The Cell microprocessor made famous by the PlayStation 3 was developed as a joint venture between Sony, Toshiba and IBM, with Toshiba taking over the majority of manufacturing duties in 2007. Toshiba plans to make the most of the Cell with a new range of Cell-powered TVs for the US market - read on to find out what 200 gigaflops can do inside a TV.
The KIRA2 Super Local Dimming LED panel features 1000 cd/m2 brightness and a whopping 512 local dimming zones offering unmatched control over black levels and a 9,000,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio.
Net Resolution+ detects, and corrects, the noise in heavily compressed, low resolution streaming video promising sharper, cleaner video suitable for large displays.
AutoView RGB uses an ambient light sensor and an RGB sensor to automatically, and constantly, set the brightness, contrast, gamma, sharpness, color saturation and color temperature to levels suited to the viewing environment, taking the "set" out of set-and-forget and making the ZX900 a true plug-and-play TV.
The ZX900 is more than ready for the coming 3D revolution, with support for 3D formats including MPEG4-MVC and RealD. Operating in 240Hz in 2D mode, the system switches to 120Hz for the left eye and 120Hz for the right eye in 3D mode. Additionally, TriVector 2D to 3D conversion promises to turn any 2D content into 3D in real-time, including TV, movies and video games.
With an on-board 1-terabyte hard drive, Blu-ray player and DLNA server, Toshiba clearly wants to ensure that you don't need additional hardware to make the most of the Cell TV.
The ZX900 will be available in 55" and 65" sizes. No word on pricing yet, but Toshiba's similarly specced Cell Regza 55X1 came in at ¥1 million (US$11,500 approx).