Don’t Hog the Trackball
For reasons that are not always clear, computer and consumer electronics companies are determined to create hybrid devices that give a TV set computer capabilities--and such devices were the hot topic at the Consumer Electronics Show in Orlando, Fla., last week.
The biggest real product announcements came from Zenith, a dowdy company that has suddenly become a Wall Street darling thanks to the Internet. The company showed off a series of products that allow access to the Internet’s World Wide Web from a big-screen TV.
Starting this fall, new sets from both Zenith and its new high-end “boutique” brand, Inteq, will feature built-in connectivity to the Internet--courtesy of a 28.8 modem and an Ethernet port that will accept super-fast cable modems when they become available.
A proprietary Web browser (from a company called Diba) is stored in special memory chips and can be upgraded over the phone line. Turn on the TV, choose an Internet service provider, and through either a trackball-equipped remote control or an optional wireless keyboard, you’re surfing the Web. There’s a printer port, so users can save e-mail and documents.
Not to be outdone, RCA announced a major new partnership with Compaq, in which the two companies will cooperate to create an entirely new product category, the PC/TV. Rather than concentrating on a single product, the two companies will work together to create a system of technological and usability standards that they hope third-party manufacturers will eventually adopt.
Given the huge advantage in brand recognition and marketing power that both companies enjoy, the standard they develop will have to be taken seriously by the rest of the industry. Besides the obvious idea of a TV that does PC jobs and vice versa, much speculation revolved around how RCA might fit its highly successful Digital Satellite System into the mix.
