers for your home theater project reveals that Foss-AVI carries three of the top brands. This should not come as a surprise to anyone as we strive to offer only the best for your Home A/V projects.

First up is Cambridge Audio 640R. 

The Cambridge Audio 640R’s 7 amplifiers are carefully isolated from the processing and input stages to maximize signal quality. In addition to HDMI and analog video switching, the 640R uses A-BUS for multiroom functionality. 

Next we have the Integra DTR-7.8

Integra is popular with integrators because of how well it can be controlled via either IR or RS-232. Their new A/V receiver is packed; in addition to HDMI v1.3a switching with Faroudja DCDi processing, it offers auto calibration, XM and Sirius connectivity, and Dolby Pure HD and DTS Master Audio decoding.

And lastly we have the Yamaha RXV-3800
In addition to its iPod dock, Yamaha’s new A/V receiver can connect to your LAN to access mp3 and WAV files on up to 4 PCs in your network, as well as access and control Yamaha’s MusicCAST server. If that’s not enough for you, it also offers HDMI v1.3a switching and upconversion of analog video sources to HDMI output.

File this one under Plasma Public Service Announcement

This is an interesting site put together by the Plasma Display Coalition It is well worth reading as it addresses some of the questions that everyone has about display technology.

News from Runco CEO & Founder Sam Runco

As many of you may have heard, Planar, Inc. announced that it has acquired Runco International. Planar has a company philosophy akin to what Runco has always stood for – excellence in technology, outstanding quality and service and dedicated focus to its custom channel partners. This union will create an unstoppable force in custom home theater and accelerate the vision for all three brands. As a founding CEDIA member and as the CEO and founder of Runco, I am excited about what this means for the future. While this acquisition combines the many market strengths of Planar Systems, Inc. and Runco International, the brands, products, sales and partner strategies remain unchanged. Planar is not looking to replace the Runco or Vidikron line, but to strengthen all three brands in the custom high-end home theater market.

Runco plans to release several new products in the second quarter of 2008 so stay tuned. And just in case you're interested check out the 103 inch plasma display.

This from the Feb. 08 Issue of CEPro

This from our favorite magazine CEPro.

Escient Offers First Video Server The Vision VS servers are the first Escient media managers to support DVD ripping. They also accommodate up to four external DVD changers. Of course it goes without saying that Foss-AVI offers the entire line of Escient Products. We featured these at the recent Home Show and they performed flawlessly, just as they will in your home.

Escient has finally added DVD storage to its line of media servers. In the past, the company — which pioneered CD music streaming — stuck to legally safe ground by managing DVD collections in a disc changer, but not supporting DVD ripping. That changed during the CEDIA Expo, when the company debuted an entirely new media management solution that allows users to rip both CDs and DVDs onto a hard drive and deliver the content to remote rooms of the house. “We’re taking the leap,” says Escient GM Bill Carson. “It builds on the core Fireball middleware developed over the last five years.” Fireball is Escient’s flagship brand of hard-drive media servers. The series, called Vision, is anchored by the VS-100 and VS-200 integrated servers/players. They offer 500 GB and 1 TB of storage, respectively — both with RAID 1 redundancy. The units have four HDMI inputs for connecting compatible DVD changers, and there is a switcher built in. Another product in the Vision line is the VC-1 , a networked A/V zone player that acts as a client to stream content from VS servers to remote rooms. Rounding out the line is a large capacity media server called the VX-600, featuring four 1 TB drives in a RAID 5 configuration and unlimited expandability. The VX-600 provides advanced early detection monitoring systems. “It’s monitoring the system all the time,” says Carson. If a drive is on the brink of failure, the system could alert the integrator. ■ —Julie Jacobson

The War Is Over!

This post is excerpted from Terry White's Tech Blog if you're into tech gadgets, digital photography and all things Adobe, it's a must regular read.

It’s finally over! No, not that war. The High Def, format war has come to an end. Toshiba has announced that they will stop making HD-DVD players clearing the path for Sony with Blu-ray. The company held a press conference in Japan this morning, announcing that it will aim to stop shipping HD DVD products by the end of March 2008.

“We carefully assessed the long-term impact of continuing the so-called ‘next-generation format war’ and concluded that a swift decision will best help the market develop,” said Atsutoshi Nishida, Toshiba president and CEO. So that's the official word. Now you can focus your attention clearly on Blu-ray and later in the year start outfitting your HDTV’s with Blu-ray players. At the moment the Sony Playstation 3 is still the best bet for a Blu-ray player. You not only get a good gaming machine, but you also get the only Blu-ray player that is upgradeble via firmware updates to the new Blu-ray features slated for release later in the year. Newer players could be released that are just as upgradeable, but if you’re looking to finally get on board with a Blu-ray player now, I would strongly suggest looking at the PS3.

2008 Sioux Empire Home Show

As usual Foss-AVI will be exhibiting our custom products at this years Home Show held at the Sioux Falls Convention Center from February 28th through March 2nd. This year we'll be featuring the concept of Distributed Audio & Video for the Home. Our featured products will be Runco Displays, Paradigm Speakers, Integra and Escient Electronics. If you're at the show be sure and stop by booth E-9. Look for the big overhead Foss-AVI banner. We hope to see you there.

LG press conference from the CES Show

A late posting from the CES Show. This slide show from CEPro Magazine is a press conference from LG. Foss-AVI has found the LG brand of Plasmas and LCDs to be very popular and reliable with our customers. Here's a link to the slide show.

Fun Stuff - The 8 Biggest TVs ever made

This entertaining bit of fluff comes to you courtesy of CEPro Magazine. Click on the link to view the show.

A slideshow guide to custom lifts for your display

The Ultimate guide to mounts and lifts from CEPro Magazine. Click on the link to view.

Toshiba Hints at moving to Blu-Ray

Excerpted from an article appearing in CEPro Magazine
By Jason Unger of CEPro Magazine
Filed in: News, Product News, Blu-ray/HD DVD

02.15.2008 — Toshiba is planning to abandon HD DVD in the next few weeks, according to a story in the Hollywood Reporter, which cites “reliable industry sources.”

The Hollywood Reporter quotes Toshiba’s Jodi Sally as saying that recent developments are shifting the company’s outlook.
“Given the market developments in the past month,” she is reported as saying, “Toshiba will continue to study the market impact and the value proposition for consumers, particularly in light of our recent price reductions on all HD DVD players.”
The story also quotes an HD DVD source saying the move could come soon. “An announcement is coming soon,” the source is reported as saying. “It could be a matter of weeks.”
Toshiba isn’t commenting on the story, calling it “rumors and speculation.” So please, take it with a grain of salt until any official announcement is made.
Just this week, Netflix and Best Buy both announced that they will be supporting Blu-ray.
At CES, Toshiba said they were committed to HD DVD despite Warner Bros.’ decision to release its discs solely on Blu-ray starting this May.
Since the January event, both sides have announced incentives for buying hardware and software, with Toshiba cutting prices of players significantly.

HD-DVD vs Blu-Ray or maybe something else entirely…

This post is excerpted from The New York Times CES Bits pages
High-Definition Movies, Without the Format War
By BRAD STONE

As the major studios continue to battle over Blu-ray and HD DVD, the competing standards for high-definition DVDs, it’s always worth considering whether both camps are ultimately doomed – leapfrogged by straight-to-the-home digital downloads of high definition movies.
The working prototype of a Vudu box, with its remote. Last summer, I wrote about Vudu, one of several companies selling a movie store-in-a-box service to consumers. The company has distribution deals with all the major studios and more than 5,000 movies available for instantaneous television viewing via its $400 device.
Now Vudu is here at the Consumer Electronics Show making a few interesting announcements. It says it is going to start introducing high-definition movies, starting with 70 titles. Oddly, it is not disclosing which studios are participating, but from the list of available films (”Star Trek,” “Transformers,” “A Mighty Heart,” “The Bourne Ultimatum”) it appears that Paramount and Universal are involved.
New HD releases will cost $5.99 to rent, while older titles will rent for $3.99 – slightly higher prices than the standard definition titles on the Vudu service. To really make the Blu-Ray, HD-DVD war irrelevant, of course, Vudu will have to add more than 70 titles and other direct download services, like Amazon Unbox, must start adding HD movies as well. But that can’t be that far off.
Vudu’s got some other news as well – its new $999 Vudu XL box (for rich movie buffs) sports a terabyte of storage capable of storing 500 movies.
Vudu’s digital TV box has a raft of strong competition from Apple, Amazon and now, Netflix, which announced a deal with LG Electronics last week. Patrick Cosson, Vudu’s vice president of sales and marketing, suggested that some of the digital video announcements coming from C.E.S. this week may be, in the industry’s parlance, a tad vaporish.
“Vudu is not a promise, it is a working device,” he said. “It’s not someone’s pipe dream, where they are saying that sometime next year they will release something. There’s a lot of work that has to go into delivering what were talking about. We’ve done it and we’re proving that its working.”

Pioneer is the New Black

This post is excerpted from the New York Times CES Bits pages

Black Is the Color of My True Love’s TV
By ERIC TAUB

When TV manufacturers tout their excellent picture, they often refer to the display’s resolution, the number of pixels it can put on a screen. But image aficionados know that pixels don’t make up the whole picture, so to speak. Equally important to good picture quality is the screen’s contrast ratio, its ability to display a wide range of tones, from dark blacks to white whites.
According to Pioneer executives at a C.E.S. press conference in Las Vegas Sunday, the debate as to who has the best contrast ratio is over. In a new plasma TV now in their labs and not yet ready for production, Pioneer says it has achieved blacks so black that they literally can’t be seen. In a pitch-black room, Pioneer execs said, a viewer cannot even tell the set is on if it is showing only black. Which makes their contrast ratio “off the charts.”

“True black is the holy grail of providing a great picture,” said Russ Johnston, Pioneer’s executive vice president of manufacturing and product planning. “This is an end to the discussion.”  Follow this link to see for yourself. 

And by the way. Foss-AVI has been selling a lot of Pioneer Plasma's, so they must be doing something right. Check out the photo courtesy of Pioneer of their 60 inch plasma display.

File this one under life imitating art.

This post is excerpted from the New York Times CES Bits pages

A Wave of Information
By ERIC TAUB

The technology featured in the blockbuster movie “Minority Report” is coming to a Hilton hotel near you.
The film showed Tom Cruise manipulating images on a large video screen by simply moving his hands around the display. Reactrix, a Silicon Valley company allied with Samsung, has created a system that mimics those features.
Think Wii without the remote, and you’ve got the idea. And Mike Ribero, Reactrix’s chief executive, readily admits that familiarity with the Nintendo paradigm is what makes the system so understandable.
Stand within 15 feet of a Reactrix-equipped Samsung L.C.D., wave your hands in the air, and watch a cursor (or other object) move around the screen.
During the demo in Samsung’s booth, users could control two boxers by punching the air, or puncture balloons with a virtual dart. If you weren’t watching the screen but only looked at the gyrating players, you would swear that they were possessed.
And we’ll all be able to look equally silly this summer, when 115 Hilton hotels get the screens to serve as “virtual concierges.” Hotel guests will be able to check in and get various information by moving a cursor across the screen with a wave of the hand. You might want to make sure no one is watching.

If size matters - don't miss this one

This post is excerpted from the New York Times CES Bits
Electronics Makers Look for the Next Display
By SAUL HANSELL

For the last several years, the biggest story in the biggest market in consumer electronics—televisions—has been the war between plasma and liquid-crystal displays. In the market now, L.C.D.s have clearly won. Even Matsushita,, the biggest backer of plasma technology, is investing in a big new L.C.D. plant.  But that isn’t keeping electronics makers from looking for the next big thing in televisions. Big, of course, is always a sure bet for bragging rights. And Matsushita’s Panasonic brand showed off a 150-inch plasma set, for those with an 11-foot-wide space and nothing to put in it. Beyond such stunts, Panasonic introduced new technology meant to make plasma sets thinner. To see a video clip of the 150 inch, 4096 x 2160 display resolution monster follow this link http://gizmodo.com/341676/video-hands+on-with-the-150+inch-panasonic-lifescreen-plasma

Cool Stuff from CES 2008

Following the footsteps of last year's Best of CES winner in the TV category, Samsung's FP-T94W series, LG this year is introducing its own wireless plasma TVs. The series is called PG70, and it includes the 50-inch 50PG70 and the 60-inch 60PG70. Yes, you'll still need to connect the power cord, but all those pesky audio-video connections can be moved to a separate AV transceiver box that networks with the panel over the 802.11n wireless standard. Judging from LG's claims regarding its similar wireless LCDs, the box can be set up to 50 feet from the panel and going wireless doesn't impact picture or sound quality. Unlike those LCDs and Samsung's units, however, the box on the PG70 series is optional (price TBD), so you can wait to invest in wireless. These sets will carry THX Display certification, for what that's worth, when they ship in the third quarter of 2008--pricing was not disclosed at press time. Here's a photo courtesy of LG.

International Consumer Electronics Show

Consumer Electronics Show (CES) 2008 starts January 7 in Las Vegas. Foss-AVI will be posting new product info and other tidbits from the country's largest electronics show. If you’re not going to CES, stick with the Foss-AVI blog for product announcements that you may be interested in being the first to know about. It's pretty cool to be able to tell your friends what's on the horizon in the home electronics field. CES is a big show—if you’ve been there, you know it. So stay tuned to this blog.

So much to see…So little time.

We have found that the educated, tech savvy consumer is becoming more the norm than the exception in today's market. With the internet and search engines you can at the push of a button avail yourself of an overwhelming amount of information. Sounds like a good thing - Maybe Not.

How do you make sense of all that information. Is it possible to buy a 60" high def plasma TV for $150. The no-name reseller says it's just as good as the name brand. As Clint Eastwood once said, "are you feeling lucky today." We thought a good place to start this informational blog would be to link to a few of the magazines that we subscribe to. You'll also find them in the links section to the left. They are filled with product reviews and editorial commentary about the industry in which we work and in which you may be interested. CEPro Magazine, Electronic House and The Robb Report for Home Electronics. We'll be posting articles from these magazines on this blog on a regular basis. We hope you find them informative and entertaining. Let us know what you think.

We all have to begin somewhere…

Since today is the beginning of our walk-in Design Center hours, please wish us good luck with this new venture. If you know Foss-AVI as a current customer or from our advertising you know that we have always done business by appointment. We just thought it was time to make the really cool stuff we have to offer more accessible to the public. We will still honor appointments if you wish, just give us a call at 605-336-9550 or visit the site at Foss-AVI to learn more. If you live in the area of Sioux Falls, SD and are in the market for top of the line  A/V equipment just drop by during our open hours from 4 PM to 7 PM on Tuesdays and Thursdays and 1 PM to 5 PM on Saturdays. You won't be disappointed.