Mitsubishi Readies 3D Promotions with Aspen Media, Nvidia

Mitsubishi said it expects sales of rear-projection sets to fall to 800,000-to-one million units this year, but others are predicting sharper declines. Still, Mitsubishi is banking on its new line of three 3D-capable 73W models along with 60W and 65W sets to reignite consumer interest in the category, company executives said. To support the 1080p- capable sets, each with three 0.65-inch DLP chips, Mitsubishi developed an in-store display built around a 65W set and an Aspen Media Products media server ($1,999) that will generate a two- to-three-minute demo mixing 3D PC games with 3D movies, they said.

In delving into the PC market where 350 3D game titles are available, Mitsubishi enlisted support from Nvidia. Nvidia’s GeForce 8800 GTS graphics processor is at the heart of the Aspen media server. Nvidia also is working with Mitsubishi to develop 3D glasses that will be sold with the sets, though company officials declined to disclose who will supply them. Mitsubishi has worked with Real D in the past, but at a line show in April, it used I/O Systems models (CED April 8 p3). The 3D feature in the sets works with the DLP chip for the display of two stereoscopic images, each with a 60 Hz frame rate.

The in-store displays will debut later this month at two Ken Crane’s stores and two Fry’s Electronics outlets, expanding to more than 300 outlets by late August, company officials said. The display will feature a single button to turn on the demonstration, which will include PC games and trailers from movies, including Paramount Pictures’ Beowulf and Spy Kids 3D: Game Over. About 10 3D movies have been released on DVD, said David Naranjo, director of product development, said. In a demonstration Monday, Mitsubishi used Epic Games’ Gears of War.

“We're trying to rejuvenate the category and talk about it in a different way, and one of the ways we're trying to build interest is 3D,” said Frank DeMartin, vice president of marketing. The tie-ins with Nvidia and Aspen “bring a solution to the home that’s wrapped around PC games, but one that is flexible enough moving forward for other types of content like movies and broadcast content,” Naranjo said.

Indeed, Aspen preloads its media servers with Music Giant software, that provides a link to the company’s movie download service. While Aspen demonstrated the GL5138 on Monday, it also is readying three other models in the CL and GL series that will be sold at retail, Chief Technology Officer John Oliver said. The custom Windows Vista media center-based GL5138 ships in July containing an Advanced Micro Devices’ dual-core 2.4 GHz processor, 1.5-terabyte hard drive and 2 GB of double-data rate 2 memory. The line starts with the CL1058 ($1,299) featuring a 2.4 GHz AMD processor and 500 GB hard drive and tops out with the 3D-capable GL3108 ($2,499) with 1 terabyte of storage and an Nvidia 9800GTX graphics chip. Aspen currently sells its media servers through a network of 30 CEDIA dealers, company officials said. The retail servers will be sold separately from the Mitsubishi TVs, although the companies may share some dealers, Oliver said.

Nvidia’s co-promotion with Mitsubishi doesn’t signal any company push into the TV market, Senior Product Manager Andrew Fear said. While Nvidia weighed entering the TV tuner category several years ago, it decided against it and instead kept focus on value-added graphics processors, Fear said. “We looked at the tuner space a couple of years ago, and it just didn’t make sense for us because we like to be able to have a lot of value-added features,” Fear said. “There’s nothing wrong with saying we're not going to get into the market.”

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Citing retailer complaints about the poor lifetimes of rear-projection TV lamps and their high replacement costs, DeMartin expects bulb prices to fall to between $100 and $150 “over the next couple of years,” he said. Rear-projection TV lamps frequently fall short of advertised lifetimes and carry a $300 cost, retailers have said. Some warranty companies also have dropped lamp coverage from extended service plans, industry officials said. Mitsubishi has met with warranty companies to broker an agreement, company officials said. “We realize that’s an issue that has to be addressed and we're working toward that end,” DeMartin said. “It’s going to take a little time, but with the warranty companies on board there won’t be any issue with retailers having access to extended warranties for DLP.” To hit the lower price, Mitsubishi will work to cut the lamp and housing costs and “be more efficient in the way we handle it in our parts line,” DeMartin said.