Tom Norton

With new HDTV technologies flying around fast, Sharp wasn’t about to be left out. This year, it’s hot on a new display technology called IGZO (Indium, Gallium, Zinc, Oxygen) said to offer twice the resolution of conventional LCD, together with significant energy savings and better touch screen performance than present display devices.

Don’t expect to see technology in Sharp’s big screen HDTVs this year (with LCD displays ranging up to 90-inches, Sharp claims to lead the industry in sales of sets 60-inches and above). But it is or soon will be available in a 32-inch, 4K monitor (particularly useful in medical imaging), a new 4.9-inch smart phone to be introduced in Japan in March, and a 7-inch tablet.

Significantly missing from the press event was any mention of Sharp’s Elite line. We’ll be checking on the show floor to see what that might mean.

The BluWavs Headset from Mozaex is the first truly discrete 7.1-channel headphone, with 10 individual and individually driven drivers. They come with a console that provides full amplification for a package price of $1299. An optional multiband graphic equalizer (for the front channels only) adds $300. They were effective, though the frequency balance of the prototypes on display needs a little more TLC, as does the comfort for this large, heavy design.

The new Sony VPL-HW50 discussed earlier in our report also features anamorphic processing. It’s shown here with a fixed Panamorph anamorphic lens.

If there was a theme to this year's CEDIA EXPO, it would be The Rise of the Soundbar. While these devices are incapable of reproducing the full impact of a 5.1 or 7.1 surround system consisting of discrete speakers and a subwoofer, they are undeniably convenient. And many of them sound better than you might imagine. One such is this fully powered $900 model from Atlantic Technology. The driver configuration is 2-channels, but has internal processing that is said to offer a three or five channel ambient experience from a Dolby Digital or DTS surround source. Using H-PAS technology, the Atlantic claims extension down to 47Hz without a subwoofer. While there was a trend at the show toward ultra thin soundbars, most of the latter required a subwoofer to go that low. The Atlantic is 6.5-inches deep, and may be wall mounted, shelf-mounted, or positioned on top of your stand-mounted flat panel using special brackets designed for this purpose.