The proof of the pudding…


Kudos to Samsung for some smart thinking that saved the day at a recent event held by Best Buy and Carphone Warehouse at a trendy venue in Central London where the internet access falls over as soon as several people try to use it.

Sony had been caught out at the same venue a month or so earlier, trying to demonstrate connected TVs without a reliable internet connection.

Samsung’s Rob Smith thought laterally and took advantage of the feature now offered by most modern 3G smart phones – they can be used as a wi-fi hot spot. With the phone paired with the Smart Hub TV, Samsung became the only demonstrator in the room with reliable high-speed internet access. 3G speed was even fast enough to play some of the 3D VOD clips on Samsung’s Smart TV site.

Here’s a radical thought. Wouldn’t it make sense for companies booking venues for internet-dependent demos to check the venue broadband before booking?

I learned long ago not to review or praise half-finished Beta products. When I find something wrong, the maker just says: “Oh yes we know about that and it will be fixed in the final version”. So I’ve played unpaid consultant for no thanks.

It’s well over a year now since I went to a wag-studded event at the posh Ivy Club to see a half-finished prototype of an appealing Feeview/internet/iPlayer box from 3View. I was promised a finished version to test and carefully wrote in ERT "if production models live up to the prototypes and the ambitious promises I want one.”

More than a year later, I was still waiting for the promised sample. John Lewis offered to fix this, but has now told me that "3view no longer have any distributors for the box, and John Lewis cannot vouch for their continued business with them." I have asked 3View for clarification. Nothing yet.

“Harvard will be launching a new connected TV brand and STB product range shortly,” said the invite to a briefing at plush publicity offices in Central London. There was a big screen TV on the wall of the meeting room and exciting talk of a new internet TV box from Harvard International, maker of good value Goodmans goods.

The big plus, explained chief technical officer Paul Fellows, is a new user interface and EPG based on the Galio browser developed by British software company ANT. Sounds goods, I said, can I see it working now please?

Sadly, not. There turned out to be no box to plug into the telly and not even a laptop simulation or screen shot of the new Galio interface. So I didn't dare write anything.

Soon after this puzzling non-event, computer company Acer launched the Aspire S3 (pictured), a new super-slim laptop with 50 days’ battery life in sleep mode and 1.5-second wake-up from sleep. I think it is safe to say that everyone present wanted one. But that is because we got to see them working.

At the same event, Acer also unveiled the K330 LED projector, which claims a staggering 20,000 hours lamp life and costs under £500 – less than the cost of replacing the lamp in a conventional projector when the warranty, often lasting only a miserly 90 days, has expired and created a very unhappy customer.

If the LED lamps can give a decently bright picture, then the Acer LED projector is the answer to every dealer’s prayer. But I daren’t yet recommend it. Although the lovely laptops were working and winning hearts and minds, there was no demo of the projector.