Man vs Machine: Hunting a 3D TV in the wild.

Not being a member of the “traditional” or “friendly” media, I didn’t get a chance to play with a shiny new 3D TV at a junket or special demo. Fair enough, as an unpaid critic, my role is to hate everything and tell almost nobody about it.

But with news reports saying that 3D TV sets were going to be by Samsung, and available in stores from next week (this week?) I knew as a TV fan/scholar I had to look at one just to see what it was like, so I could understand what it will mean for the TV landscape.

What did I do on my Sunday afternoon? I called around all of my local inner-west-Brisbane electronics stores to see who would be stocking 3D TVs, and who would have them Monday, so I could walk into a store on Monday morning, pretending to be a “Joe Citizen” and ask a lot of technical questions of a pimply teenager who would read responses from a glossy pamphlet. It’s a new technology with many questions, and after the health warnings released by Samsung were made into a million asinine blog posts shouted “OMG   don’t drink and watch”. I have a pregnant wife and a young son, both of them would be in “caution” categories, so I’m interested in what the people selling the TVs have to say before I bring one into my house.

I sat on the Samsung website at 3 this afternoon, an exciting little countdown told me some hyperbole about the future of television being 17 hours, 54 minutes, etcetera etcetera… away. So I don’t waste my time tomorrow going into stores, I start calling around. I call the local yellow and black discount store and I hear “We’re in the middle of stock-take, we aren’t able to get new stock in, we won’t have them for a week or so, all the other stores are in the same boat”. How’s that for shitty timing?

Onto the local Harvey Norman. I call. I ask.  “Will you have them tomorrow?”. I hear. “We’ve had the 3D TV out since yesterday!” With 40 minutes until closing, I rush down, expecting queues out the door. Instead, I walk straight into the home theatre set up. I have a freshly charged-via-USB goggles on my face, and I’m watching Monsters vs Aliens 3D. I believe the Samsung website’s timer was “pwned”.

Do you want a one word review of the experience?: Meh. It was nice, looked good, but without the big screen and sense of occasion of watching 3D at the cinema, it’s not all that great.

Now, it’s stating the obvious that you need a 3D Bluray or game to experience the 3D features of the new TVs, it doesn’t render broadcast TV into 3D. You’re going to be waiting a while for 3D broadcasts. Perhaps forever. 3D broadcast TV is pretty naff, and don’t expect it to do much. This being said, 3D is just a mode you switch the TV onto, and the TV is actually pretty awesome, reasonably priced, and have pretty nifty features. It’s a good TV, and if you think you’re going to watch some 3D, then go for it. If not? Whatever. I’m not your mother.

Some interesting points that came from my hunt:

• The health warnings given in store were “epilepsy” and… that’s it, although I was told they’d ask and call me tomorrow. I suspect the rest of the categories are set up as groups who have CATASTROPHIC results if they had undiagnosed epilepsy: pregnant women, children etcetera
• The screening was in a darkened room, and certain lights apparently can have negative effects. I was told that fluerescants were a big issue with the technology. I wonder what the compacts energy saving bulbs in most lounge rooms will do.
• People who know me know I wear glasses, I can get by without them, but when I put the 3D goggles over my glasses, the experience went from “cool” to “shite”. I’m not overly interested in getting prescription 3D goggles, especially if they’re locked into one TV technology.
• Quite a lot of people went in today, and because of the wiring in their brains, the 3D did nothing for them.
• My colleague Dan tried three different places and found no 3D TVs in store (call ahead newbie)
• Goggles were charged in the store via USB, so expect a queue around the family PC come movie night.
• I felt kind of ill watching it.

The next experiment for my hunt, showing up for a demo drunk to see if the health warnings are true.