Sony Style stores proclaimed 3D ready, are you?
By Richard Lawler 
posted February 23rd 2010 1:56PM
posted February 23rd 2010 1:56PM
posted February 23rd 2010 1:56PM
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Pass on 3D, pass on a Sony TV.
@EM1
I'm betting you've never seen any 3D content on a TV, and have simply decided based on ... nothing! That's too bad. The new 3D stuff can look great, even on the Sony TVs (I've seen it). And I've heard the Panasonic's Plasma 3D look even better!
Try not to be close minded and see it before you judge!
-Pie
They now have the BDP-S570 3D players in stock on their web site. They weren't expected until this summer, but now they are available, even ahead of the cheaper S470.
@LarryL
I'm pretty sure only the S770 is 3D. The S570 has all the other features, but is 2D.
I am interested however I have a 60A2000 now and I have a rule about going bigger every time. I want a 65 or 73. Also if I went to a flat screen for my main theater tv I would want to wall mount it thus placing it futher away thus requiring the increase in size.
Gotta get a bigger panel Sony !
@Maxx
I've been saying this for some time. While Sony did have a semi-affordable 65" last year (well, $5,000), it did not look that great and it probably did not sell well. I won't even mention the 70" models, as those are too expensive to be spoken about in the same context as mass market products. This year, we are back at a 60" max for Sony. At least Panasonic has 65" as a standard size (and the 65S1 is not much more than $2k), and maybe with Vizio coming out with a cheap 72" model, there will be more pressure from other companies. I have to commend Sharp for pushing 65" models consistently, which the prices going down and the quality going up.
I was at the Sony store in pentagon city this weekend. Was watching cloudy with a chance of meatballs in 3d. The glasses were comfortable, but after trying it out I'd rather just watch the movie on a hi def tv minus the 3d. It's cool for 5 minutes. Even blu Ray in cgi heavy movies is distracting to me though.
What do you mean by "even Blu-ray in CGI heavy movies is distracting"? Movies *always* benefit from higher resolution and increased color space, and CGI movies have often been the best looking Blu-rays on the market (Monsters vs. Aliens and Bolt -- which I refused to see in the theater -- are absolute visual and audio feasts).
Also, 3D works best with CGI. Avatar worked well because it was almost 100% CGI. Monsters vs. Aliens before it was even better.
I saw a 3D demo in the San Diego Sony Style about a month ago, fed from the PS3 HDD. Motorstorm (non-playable) was hotness! Live action stuff worked fine -- good enough to be past "gimmic" but as engrossing as the CGI demos.
Sony needs to just deploy a bunch of these PS3s to their stores because it's the only way (currently) to see a variety of 3D demoed on their TVs.
I appreciate that Iamperfect2 actually saw a 3D demo and decided on that basis. A lot of naysayers, however, have never seen 3D and don't understand how well the new crop of movies are done, and that the TVs -- much to my surprise -- actually work!
-Pie
I went to go check out the 3D TV at the Sony store this past weekend. They has the movie Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs playing different scenes in a loop. The first thing I noticed was the fidelity of the image in 3D. Another point of note is that I could see flicker of the shutter glasses for the first minute or so and then it went away. I wish they had more content to see other than just the movie. I would of liked to see the college game was done last year or clips of the video games that have been ported into 3D. Overall I was impressed and the quality of the video makes a difference of the experience you watching a 3D movie at the theater. If the price is right I can see myself getting one.
I've seen the 3D demo of Cloudy w/ Chance of Meatballs at my Sony Style store in Scottsdale, AZ & I have to say this (at the moment) is a fail. As "impressive" as the 3D part looked, I got tired/bored of having the shutter glasses on after about 1 minute. I cannot imagine sitting and watching an entire movie at home with glasses on. Not to mention if you're watching with friends/family for everyone to be sitting there with glasses on, ridiculous! Also, this technology is only in the early stages, but it would have a long way to go before it would officially be adopted by the mass public. As it stands, this is just a show-off gimmick for a handful of individuals with more money than brains. I mean, if you're in the market for a new TV, fine, go for a new TV and if the model you like happens to offer 3D, so be it. But if you're going out of your way to pay extra, or replace a perfectly fine 1080p HDTV that is 3 years old or less, that would be a dumb investment. Personally, after seeing the demo, reading all the hype about 3D TV, etc, I do not think it will take off. To specific for what it is. You're just getting the mass public onboard with HDTV and barely Blu-ray, and in order for 3D TV to work not only would you need a new TV, but a new BD player, receiver, cables, etc. No way will this work/take off. Furthermore, only a small amount of content will be shot in 3D/offered to purchase on BD-3D. And of those few titles released in 3D, even fewer will be worth watching/owning! Not to mention, as long as you have to have glasses on to watch 3D content, fail. I admit that I appreciate the new technology. But from a consumer point of view, 3D is one of the worst ideas to date. The concept of it is okay. But as it stands, I GUARANTEE 3D to fail within 2 years. The electronic companies will try to make it for for about 2 years, but when the notice that buyers aren't going for it in the numbers they were thinking, they'll either pull the plug and move onto some newer technology, or they will re-do 3D without the need for glasses, and find a different way to go about it.
I we have to wear glasses then 3D will never be huge.
I'll probably pay extra for 3D when I buy my next TV set. It's nice.
The Topanga store in L.A. got 3D right after CES. It is impressive and everything(loved the water in the polar bear demo), but the glasses don't even fit me and my eyes feel strain after a few minutes. I'm not sure I can sit through an entire film.
The problem is that 3D is here because we have too many channels. Let me explain.
Manufacturers have to do something new, as HDTV has been largely commoditized in that past year or two, and they need a new cutting edge technology.
The right way to go would be 4K (i.e. a 4000x2000p picture, or 4x the resolution of HD). The problem with that is bandwidth. Because we have 300+ crap channels out there, and there are only so many DSS/FSS slots for satellites, Dish and DirecTV just couldn't handle more than a couple of channels in 4K, as they would likely eat up 10x the bandwidth of current HDTV channels (4x for the resulolution, a little more to ease up on compression, and another 2x for a full progressive picture), which are already 3-6x SD channels. Cable providers, who are locked in MPEG-2, are already hurting on HD, so they probably wouldn't be able to deliver 4K at all, although at least for the early adopters, this isn't an issue, since the early adopter types are on DBS anyways, since it is so far ahead of cable.
3D is the only thing that they can do without using more bandwidth, even though the experience is horrible, it has been tried before, with various technologies from full-on setups in theaters to red/blue glasses on DVDs, and none of it works, because people don't want to wear clunky glasses and
I think 3D HDTV will be successful but only as an extra feature kind of like how Picture and Picture is a feature or how 5.1 surround sound is a feature or like how Internet Apps are a feature.
I'd like to Buy a TV with 3D capabilities but I don't think it fits into the category of premium feature sets. It's something that my kids might enjoy more and therefor it should be a feature on all TV's kind of like how an HDMI input is on all TV's now.
Wants a SONY TV. PASS ON FOR 3DTV for being a quick scheming money maker.
Ironic that the Sony plays "Cloudy with a chance of meatballs", given the flashlighting/clouding effects their XBR TV's have :-)