Items tagged with Philips
Following in the footsteps of the 49-inch Brilliance 499P9H, Philips has announced a new SuperWide monitor. The latest is the Brilliance 439P9H, which is a massive 43-inch panel with a gentle 1800R curve. The SuperWide display (32:10) has a resolution of 3840x1200, which could easily allow you to replace two lower-resolution displays on your desk, and cut down on the rat’s nest of cables lurking around your work area. In this instance, it would be like having a pair of 1920x1200 panels at your disposal. The 439P9H's VA panel is VESA-certified for DisplayHDR 400 compliance (over HDMI and DisplayPort), has a 450 cd/m² brightness rating, a 4ms (gray to gray) response time, 100Hz refresh...
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Philips heavily invested into tech that it integrated with some of its higher-end TVs years back called Ambiglow or Ambilight. That tech put a backlight behind the TV that would glow to match the action on screen with light that filled the room. Watch a flick with the Incredible Hulk and your room would glow green. It is slick technology that not only improved immersion in a movie, but the light also helped to bias the eye to prevent flicker from the screen from straining your eyes in a dark room. Philips is now doing something similar for owners of its Hue lightbulbs with a new app called "Philips Hue Sync" for Mac and Windows. With that app, the user can sync Hue lightbulbs with films, music,...
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Philips is cranking out a truly high-end display in the form of the Momentum 43-inch gaming monitor. Besides its rather mammoth (for a gaming display) screen size, the Momentum is notable for its support for the DisplayHDR 1000 standard. Up until now, the VESA standards organization has recognized DisplayHDR 400 and DisplayHDR 600 certified displays, which have brightness ratings of 400 nits and 600 nits respectively. However, given the DisplayHDR 1000 rating, the new Philips Momentum boasts a brightness rating of 1,000 nits. The display supports 4K resolutions (3840x2160) and 10-bit color input. In addition, it is able to cover 97.6 percent of the DCI-P3 color space. Other features...
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EPI, the North American brand partner for Philips monitors, has announced that it will have a very drool-worthy monitor available to purchase in the U.S. later this year. The 49-inch Philips Brilliance 492P8 is a curved super-wide display with a native resolution of 5120 x 1440. That wide panel is a VA unit with 1800R curvature, up to 600 nits brightness and up to 5000:1 contrast ratio. Viewing angles are 178-degrees and it has very narrow bezels. The thin bezels of the monitor are intended to make them ideal for people that want to stack them in multiple monitor setups. EPI is aiming these monitors directly at finance, engineering, design, A/V production and other industries. Unfortunately,...
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On the desktop, a 4K resolution isn't just hard on our graphics cards; it can be hard on our eyeballs as well. When the first 4K monitors hit the market, most of them used similar form-factors as 1440p models, despite needing to cram way more pixels into that space. Speaking from experience, 4K on a 28" monitor can be headache-inducing, and it's for that reason that larger 4K panels can hold a lot of appeal. Philip's latest foray into 4K definitely has a lot of appeal with its 40-inch screen size, which means it'll require a fair bit of desk space, but your eyes won't bleed from squinting at the desktop. The Brilliance BDM4037UW is also priced attractively ($999) and foregoes a TN panel...
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Some people have the ability to light up a room just by their very presence. So can you, says Philips, when you use its Hue gen 2 app for iOS and Android. The new generation app for the company's smart lighting system gives you better control over your home illumination along with some intuitive ways of brightening up a room. One of the new features is called Rooms. Using the Rooms feature, you can group all of the lights in one room together to control them all at the same time. This can be handy for rooms like kitchens and the basement where you might have lights installed in different locations, each of which is controlled with a different switch. The second generation Hues app also supports...
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Philips is getting ready to release what it claims is the world's first quantum dot desktop monitor, the 276E6ADS. It's a 27-inch display with a Full HD 1080p (1920x1080) resolution, which is nothing to write home about, though what's interesting about the monitor is that it supposedly delivers 99 percent coverage of the Adobe RGB color space. There's an excellent primer on Wired about quantum dot technology, which was a point of focus at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas earlier this year. Quantum dots are semiconductor nanocrystals engineered to emit light. They have narrow light emission properties that enable a wider color gamut for improved color fidelity and better backlight...
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Philips has a great product with its Hue LED lighting system, but up to this point, it's suffered one glaring flaw: it's a little pricey. It seems the company isn't ignorant of this fact, nor the one that most people are not going to buy into the Hue ecosystem until it becomes more affordable. Fortunately, a cheaper solution is on its way, and while it's only been announced for Europe, it seems likely that demand could bring it to other parts of the world, including North America. The latest product is called Hue wireless dimming kit and will retail for €40 (~$45 USD). It'll include a simple dimmer switch as well as a single light bulb - additional bulbs can be purchased for about $20 a pop....
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Incandescent bulbs may be a 19th century invention, but some people swear by the bulbs due to the pleasant light they give off (despite the drain they put on your energy bill). For a time, CFLs were seen as the next logical step as a replacement for incandescent bulbs in residential homes, but LED technology is quickly dropping in price and more and more people are starting to embrace the extremely efficient bulbs. Philips is hoping to capitalize on the efficiency revolution with a new family of LED bulbs that will be available starting in early May. The new Everyday LED bulb is equivalent to a 60W incandescent bulb, but only sips 8.5 watts and puts out 800 lumens. The A19 bulb clocks in at 2700K...
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Last month, news emerged that Philips was suing Nintendo over alleged patent infringements in the U.S., and the proverbial chickens are already coming home to roost in other countries. According to Reuters, Philips said it has won a patent suit in the UK (although no details about amounts for compensation have been shared). The patents concern motion, gesture, and pointing control that Philips licenses to companies that make set-top boxes and game consoles, and the company has asserted that Nintendo has been using the technology in the Wii U without a functioning license agreement. Philips spokesman Bjorn Teuwsen told the outlet that the company had been trying to come to terms with Nintendo...
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Logitech Harmony Ultimate and Smart Control Remotes Add SONOS Speaker Support, Speech To Text Search
Logitech has added more functionality to some of its remote control products, and with them the company is aiming for a smarter home. The Logitech Harmony Ultimate and Logitech Harmony Smart Control now have the ability to control SONOS wireless HIFi System speakers and Philips Hue lights, and they offer speech-to-text capabilities through the associated Harmony App. The speech-to-text functionality is particularly useful for searching for content on your set-top device such as the new Amazon Fire TV, and the app uses Siri or Android Speech Recognition (depending, obviously, on your device). This update also grants the Harmony Hub remote setup to a number of devices including Roku boxes as well...
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To paraphrase David Letterman, we wouldn’t give Nintendo’s troubles to a monkey on a rock. Amid a terrible sales performance that only got worse over the first quarter of this year (Nintendo president Satoru Iwata took a 50% pay cut over the the Wii U’s awful sales back in January) and a mini-scandal when word emerged that users couldn’t be same-sex couples in the 3DS handheld console game Tomodachi Life (an oversight for which Nintendo has apologized), the company has a lawsuit on its hands. Philips is suing Nintendo over two potential patent infringements. The first concerns a “virtual body control device”, which pertains to essentially all the Wii controllers....
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Philips is developing an intelligent lighting system for supermarkets that communicate with your smartphone to guide you through the store, give you deals on products, show you recipes relevant to the items you’re trying to find, and more. In addition to offering efficient LED lighting that the company says will require no special infrastructure changes, the light fixtures act as a positioning grid. “Each fixture is identifiable and able to communicate its position to an app on a shopper’s smart device,” reads a Philips press release. “This enables the shopper to get information related to his position in the store as they move around the store and location-based...
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If you're in need of a new monitor for your gaming machine, you're in good shape. We've already seen a number of display announcements at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, including an interesting 27-inch panel by Philips that uses NVIDIA's G-SYNC technology to synchronize refresh rates to the PC's GPU. The "Philips 27-inch Gaming Monitor with G-SYNC" (model 272G5DYEB) rocks a Full HD 1080p (1920x1080) resolution, 1,000:1 contrast ratio (typical), 300cd/cm2 brightness, and a 144Hz refresh rate with 1ms response time for fast action visuals presumably void of ghosting and other nasty artifacts. "This 27-inch Philips monitor is a perfect gaming partner, with G-SYNC technology bringing...
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Historians can argue the exact date of the compact cassette tape's birth, but as far as Philips is concerned, it was on this day in 1963 when the company first launched the format at its headquarters in Amsterdam. It's hard to believe it's been that long, but that makes the compact cassette 50 years old today. "This month, Philips, the innovator behind compact cassette technology, celebrates the cassette’s golden anniversary. That’s 50 years of playing, recording, fast forwarding, rewinding and flipping the tape," Philips said. "As a company rooted in continuing our commitment to meaningful innovation, few inventions have been as culturally meaningful in the last 50 years as the compact...
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You don't have to worry if you just plunked down a wad of cash on a swank Full HD 1080 large screen television, it will serve you well for years to come. At the same time, the transition to 4K might be a little more swift than most anticipated. More and more TV makers are launching 4K sets (albeit comparatively expensive ones), including Philips, which unveiled its first 4K UHD (Ultra High Definition) TV line at IFA in Berlin today. The company's 9000 Series kicks off with 65-inch and 84-inch 4K UHD TVs sporting a 3840x2160 resolution. Content for such high resolution displays is a bit lacking at the moment, though the 9000 Series will happily upscale viewing material when watching from Blu-ray,...
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Philips is making a big splash in the HDTV market with the Philips DesignLine TV, which looks like just a large piece of glass with an incredibly thin “TV surface” taped on. (Yes, taped.) There’s no bezel, no body, and if the promotional photos and video are to be believed, no cables or wires. (We’re guessing the latter will show up when you install one of these in your home.) To say that the new Philips DesignLine TV is “striking” or “beautiful” is to almost do the design and engineering teams a disservice. It really just looks like a solid sheet of glass, and they added a bit of gradient color that gives the unit a bit of shape and form. The gradient...
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According to a Reuters report, the European Commission is planning to level fines at six major electronics companies that participated in a price-fixing scheme for CRT displays in the late ‘90s. The apparently guilty parties include LG Electronics, Philips, Samsung SDI, France’s Thomson, Panasonic, and Toshiba. Presumably, the companies have all been bracing for this inevitability, as they were raided by the European Commission five years ago, and the day of reckoning is likely to be November 28th. European Commission building It’s unclear how much the sanctions against the companies may be, but because of the length of time over which the price fixing occurred, they may be...
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Glasses-free 3D? For many, it's a pipe dream. The newest 3D revolution, which roughly began around the time that CES 2010 started, has faded somewhat. Yes, it's still booming in cinemas, but having to wear glasses just doesn't seem that appealing in the home. That said, the concept of seeing 3D without any facial intrusions is a bright one, and both Dolby and Philips think that it may be sooner rather than later before that concept comes to life. The two companies have unveiled Dolby 3D, a 3D HD format and suite of technologies designed to deliver full HD 3D content to 3D-enabled devices, including glasses-free displays. It's being unveiled and shown at the NAB Show in Las Vegas. Both companies...
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Posture. It's an important thing. And for many computer users, keeping it for an extended period of time is very tough. Philips is clearly aware of those struggles, and to deal with them they have introduced the world's first ErgoSensor display. It's designed "for a healthy, productive workplace," boasting an intelligent center and sensor network that can advise you how to sit in an ergonomically correct position while at your computer screen. Outside of telling you how to best position yourself while computing, it also includes a time-break reminder, neck posture detection / corrective advice, user prescence detection and a low bezel-to-table height. Other specs include a 24-inch screen, 1920x1080...
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There's plenty of moving and shaking in the television / display business these days, with everyone from Samsung to Hon Hai to Sharp to Sony making significant changes in recent months. Now, Philips is joining that crowd. Display profits have been largely sinking over the past few years, making it harder and harder for companies to turn a nice profit on HDTVs. Margins are razor thin, and competition is incredibly fierce. In order to adjust to the changing realities of business, Philips is transitioning their television business into a joint venture with TPV Technology. The new entity will be named TP Vision, and it'll be 70% owned by TPV and 30% by Philips. TP Vision will develop, manufacture...
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Vampires and Wesley Snipes come to mind when we think of Blade 2, or at least that's what our minds would conjure up prior to today. But going forward, we may find ourselves thinking about Philips and its new Blade 2 monitor (239C4QHSB) with a 24-inch In-Plane Switching (IPS) display, ultra-slim form factor, and stylish design. Philips new monitor measures just 12.5mm deep and ships in "classy black" or "elegant white." It has an angled base and arm that give the panel a sense of modern style, which is something we've noticed more and more monitor makers paying attention to these days. "The Philips Blade 2 demonstrates the company's ability to deliver versatile monitors that combines cutting-edge...
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