Goodbye, FlyWire: The now-cancelled product will never see store shelves.
(Credit: Belkin)Belkin will not be releasing its FlyWire wireless HDMI accessory.
CNET has learned that the company has decided not to offer the FlyWire for sale. A Belkin spokesperson confirmed the product's cancellation, saying that "its retail price of $1,499 would be out of line given the current state of the economy."
The FlyWire was introduced at CES 2008. The unit was a transmitter/receiver combo: the transmitter toggled between multiple audio and video sources (HDMI and analog), which were then wirelessly beamed to a receiver. Since the tiny receiver required only AC power and utilized a single HDMI output, it could be stealthily mounted behind wall-mounted flat screens or ceiling mounted projectors, eliminating the need for long unsightly cable runs. At one point, Belkin was mulling two versions: an initial high-end, multiroom-capable $1,499 version for multiple AV sources, followed by a less pricey single-source transmitter.
Early demos of the FlyWire impressed us--enough that we nominated it as a finalist in the Home Video category for Best of CES 2008. (It was edged out by the Dish Network DTVPal DVR.) But the FlyWire's premature death is just another indication that wireless HDMI technology is all but stillborn at the consumer level. Other notable no-shows, at least so far: the Philips wireless HDMI kit (introduced January 2007) and the Monster Express HD System (announced summer 2008).
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Mitsubishi's foray into wireless HDTV.
(Credit: Amimon)Mitsubishi will be joining the rarefied ranks (in TV anyway) of Sony and Samsung in offering wireless television.
Wireless chipmaker Amimon is set to announce Thursday that Mitsubishi will use its technology to send high-definition TV signals to its latest LCD TV without wires. It will come in 40-inch and 46-inch sizes. The 40-inch model will cost 300,000 yen (or $2,731), and the 46-inch model will sell for 400,000 yen ($3,642).
Mitsubishi's TV will have the chips embedded in the TV, and will come with a separate receiver unit that can send and receive uncompressed HD video signals up to 100 feet away. That means you can keep the receiver in a room downstairs or in a cabinet--no line of sight necessary.
Here's the catch--it's being released in Japan only this fall. However, it's likely Mitsubishi will broaden distribution of this TV. Wireless HD video is a category that Amimon--which heads a consortium of chipmakers and consumer electronics companies pushing for a whole-home wireless TV standard called Wireless HDI--and others have been talking up for a while.
But it's been a long time coming, and it will be even longer before this is a mainstream product category. Amimon said recently it sees that happening in three to five years.
(Credit:
Dvice)
There was a time, somewhere back in the Dark Ages before cable and satellite, when the television set needed only to have a single connection--plug it into the wall outlet, and it was good to go. That day may finally have returned for Sharp's newest line of ultra-thin LCDs with the help of Amimon, an Israeli company that developed its first chips for wireless HDMI connections last summer.
The technology--known as WHDI, for "Wireless High Definition Interface"--can send 1080p signals up to 100 feet and "through four or five walls," according to Dvice, which witnessed the the system in action and found the quality to be excellent. Amimon's technology will debut in Sharp's X-Series HDTVs in Japan, with screens of 37, 42, and 46 inches, which will eventually make their way to the U.S. market.
The wireless TVs do, however, have a couple of drawbacks: One is an additional $800 cost; the other is that they still require a separate box to house all the necessary gear. (It probably can't be accurately called a "set-top" box anymore, lest it teeter on the top edge of the screen.) Still, if you have issues with exposed wires, this could go a long way toward keeping OCD symptoms under control.
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