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DVdoctor - some predictions for 2006

by Bob Crabtree on 10 January 2006, 16:13

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Video analyst John Ferrick of DVdoctor Inc looks at the year ahead in his crystal ball

When I was writing a column for Computer Video magazine (RIP), I would at this time of year offer my predictions for the coming 12 months. So...

Things we will see this year

* Blu-ray Disc continuing to falter and its rival high-def format HD DVD moving forward

This looks to be the inevitable result of three factors combined - the relative costs of changing the manufacturing equipment (HD DVD is far cheaper than Blu-ray); the fact that Microsoft/Intel are firmly behind HD DVD; the negative impact on Blu-ray and its biggest supporter, Sony, of the whole digital-rights-management disaster suffered in 2005 by music label Sony BMG.

* Dual-core graphics chips, probably from NVIDIA - I think this will be a dual-core single-chip GeForce 7800

* AMD continuing to make more and more inroads into Intel's strongholds

* Toshiba's new 0.85in/4GByte hard drives are already in production and drives of the same size but of 10GByte and beyond will be arriving

This allows for storage space equivalent to a DV tape - but on an extremely small hard drive. It will be this technology that will move camcorders from being tape-based to hard-drive-based. So, yes, that, means that Focus Enhancements will have created a market that the bigger players take control of by providing hardware that is a fraction of the size and cost of FE's devices.

* Just as Sony starts to ship PS3, Microsoft will offer the update to Xbox 360 - keeping the Xbox 360 in front once more

Things we COULD see this year

* Dell and Apple reaching an agreement for a locked-spec Intel-based Dell that runs Apple's Mac OSX

* Some of the shine starting to come off Google

Google has been attempting to move in too many directions and continues to make partnerships with continuing second-tier companies such as Sun (Google CEO Eric Schmidt's former company). Eric - at both Sun and Novell - seemed to have a great knack of creating partnerships where 1+1 equals 1.5

All in all, it should continue to be a very interesting year!

John

HEXUS Forums :: 27 Comments

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Posted by Jonny M - Mon 24 Jan 2005 22:31
See if you can get hold of an HP iPAQ 4150, discontinued now, but very good PDAs (Bluetooth and WiFi), then get a bluetooth GPS adaptor for them (something like a TomTom).

Otherwise have a look at the Dell Axim range, they do GPS bundles.
Posted by Flibb - Mon 24 Jan 2005 22:35
All the PPC are virtually the same, the question is what other features do you want? I would suggest blue-tooth, WIFI and both compact flash and SD/mmc slots. That would give you the best all round option, but also the highest cost. I ended up getting a used Toshiba E750 cheap of ebay, it has everything above apart from the WIFI, I added this with a separate card costing £23, but its a slight hassle carrying the extra card. You will also need a storage card, a 1 gig SD card can be had for around £70, beware that some SD cards are better than others (compatibility). Software wise most people use TomTom 3 (I use TT2, cant be bothered to upgrade). GPS wise you can go cabled (cheap), CF card based (mid price), or blue-tooth (loadsa money). I prefer blue-tooth as I can use the GPS for other things outside the car, and unlike CF card based you can put the GPS / PDA where you want. My setup is as follows

Toshiba E750 BT
Various cards including a dedicated backup card (for the PDA)
Fortuna clipon BT GPS
TOM TOM 2
Arkon powered amplifier mount with a suction base.

I have also setup a very cheap system for my parents thats wired, its only used for satnav. Thats also a cheap Toshiba with a rikaline wired gps and a cheap mobile phone mount. That system cost around £200.

If I was buying a new system just for satnav I would get a TomTom Go, if I wanted a full pda as well probably something like ipaq h2210 (£200 ish), think thats been replaced with a newer model. You can run satnav on the new palms, might be an option.
Posted by smashie - Mon 24 Jan 2005 22:49
Hmmm, I've got an rx3715 and a tom tom 3, I had the bluetooth version and found that it was very slow to update (no I don't drive too fast :D) so I swapped it for the cabled model. Still got the same problem. I'm still looking for an alternative :( The ipaq is fine, talking to other people it seems to be a problem with tom tom.
Posted by Flibb - Mon 24 Jan 2005 22:54
TT updates every second, but there have been issues wit heh TT gps drivers, there are a variety of versions to try. Was the blue-tooth gps an xtrac one? Some of these have slower update times, my fortuna can be run in sirf or xtrac. Xtrac is usefull in areas with bad reception.
Posted by Covenant - Mon 24 Jan 2005 22:55
Wow, quick responses on this forum! Just looking at the deals on the Dell Webpage - Are Dell PDAs any good? What would be the limitations to this one ?

Really don't know where to begin with this - thanks for the input so far. Really just want something simple to use in the car (i.e. key in start postcode and end postcode - and then drive). But seeing as I'd be shelling out a fair bit, I might as well replace my rather dated palm!

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