Home Entertainment & Automation Services in Matthews, NC.
Home Entertainment & Automation Services in Matthews, NC.
Home audio and Video Services in Matthews, NC.  TV installation, Surround Sound, Home Entertainment Systems
Samsung 3D Glasses Interoperable When Worn Upside Down

CIS - Charlotte NC's Source For 3D glasses From Samsung & Panasonic

CIS - Charlotte NC's Source For 3D HDTV's & glasses From Samsung & Panasonic

Samsung and Panasonic 3D active shutter glasses rely on the same technology.

Ever since consumers realized active shutter glasses would indeed be the law of the land for 3D TV, they’ve begged for interoperability from brand to brand. 

Judging by a recent comment from Samsung R&D chief Simon Lee, it looks like Samsung and Panasonic‘s glasses are so close, but so far away.

First reported by Home Cinema Choice, Samsung and Panasonic 3D active shutter glasses rely on the same technology, but the right and left eye sync are reversed. This means you can actually use one brand’s glasses with the other brand’s displays as long as you flip them upside down. 

This almost seems like a slap in the face. There’s no real technical reason the two systems couldn’t be inter-operable. The driving factor, like so many things in our industry, boils down to accessory sales and the associated ancillary revenue. There’s still hope, though.

“I think that it’s likely that the different manufacturers will come together, possibly as early as next year, to agree a common standard for Active Shutter glasses,” says Samsung’s Lee.

by Stephen Hopkins

http://www.electronichouse.com/article/samsung_3d_glasses_interoperable_when_worn_upside_down/

Custom Installation Services, LLC – Charlotte and Boone NC’s Source For 3D TV Sales & Installation with HDTV’s From Samsung & Panasonic!

Posted in 3d movies, 3D TV, Blu-ray, Flat Panel TV's, Home Theater, Media Rooms, News, technology | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment


10 Reasons 3D Will Succeed

CIS is Lake Norman's 1st Choice For 3D HDTV Sales & Installation!

CIS is Lake Norman's 1st Choice For 3D HDTV Sales & Installation!

Why 3D will find an important niche in the home theater experience.

Our good friends over at eCoustics.com offered “10 Reasons 3D Might Fail.”

I was a little surprised to see such a forward-looking A/V news source predicting such blasphemy. It’s been a long time since a tech trend has generated as much buzz as 3D, and theater hits like “Avatar” and “Alice In Wonderland” have heightened consumer interest in 3D.

Here are my counter points as to why 3D TV will find an important niche in the home theater experience.

Glasses – Consumers have shown they’ll don 3D glasses in large public venues (i.e. theaters and theme parks). Why wouldn’t they do so in the privacy of their own home. Glasses are also a stop-gap as auto-stereoscopic technologies develop and the associated price tag softens.

TV Watching is Social – While 3D viewing may alter the social atmosphere, it also heightens immersion. The times 3D will be most interesting are the times you’re so immersed in the content that you won’t want to talk to the person next to you. It’s not for the news, SportsCenter, or AMC.

Compatibility – Nearly every major upgrade in home theater content has had associated hardware upgrades. Dolby Digital? DVD? HDTV? Blu-ray? All required new hardware to varying degrees. Some early adopters will abandon perfectly good equipment for the latest and greatest, while others upgrade through attrition. It’s all happened before and will happen again.

Lack of Content – Hardware and software are like the chicken and the egg. But in the A/V world, hardware almost always comes first and languishes a bit until some killer app (like “The Matrix” on DVD) pushes people to invest. Once the seal is broken, the trickle gains momentum and becomes a flood.

Confusion – The launch of HDTV in the U.S. caused more consumer confusion than any other technology roll-out of all time. While HDTV was slow to ramp-up and had a big government push behind it, it’s a success regardless of the confusion, and not every Joe Six Pack even saw the benefit of HDTV’s resolution, aspect ratio, and digital video/sound. It’s hard for anyone to say they physically don’t see what 3D offers.

Health Risks – It’s true that some people can’t see stereoscopic 3D effects. Another small minority can experience some discomfort or eye strain from extended viewing. The percentages of people affected by both categories vary wildly based on who you ask. Some warnings have been issued by electronics manufacturers, but you can find similar warnings for everything from cell phones to supermarket plastic bags. Until there is some substantial evidence to actual risks, these kinds of allegations are best left to Fox News.

Unwatchable 3D Footage – 3D content can easily be viewed in 2D. While it’s an either-or proposition (either everyone watches 3D or 2D), displays and content devices offer the ability to “flatten” 3D content to 2D. Since the 3D effect is generated by separate 2D images for each eye, showing only the left or right image effectively renders 3D content in 2D.

Just Good-enough Syndrome – While HDTV content and Blu-ray content haven’t replaced SD or DVD as de facto standards, saying they haven’t “taken off” is disingenuous at best. 3D isn’t meant to replace 2D, but augment it. Every major new technology has early adopters and those who hold back. 3D won’t be any different, but that doesn’t mean it will fail. DVD didn’t, surround sound didn’t, HDTV didn’t, and 3D won’t.

Discs are Dying – While 3D can require more storage space or bandwidth, it’s not reliant on a physical medium much, if any, more than HD video.

History Lessons – While the term “HDTV” may have been around 20 years before it reached market saturation, the digital HDTV broadcast in the U.S. occurred in the summer of 1996, and the ATSC standard wasn’t finalized until the fall of 1998. By 2001, HDTVs were becoming common place in big-box retailers. Twenty years is a huge stretch. Consumers have a short memory, and far more people are likely to remember their 3D theater experience and become interested in replicating it in their home (unless they see “Clash of the Titans”).

by Stephen Hopkins

http://www.electronichouse.com/article/10_reasons_3d_will_succeed/C155?utm_source=eh&utm_medium=side

Custom Installation Services, LLC – Charlotte and Asheville NC’s Source For Samsung & Sharp 3D HDTV Sales, Service and Installation!

Posted in 3d movies, 3D TV, Blu-ray, Flat Panel TV's, Gaming Systems, Home Theater, Media Rooms, Music and Movies, technology | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment


Home Structured Wiring System Basics

CIS: Charlotte NC's #1 Installer/Dealer for Open House Structured Wiring Products!

CIS: Charlotte NC's #1 Installer/Dealer for Open House Structured Wiring Products!

“Home cabling systems are no different than commercial systems, they often contain a mix of broadband (coax) cables, and twisted pair cables carrying voice, data, and security signals. The components and connectors for these systems have been tried and proven in the commercial industry and there is no reason to reinvent them for the HCS industry.”

It used to be rare that you’d see a home wired with basic-quad cable in more than a couple of rooms for phone service. Now it’s quite common for new houses to be built with multiple data-grade cables in all rooms (including bathrooms). Home cabling systems have only recently begun to gain any real attention, and like any new technology there seems to be a lot of different ideas on how to ‘do it right’. This series will describe some of the basic components and concepts of a good home wiring system, and explain how to choose and install the right pieces to make your system work the way you planned.

With the rise in popularity of residential cabling, several vendors have come out with their interpretation of the ‘best’ home cabling system (HCS). In my experience I have yet to find one of these systems that truly meets all of the factors of a good HCS:

 1: Ease of installation.

You’ll find cable bundles a popular offering from several HCS product lines. These bundles usually consist of two Cat5 cables, two RG6 cables and maybe 2 fiber optic cables. At first these seem like a great time saver, but they have many drawbacks:

These cable bundles are often more difficult to pull than pulling the same number of ‘loose’ cables. A common problem is with the bundling medium, (usually a fibrous ribbon, or cellophane) it can get easily caught on rough holes in studs, etc. With the cables tightly bundled together it can often be difficult to pull the cable bundle around a corner, or through a hole that’s not drilled straight through (as in when you’re drilling into studs without a right-angle drill.)

They may not be easier to pull, but you’d at least expect that these bundles would be cheaper than buying the same kinds of cable individually, but that’s not usually the case either.

Also, you’ll find that many outlets require more or less than the number cables found in a bundle. You may only want one RG-6 and one Cat-5 in a bathroom location for instance, or you may want 4 Cat-5’s and 2 RG-6’s in the computer room. This requires you to either untangle (and possibly waste) wires from the bundle, or buy additional extra spools of all of your cable types, driving the cost up higher, and almost guaranteeing a lot of waste.

In commercial applications it’s very rare that cable bundles (even bundles of all the same type of cable) are ever used. Sure, there’s always an exception, but often these bundles are made up of cable types or colors for a specific job, and not for ‘general use’. It’s much easier to have 2 or 4 individual boxes of cable, and pull them all at the same time.

It’s not just the cable bundles that can make installation difficult, often the cabinets for these systems are overly bulky, and don’t provide enough room to route the amount of cable necessary for a good installation.

If that’s not enough, try to find a local retailer that can sell you an extra piece or two as a walk-up customer should you need something in the future.

2: Expandability.

One of the things most all HCS offerings have in common is their ‘gee-whiz’ cabinet, with smoked glass, and/or ‘snap-in’ modules for various services. This seems like an elegant solution at first, but you’re typically limited in the maximum size of the cabinet offerings. Creating a cable system for even a modest home can easily over-fill one of these cabinets.

Cable systems have existed in commercial industries for years, and other than a few different styles of floor-mount and wall mount 19″ racks, nobody has ever successfully launched a gee-whiz cabinet system in the commercial industry. Home cabling systems are no different than commercial systems, they often contain a mix of broadband (coax) cables, and twisted pair cables carrying voice, data, and security signals. The components and connectors for these systems have been tried and proven in the commercial industry and there is no reason to reinvent them for the HCS industry. A good HCS system should be expandable in a vendor independent way, the popular HCS systems on the market today do not meet this by a long shot.

3: Outlet flexibility

Fortunately, this is starting to change, and many vendors are going to the ‘modular’ or ‘keystone’ style of outlets. These have a faceplate with 1-6 square cutouts that accept any combination and color of Cat5/Cat3/RJ-45/RJ-11 jacks, BNC/Coax outlets, Fiber Optic Outlets, Speaker binding posts and outlets, and blanks to fill in unused holes. Some manufactures (like ICC) offer outlet plates that tilt the outlets 45° towards the floor to allow furniture to be placed next to the wall, without binding or crimping the cables. Make sure that your outlets are configurable (and re-configurable) and not pre-set to the manufacturers ideas.

4: Tool-less future reconfigurations

This is one area where the ‘big-name’ HCS systems usually excel over the consumer designed and installed systems. When you want to change the service on a particular outlet, you don’t want to be hunting for punch-down tools and whatnot in the future, you want to go down to the wiring closet, pick up the appropriate patch cable, plug the two ends in, and walk away. Fortunately, it’s easy to design your own system to work like this if you plan in advance.

Before we go any further, it would probably be beneficial to describe some of the common components in an HCS installation.

Cable types:

Cat-5, Category-5 – Cat-5 is a term you’ll hear often when discussing any type of datacomm cable system. Cat-5 refers to the cable’s ability to meet minimal requirements for speed and noise rejection. Cat-5 cable can carry data at a minimum of 100Mhz (Notice this specifies Mhz, and not Mbs), and reject certain kinds of noise. Cat-5 cable usually consists of 2-25 pairs of cable. Each cable pair is twisted together at a pitch of about 3 twists per inch, and the pitch varies between each pair in the outer jacket, or sheath. The most common configuration of Cat-5 cable is 4 pairs in a PVC jacket. Cat-5 is a type of twisted pair cable (but not all twisted pair cable is Cat-5). Cat-5 is the highest recognized specification, but Cat-6 and Cat-7 specifications are expected shortly.

RG-6 – RG-6 is a type of coaxial cable, used typically for carrying video signals, such as CATV signals, DSS signals, and video camera signals in a typical HCS environment. Sometimes RG-59 is substituted for RG-6, but this is not recommended. RG-6 has a thicker center conductor, and a better shield, allowing for better signal quality, better interference immunity, and longer working distances than RG59.

Quad-cable – Quad cable refers to 4 conductors (typically non-twisted) in a PVC jacket. Quad cable is generally only used for contact-closure systems as in alarm systems. Quad cable shouldn’t be installed or used to carry data or telephone signals.

Fiber Optic – Fiber optic cables are long, thin strands of glass or plastic used to carry light over long distances and/or at very high speeds. Fiber optic cables are rarely installed or recommended in a typical HCS.

Connector types:

Cat-5 – A Cat-5 connector is generally either a male or female RJ-45 jack or plug. RJ-45 jacks are similar to the RJ-11 jack in a phone connection, only they have 8 contacts, instead of 4 (or 6).

RJ-11 – An RJ-11 jack is used almost exclusively in phone outlets. Some IR distribution systems use RJ-11 outlets also. RJ-11’s have spaces for 6 conductors, with 4 conductors usually present.

F – F Connectors are most commonly found on CATV equipment or jacks. They are the threaded connectors that you connect the CATV feed to.

BNC – BNC is another type of coaxial connector. Most commonly found on VHF/Radio equipment, or in 10-Base2 Ethernet. BNC Connectors are neither threaded or friction fit, instead they have two ‘nubs’ on the outlet, and the plug has two grooves, when the plug is fully inserted into (or actually over) the outlet you give the plug a ½ turn to lock the two together (sort of like a bayonet mount).

RCA – RCA jacks look like a smaller version of an F connector. They are also friction-fit, so they have no threads, RCA’s are typically used in A/V equipment for audio connections, and composite video connections.

SC – An SC connector is a type of fiber-optic connector. They look like a small square with a circle in the middle. You can remember SC as ‘Stick and Click’, because they make a click when the jack is fully inserted into the outlet.

ST – Another type of fiber optic connector. ST looks like a small BNC connector. ST can be remembered as ‘Stick and Twist’

Devices:

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By Brian Karas

http://www.hometoys.com/htinews/oct98/articles/karas/cabling01.htm

Custom Installation Services, LLC – Charlotte and Asheville NC’s Source For Your Custom Home Electronics and Structured Wiring Needs!

Posted in Home Theater, Structured Wiring, technology | Tagged , , , , , , , , , , , , , | Leave a comment


Custom Installation Services, LLC | P.O. Box 132 Matthews, NC 28106 | 704-400-8701 | dmiller@cis-nc.com
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