The Digital Home of 2013: It's an HD world

Don Reisinger — Tue, 24 Jun 2008 10:31:28 -0700

What's better than sitting on the couch in the family room while stuffing your mouth with popcorn as you watch the latest episode of Battlestar Galactica on your new 50-inch HDTV? Nothing? Well, what if you could live in a home where HD isn't found in just the living room, but all over the place? Now that is what I call living!

According to recent estimates, about one-quarter of all US households now have at least one HDTV. In fact, during the most recent holiday period, approximately 5.5 million households bought an HDTV. And while the vast majority of households still watch standard definition televisions, most analysts expect HDTV penetration to catch up to standard TV in five years, and overtake the old technology soon thereafter.

That's not all. By 2013, high-definition will become the most dominant display technology in the home. Computer monitors, camcorders, and much more will utilize the technology in a variety of ways. Instead of viewing things in standard definition 480i or enhanced definition's 480p resolution, the terms 1080p and maybe even 1920p will be part of the daily lexicon. HD technology will also lead the way in the camcorder market.

But what about all those nifty new display technologies like Laser HD and OLED, you ask? According to Panasonic -- the only manufacturer of plasma screens and a new entrant to the LCD market -- OLED is probably the only future technology that's capable of hitting store shelves by 2013. Just don't expect it to come cheap -- Panasonic thinks the cost will be too high for the average consumer until 2018.

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Table of contents from the Industry Standard special feature, Ten Technologies from the Digital Home of 2013:

Introduction: What your future really looks like: The Digital Home of 2013
1. The Digital Home of 2013: High-speed telecommunications
2. The Digital Home of 2013: It's an HD world
3. The Digital Home of 2013: Gaming gets real
4. The Digital Home of 2013: Reach out and touch something
5. The Digital Home of 2013: Automated home control
6. The Digital Home of 2013: Green goes mainstream
7. The Digital Home of 2013: Welcome to the cloud
8. The Digital Home of 2013: The rise of streaming media
9. The Digital Home of 2013: Online distribution of TV, movies
10. The Digital Home of 2013: Collaborating across town, and across the world
Sidebar: The castoff home technologies of 2013?