If the Blu-ray Player market in Germany is any indication, finally Bu-ray sales may be kicking in. With average prices at the 300 Euros barrier, GfK reports more than 30,000 units sold in Germany in December (out of 110,000 for the year).

Blu-ray suffers from competition from online delivery but also from upscaling technology. With more than 11 million HD-ready or Full HD TV sets on the market in Germany, the market potential is there but buyers penalized Blu-Ray for the prolonged standards war and high hardware prices.

Already 17% of standard DVD players sold (and even 53% of the DVD Recorders in December) has the ability to upscale standard DVD signals to nearly HD quality.

The average price of 95 Euros for a standard DVD Player (with upscaling functionality about 200 Euros) is far below the average price of a Blu-ray Player. Even DVD Recorders with an integrated HDD were on average only marginally more expensive than Blu-ray Players.

At Futuresource Consulting, senior market analyst Mai Hoang says, “Last year in the U.S. alone, BD video retail sales increased by a whopping 320% to 24 million units; and we’re going to see momentum continuing in 2009, with over 80 million disc sales forecast.” The uptake of BD in Western Europe is still at the early-adopter stage, but it continues to gather momentum.

Go GfK on Blu-ray in Germany

Bryston brings out the BR2 multifunction remote control, designed to give consumers control of the Bryston BCD-1 CD player, the Bryston BDA-1 outboard DAC, as well as Bryston’s integrated amplifiers and preamplifiers.

"We had been in the process of designing an elegant remote just for the BDA-1 outboard DAC, when we realized that many consumers who purchase the DAC are likely to own other Bryston components,” reports Bryston Sales VP James Tanner. “It was our goal to embed control functions of our other products into the BR2, creating one elegant solution that provides both control and convenience from a single device." The BR2 is made from milled aluminum, is available in either black or silver.

Go Bryston

   Toshiba calls it "the first ever upscaling TV," the new REGZA ZV series. Using Toshiba’s Resolution + technology, the REGZA ZV is able to improve the picture quality of standard definition TV broadcasts and DVD images to a level approaching high definition.

At the heart is the firm’s Quad Core HD processor (the SpursEngine) that reviews adjacent areas of an image to determine "waveforms of a similar nature", before combining pixel information to enhance edge detail and improve the perceived depth and texture of the final picture.

Comes in a 42" or 46" screen: the 46" model betters the 42" model’s 17,000:1 contrast ratio with a 30,000:1 value.

Both sets feature 100Hz frame rates and have a built-in digital tuner. Three HDMI ports are integrated as standard. Coming in December to market…

Go Toshiba Upscaling Regza

The UK market for consumer electronics suffers year on year, infected by further declines in both unit sales and turnover in the last three months. Despite that, GfK says Home Theatre continues to find favour among consumers.

Yes, part of the reason is the volume sales for flat panel TVs, often sold in a package that includes a Home Theatre System. But GfK says the market is now worth £152 million (up 23%) and 638,000 units (up 22%) in the 52 weeks ending July 2008. In addition, the average price has hardly altered in four years (£255 in 2004 against £239 in 2008).

This relatively high price comes off the backs of independent retailers, whose ASP is almost double the market average at £451 (and there are some products costing in excess of £2000). These high average prices give independents 29% of Home Theatre turnover in UK.

Two-channel products saw further growth, although they are still worth less than 20% of the Home Theatre market. These are another example of turnover potential with an average price of £326 in the last 52 weeks against £221 for more traditional 5-channel models.

The case for surround sound is further strengthened by speaker systems, traditionally the preserve of High End specialist HIFI manufacturers (who are also responsible for some excellent business in Home Theatre Systems referred to above), while volume sales have been boosted by the Mass Merchandisers distribution channel in the last two years. The upshot is a total market approaching 150,000 units a year at an average price of nearly £200.

Go GfK Retail and Technology

BMB Electronics, exclusive European mainland distributor for ReQuest, will launch ReQuest’s new Intelligent Media Client.

Texas Instruments DLP  is developing technology that allows two people to view two different programs simultaneously while on the same TV.

TI wants to sell this chip-driven technology to be incorporated in a third-party home entertainment system for 2D, 3D or "dual view mode" on the same TV. Dual view mode, step-daughter to 3D viewing, allows two images, but two different images that are diverged (as opposed to 3D where they are converged for one affect).

At this point, each viewer would wear different glasses -- one exposing only view "A" and one for view  "B." At least one viewer would need to wear a headset in order to get the correct audio. For yor customers, this could cause severe sibling rivalry.