CES 2000 Picture Gallery!

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Site created 12/15/97.

page created: 1/8/00
(updated 1/13/00)

CES 2000 Picture Gallery

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This is Bits editor Bill Hunt here, and over the next 10 pages or so, I'm going to give you my thoughts and perspective on our visit to CES 2000.

The last few years we've gone to CES, it invariably happens that we get tied up in meetings and appointments, and we never get to see all the goodies on display. So this year, Frank and I decided that we'd cover the event combat-style - hit the show floor only and look at everything we wanted to see, all in one day. That's no small task. CES occupies the entire (and massive) Las Vegas Convention Center (including tents in the parking lot!), along with more halls at the nearby Hilton, the entire Sands Expo and Convention Center, and even the Alexis Park. And that doesn't include the thousands of private meeting rooms and suites that the exhibiting companies rent to entertain guests and clients during the event. There is just no way to see it all. So Frank and I made up a game plan of the exhibits and booths we knew wanted to visit for sure, and anything else we saw along the way would be just gravy.

We hit the road from L.A. bound for Vegas on Wednesday night, got in about 10 PM and grabbed a late dinner. Okay... we also managed to sneak in a quick run through the Star Trek Adventure at the Hilton, and I checked the odds on the Vikings to win the Superbowl at the hotel's sportsbook (FYI... they're 6 to 1) - gotta have some fun in Vegas, right? And while we left the wives at home, we had too much work to do to get ourselves into any good trouble. So after a scant few hours of sleep, we set off to the convention floor, armed with note pads and a digital camera. Here's what we saw....

Welcome to CES 2000 at the Las Vegas Convention Center!

Another view of the welcome sign.

The first booth we visited on Thursday, was Zenith's exhibit of digital TVs and DVD players. They were first not because we just had to see them first - they were closest to the door. ;-) But their setup was pretty impressive anyway. Right off the bat, we were treated to an array of thin-screen digital plasma TVs, all capable of displaying HDTV programming. The display you see below was showing high-def images from Disney's animated Tarzan, as well as sports footage and other clips being broadcast by CBS.

A high-def digital plasma display by Zenith.

As amazing as the show was - and let me tell you, both Frank and I could've watched the high-def video all day long - we were there to look at DVD. And once again, Zenith's offerings were impressive. The first thing we looked at, was their prototype DVD recorder, the DVDR-2300.

Zenith DVDR-2300 recordable DVD player.

The nice thing about this player-recorder, is that it uses DVD-RW format discs, meaning that they'll be able to play on other players (although I'm told that older, existing DVD players MAY require firmware upgrades to enable them to recognize DVD-RW discs). The DVD-RW discs hold 4.7GB of data, which translates to about 2 hours of programming at DVD-Video quality, or 6 hours at VCD quality (you can choose the quality level, just like you choose the record speed on a VCR). The recordings are fully MPEG-2, with 2-channel sound only. The DVDR-2300 is in all other respects a fully-functional DVD player (with DTS output). According to Zenith, it's expected to ship sometime in the 4th Qtr of 2000, and the estimated retail price should be somewhere in the neighborhood of $600.

Zenith's DVDR-2300 player at work in the booth.

As far as picture quality... it isn't going to blow you away. One thing to keep in mind, is that the high level of image quality we're all used to on DVD-Video is dependent on teams of trained experts in color timing and MPEG-2 compression, working at highly-specialized post production facilities. You're just not going to get that kind of quality from a chip. Still, the recordings (at best quality) resemble video from a digital camcorder - which is plenty fine for home use.

Zenith HDP-2000 high-def DVD player technology demonstration.

In addition to recordable DVD, Zenith was also showing off their efforts at High Definition DVD. And their efforts were very impressive. Using specially developed 18GB HD-DVD discs, they were able to fit a little less than 2 hours of high-def video onto a single disc (at an average video bit rate of 19.4 mbps). And all of the physical disc "formats" of current DVD can be adapted to HD-DVD discs (dual-layered, dual-sided, etc...) to allow for even more storage capacity. The picture quality was astonishing. The picture you see below shows a Zenith HDTV being driven from their prototype HDP-2000 player.

A high-def display driven by the HDP-2000.

But before you get all excited, and start worrying that current DVD is about to go the way of the do-do, know this - EVERYONE we spoke to at CES was careful to inform us that HD-DVD is still MANY years away. The Zenith rep I spoke with said that even the most optimistic estimate for a possible HD-DVD rollout to consumers was at least 5 years away, and probably more like 10. Their display was meant to demonstrate technical capability only (as were all of the HD-DVD displays at CES). The reasons for this are that even though the technical hurdles have been overcome for the most part, the studios and manufacturers have only just begun to discuss the actual technical specifications for an HD-DVD format. Haggling out a format agreement takes years (DVD itself was delayed for many years while all the industry players negotiated the details). And the biggest concern is, of course, digital copy protection. In light of the recent CSS-encryption hack, you can bet that the studios are going to be extremely slow and careful about allowing their precious catalogs of films to be made available on disc in high-definition format.

I'm reminded of my own experiences in this area - being involved in the industry for as long as I have, I had seen demonstrations of true HDTV as early as the mid to late 1980s. That aside, only NOW - some 10 to 15 years later - are we seeing the actual industry-wide conversion to HDTV here in the States. So as neat as HD-DVD is, don't hold your breath.

Nuon-enhancement for DVD makes set-top players game machines.

From the Zenith booth, Frank and I moved on to Nuon, which is a pretty interesting technology enhancement for standard DVD players. In an nutshell, Nuon is a special chip (designed with VM labs and manufactured by Motorola) which is added to DVD players, allowing much greater interactivity between the user and the software. This interactivity can turn set-top DVD players into full-on gaming consoles. It can allow you to surf the web with your DVD player. And it can dramatically enhance the interactive possibilities with DVD movies.

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