BigBand Networks knows a thing or two about making the transition to switched digital video, and now it can say that it helped flipped the first ever SDV switch overseas. The company, in conjunction with interactive TV middleware provider Alticast, has "added functionality to its switched digital video solution in preparation for deployments by Korean cable operators." Obviously, the opportunities for SDV outside of North America is significant, with many markets gasping for bandwidth just to get a handful of high-def channels out to the people. Research firm In-Stat actually asserts that "Asian deployments of SDV will grow at an average rate of 85% for the next four years, reaching $212M by 2012," and we can only hope that this is one method for greatly boosting the amount of HD content available outside of the US.

It's no secret that OLED gurus have had the toughest time improving the life of blue luminance to match the lifespans of its red and green counterparts, but a team of South Korean scientists have purportedly stumbled upon (or developed, as it were) a breakthrough "true blue" material that can "accelerate the development of next-generation organic light-emitting diode (OLED) displays." Up until now, scientists have been able to create highly efficient green and red OLED materials, but the inability to make a true blue OLED material was really holding things back. So, now that this little hurdle has been hopped, how's about we get some big screen OLED HDTVs out to the people?

[Via OLED-Info, image courtesy of Universal Display]

Those guys look pretty passionate, wouldn't you say? It's folks like that (we presume) that have forced Warner Brothers' hand, and now the studio will end its home video and DVD business in the nation of South Korea. According to an unnamed official at Warner Brothers Home Video Korea, "one of the reasons for the pullout is a slump in the video and DVD market, resulting from online piracy and illegal downloading," and amazingly enough, Warner Bros. is actually the last remaining Hollywood company to pull out of the region. Instead, the firm will focus on "digital distribution," and given that just about everyone and their grandmother has access to the internetz in South Korea, we'd say that's probably an intelligent move.

Are you one of those freaks of nature who prefer your fonts as tiny as possible in order to best take advantage of every last square millimeter of screen real estate? If so, point your retinas to Samsung's latest marvel, the 23-inch 2342BWX. The LCD monitor boasts a thin black bezel, 5-millisecond response time and a memorizing QWXGA (2,048 x 1,152) resolution. Just to put things in perspective, that's enough pixels to view two A4-sized sheets side by side with room to spare for Vista's sidebar. Sammy's expected to loose this in South Korea soon for ₩399,000 ($315), but trust us, the challenge won't be procuring one, it'll be making sure your GPU can handle it.

[Via AkihabaraNews]

Several Japanese tech giants are teaming together today in a quest to make 40-inch and larger OLED panels for televisions. Sony, Toshiba, Panasonic, Sharp and others will participate under a joint development project initiated by the Japanese government. All of this is of course meant to help the Japanese companies compete with South Korea's chaebols, particularly Samsung and LG, as the industry giants maneuver for an advantage over the next, next-generation flat panel technology to dominate the living room.

[Via OLED-info]

Yeah, Samsung already had your heart with the 40-, 46- and 52-inch versions of the PAVV Cannes 650 plasma, but for folks relegated to a 50- or 58-inch model, you were left high and dry -- until now. Sammy has just dropped off two new members of the family in South Korea, both featuring Cell Light Control, DNIepro (Digital Natural Image engine-pro), a purported 1,000,000:1 contrast ratio, USB port and four HDMI sockets. As for the small(er) guy, you can grab it now in Korea for ₩3,000,000 ($2,970), while the 58-inch monolith will set you back ₩4,900,000 ($4,851). Per usual, mum's the word on these coming Stateside.

[Via AVING]

We've seen some pretty shady dealings from disgruntled ex-employees in the past, but this one may have skyrocketed into the upper echelon of tales of corporate deceit. As the story goes, a 49-year old man known only as Jeong felt the need to copy over some 1,182 top secret plasma display technology-related files onto his personal drive before waltzing out of LG's doors for the final time in July of 2005. A few months later, Chinese manufacturer Changhong-Orion PDP-Chaihong welcomed him with open arms and paid him a fat salary of roughly $300,000 a year (not to mention a few perks: free apartment, vehicle etc.), while casually accepting both the aforementioned files and continued insider leaks at LG -- information supposedly valued at over a billion dollars. But despite Jeong's arrest upon his last return home to Korea, Changhong is still apparently on schedule to produce plasma panels based on LG's technology come this December. Can you say: hot water over international trade-secret law?

[Via The Raw Feed, image courtesy of RPG Classics]

Just in case those wood-framed Xcanvas LCD TVs weren't exactly your style, LG is hoping to please you still with a new line that looks a touch more traditional. The so-called Scarlett series spans from 32- to 52-inches in size, with all but the smallest sporting a Full 1080p resolution. Each set comes doused in black with dark red accents and features "invisible" speakers, a 50,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, HDMI 1.3 and a 4-millisecond response time. Granted, these suckas don't exactly check in cheap, as you'll be looking at 1.45 million won ($1,534) for the 32-incher and a staggering 5 million won ($5,290) for the 52-inch 52LG60FD.

Granted, portable OTA tuners are a dime a dozen these days, but an interesting twist has been introduced by Korea's Inkel. The AirwayHD manages to boast a diminutive size while internalizing the process of converting OTA streams into manageable files using the H.264 codec. Reportedly, the device can compress files to one-fourth of their original size without any PC software intervention, and it should make life pretty easy for those hoping to view recorded content on their portable media player. No word on a release date just yet, but it'll only run you about ₩100,000 ($106) when it eventually lands. Check out a few more pics after the break.

HIDVAN's DABODA HMC-1 most certainly isn't the most attractive HTPC we've seen, but it should do the trick for South Koreans looking to spruce up their AV center with a hint of PC. Interestingly, this media center is reportedly also an NDAS, which enables users to easily share their media over a local network. Furthermore, you'll find 5.1-channel surround sound outputs, DVI, Ethernet, component / composite / S-Video, USB 2.0 ports, and a SIGMA 8621 chipset for decoding. Not a lot of details beyond that just yet, but feel free to click on for a few more shots of this September-bound machine.

Just two months after Hitachi sued LG for PDP patent infringement in the litigious-playgrounds of Texas, LG has countersued Hitachi of course. LG's suit seeks monetary compensation and an injunction prohibiting Hitachi from violating its seven plasma display panel patents. Exactly the same claim Hitachi made earlier give-or-take a few patents. While we're fine with the plausible defense of intellectual property, LG's comment on the maneuver has us worried about a bleak future for consumer electronics litigation, "Japanese firms are filing more and more lawsuits as competition in the global display market has increased dramatically. We will proactively deal with the situation based on our patented and patent-applied-for technologies." In other words, firms must sue to compensate their dwindling margins. To make matters worse, LG and Hitachi are (or were) close business partners in areas which include consulting and data storage. A partnership with a Vision statement based on "mutual trust." Riiight.

While some may have balked at Sony taking an early exit from the PDP market, LG is becoming the fourth major player to reevaluate its investment in plasma after Philips was caught claiming that LCD TVs would likely shape its strategy and Hitachi began to look intently overseas for buyers. Reportedly, LG is closing the doors of its oldest plasma manufacturing plant in Gumi, South Korea as it hopes to "increase operational efficiency and reduce costs." The removal of the A1 plant will drop its plasma capacity from 430,000 to 360,000 panels this year, and it should save the company somewhere between "$22 million and $32 million per year." Notably, LG currently sits in second place in quantity of PDPs shipped worldwide, but considering the perpetual nosedive of HDTV prices over the past year or so, we can't say that Life looks too Good in the PDP arena right now.

[Via PCMag]

Just when Hitachi had us all believing that it was planning on reaching new heights in the plasma market thanks to a ginormous PDP set and a thirsty overseas crowd, now we're seeing the fallback plan. Of course, we can't really suggest that Hitachi's latest lawsuit on LG's (surprise, surprise) plasma displays have anything to do with the firm's dreary numbers, but it has nevertheless filed a lawsuit in the ill famed "district court in Texas" (read: patent troll heaven) saying that "the South Korean company infringed its plasma display-related patents." The suit seeks the obligatory "monetary compensation for damages," but more interesting is the tidbit that requests a "permanent injunction prohibiting LG's plasma display panel product sales in the United States." According to a Hitachi spokesperson, the two outfits had "been in talks regarding the appropriate licenses for these seven patents," but apparently, neither side is backing down anytime soon.

If the glossy black, matte silver, or brushed aluminum looks are simply too played out for your next HDTV, LG is hoping to spruce up your options by offering up yet another forest-inspired offering. Details are admittedly scant on the forthcoming 60-inch 60PT1, but we do know that this beast of a PDP will rock a dark wooden frame that could hang in perfect harmony in your kid's pimped out treehouse. Additionally, it seems that LG will only be loosing 1,000 of these limited edition units worldwide, and that folks in Korea (well, not North Korea) will get first dibs when they finally appear. Of course, meticulously crafting such a beauty apparently takes time, as you won't be finding one of these for sale until "March at the earliest," but that should give you enough time to sell off a car or two in order to finance this presumably pricey luxury.

[Via AkihabaraNews]

While we Americans tend to seem satisfied with the 720p / 1080i content that flows through our set-top boxes and ATSC tuners every single day, South Koreans are apparently up in arms over which TV truly is "the best." Sure, Mossberg says that 1080p isn't a big deal when scoping out a set, and even though Seoul's only chance at even getting 1080p content comes from gaming consoles and their highly-overpriced HD DVD / Blu-ray players, it's that "Full HD" sticker that (seemingly) counts. While Sony has apparently launched a marketing campaign that "insists its Bravia TV is the only one that meets the Full HD standards," both LG and Samsung are out to disprove that at this year's CES. Sammy is planning to unveil a trio of new plasmas alongside two new LCD HDTVs "under a new brand name" in hopes of shaking the bad image, with all units boasting about its 1,920 x 1,080 resolution; LG, consequently, is purportedly planning a similar attack, as it introduces three new Full HD models up to 60-inches in size and partners with Sega to loop some fun-filled 1080p content and hopefully wow the skeptics. While we don't know just how serious this battle's going to get, we're packing our of forms of protection just in case that buzzword barrage gets too heated to handle.