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Yamaha Music UK has opened the doors of a dedicated Audio Visual Division and has appointed industry veteran (and my good chum) Ian Galloway as Divisional Director. Galloway (pictured above, left) played a pivotal role in the 1981 UK re-launch of Yamaha Hi-Fi, and helped form Yamaha Electronics UK in 1986. He went on to lead [...]

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An interesting snippet emerged while I was having lunch with Masayuki Kozuka, who heads up R&D for Panasonic’s Media and Content Alliance office. He confided that PHL (aka Panasonic Hollywood Laboratories), the power house behind the development of the Blu-ray 3D specification was currently working on an optimized version of the MPEG4 AVC High Profile [...]

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Legendary US AV chain Ken Cranes goes down – Technology Forum | TechRadar UK. I was sad to hear about the demise of Ken Cranes AV stores in the US. The name will be very familiar to long in the tooth AV enthusiasts. Canes was a popular source of laser discs for UK and European [...]

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Samsung is to challenge old rival Panasonic in the race to launch the first dedicated BD Live Blu-ray player. The two companies first went head-to-head in the global rush to release a dedicated player, and now they’re competing again to introduce players compatible with both Bonus View (Profile 1.1) and BD Live (profile 2). Panasonic [...]

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Not very, if a new report from Bernstein Research is to be believed. The company says that Blu-ray will achieve 25 per cent penetration in US homes in just three years, predictably fueled by a drop in the cost of individual Blu-ray discs and a reduction in dedicated player prices. Yet while Bernstein calculates that [...]

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According to data released by the Consumer Electronics Association, the average American has spent just over 1,400 dollars on consumer electronics over the past 12 months. Its annual Household CE Ownership and Market Potential Study reveals that the money has mainly been spent on flatscreen TVs. The average number of CE products owned per American [...]

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Philips may have divested itself of its set-top business, selling its STB and Connected Solutions divisions to Pace Micro Technology, but it’s still got a vested interest in the sector. As part of the deal, Philips has acquired 64.5 million Pace shares, giving it a 21.6 per cent stake in the company. The deal makes [...]

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Enough is apparently enough. Having been indicted for tax evasion, the Chairman of the Samsung Group, Lee Kun-hee, is to step down. He confirmed that he will quit during a televised news conference, saying: “I will step down from the Samsung chairmanship today. I am saddened as there is still much to do, but I [...]

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