Toshiba TV adds third dimension to video viewing

(AFP PHOTO / Robyn Beck)

Toshiba on Wednesday unveiled a flat-panel television that converts any digital video into 3-D.

"With Cell TV, everything is in 3-D," Toshiba America marketing vice president Scott Ramirez said while unveiling Cell TV to the press on the eve of the Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, which this year gathers some 2,500 industry exhibitors.

"All the home video games you have right now will be in 3-D," he said.

The Japanese electronic's titan's Cell TV is powered by a microprocessor typically used in advance computers and high-end video game consoles and was billed by executives as the future of television.

"We are finally ready for the decade of conversion," Ramirez said.

"Consumers are getting more connected. Everything is connected. We are moving beyond just television. This year is going to be all about the experience."

Cell TV technology upgrades digital video content, even adding pixels to enhance low quality streams such as those common in user-generated online video.

Cell TV senses room lighting and adapts screen quality accordingly.

Cell televisions are synchronized to an array of online video channels and have built-in cameras, microphones and software for video-enabled Internet telephone calls.

"With video phone capability, you can talk to people anywhere in the world," Ramirez said. "You are going to look crystal clear at 55 inches with our technology."

The 3-D and enhanced Internet connectivity technology will be in a set of Cell TV models this year and eventually will spread to other parts of Toshiba's television line-up, according to Ramirez.

"We see the TV as an engine capable of providing a transformative entertainment experience," said Toshiba America consumer products chief executive Atsushi Murasawa.

Cell TV is at heart at a powerful "broadband engine" processor for multimedia content, according to Murasawa. Cell boasts 143 times the processing power of televisions in the market today.

Toshiba also unveiled a Home Entertainment Server with a terabyte of memory and Blu-ray high-definition DVD player to act as a wireless entertainment hub as well as a massive storage site for digital content.