The newly launched Toshiba XL700-series Regzas are some of the Japanese company’s most promising LCD TVs by a mile. For starters, these panels are based on the latest LED-edgelit backlighting technology to output a high 3 million:1 dynamic contrast in an attractive 48mm-thin bezel. We also received news that there is built-in local dimming for enhancing black levels, which is an undocumented feature verified by a reliable source. This not only puts the XL700 Regzas in the same league as a handful of competing models like the LG LE7500, the Toshibas are easily one of the more affordable choices in the market.

Other performance-centric functions include ClearScan 100 Pro, AutoView and Resolution+. ClearScan 100 Pro provides a fast 100Hz refresh rate to minimize film judder and motion blur, while AutoView optimizes onscreen visuals on-the-fly by monitoring both room brightness and playback content. Rounding it up is Resolution+, which promises improved video-upscaling quality for standard-definition programs. On the multimedia front, added DLNA-compatibility facilitates MP3, JPEG and DivX streaming from remote PCs to complement its USB port and SD card slot (JPEG only). Networking is via Ethernet and there’s no Wi-Fi, unfortunately.

“With the Launch of LED-Backlit Series our LCD TV line-up has become stronger in India and now the customers have the choice to choose between LED -Backlit and CCFL -Backlit LCD TVs. With our Advanced Technology and Superior Design coupled with the imagery of Sachin, our brand ambassador is sure to place Toshiba at the helm of the FPD market in the country”, said Pranab Mohanty, Business Head, Consumer Product Division, Toshiba India on its launch.

The new Toshiba REGZA XL700 series LED TV comes in three sizes: 138.7cms (55XL700E), 117.5cms (47XL700E) and 106.7cms (42XL700E).

These LEDs feature slim design and come in metallic-feel finishing bezel. These LEDs are equipped with Toshiba’s proprietary Resolution+ technology, its blazing-fast 14-bit video processing and Meta Brain Premium Video Engine.

The Ricoh CX3 is a brand new point-and-shoot compact camera featuring a 10.7x, 28-300mm zoom lens in a body less than 3cms thick. Successor to the 6-month old CX2 model, the Ricoh CX3 incorporates a 10 megapixel back-illuminated sensor and an enhanced noise reduction function which promises to improve image quality when shooting in low-light scenes.

The long-zoom compact market is a highly competitive one, and the CX3 has a couple of serious rivals, the most notable of course being the multi-award-winning Panasonic TZ7 and its replacement the impressive-looking new TZ10  which I’ll be reviewing later this week.

Inside is where the differences between the CX3 and its predecessors become more apparent. Its sensor is a 10-megapixel back-illuminated CMOS variety, which is purported to reduce noise as the sensitivity increases, as well as retain more detail and colour.

Other new features include an enhanced dynamic range double shot, which is a form of HDR where the camera takes two shots, and merges them together in-camera to preserve the most detail in photographs with tricky lighting situations. The CX3’s fast burst shooting speed allows the camera to take 5 frames per second at full resolution.

There is also a new S-Auto mode (taking the place of the easy auto on the previous cameras) which removes most of the control from the photographer and selects the most appropriate scene mode for the image.

The single harddrive inside has a capacity of 500GB - 1.5TB depending on the model and is surrounded in metal that measures 11 x 7.1 x 5 inches that provides a protective layer around the drive. On the waterproof side it can be dunked for 3 days in up to 10 feet of water without causing damage to the drive inside. On the fireproof side of things the drive can withstand temperatures up to 1550 degrees Fahrenheit for up to 30 minutes.

On the back of the device there is a USB 2.0 port for connecting the drive to your computer. Also the power connector can also be found there along with a hole in a plate that allows you to bolt the Solo to a floor or desk.

The ioSafe Solo weighs 15lbs making it rather heavy duty which is exactly what it wants to achieve. The benefits of having a waterproof and fireproof drive is that you know your data will always be safe in the unfortunate event there is a fire or water issue.

The ioSafe Solo’s security features for your data don’t involve encryption, but are of the physical variety. To withstand moisture, the drive is sealed in what the company calls a HydroSafe  waterproof package that can handle up to 10 feet of water for three days. The ioSafe Solo also has a ceramic block that is part of the drive’s DataCast fireproof insulation. When reaching temperatures over 160 degrees Fahrenheit, the ceramic block releases water vapor to cool the unit.

The drive includes ioSafe’s Data Recovery Service that is activated with product registration. The service includes a telephone hotline and e-mail address to contact the ioSafe Disaster Response Team. The service also comes with a Data Extraction Guarantee of up to $20,000 and a free replacement ioSafe unit with the recovered data. The Data Recovery Service and the Disaster Response Team are available with the original warranty and can be extended for up to five years.

The Samsung PX2370 23″ widescreen LCD-LED backlit monitor is elegance defined. Showcasing a Touch of Color charcoal-gradation finish and a profile of just 16.5 mm thin, the PX2370 is pure elegance. The PX2370’s images are best-in-class, as well. The LCD-LED backlight produces mega dynamic contrast ratio of 5,000,000:1 for unprecedented detail. Fast 2 ms (G2G) response and 1,920 x 1,080 full HD resolution yield the sharpest images. And with 100 % sRGB color standard reproduction, color will be displayed as it was meant to be displayed. It’s the pinnacle of elegance and performance. The Samsung PX2370 LCD-LED monitor.

You tell the PX2370 where you are sitting in relation to the monitor (presumably through the OSD) and it adjusts the contrasts and brightness to make the image as visible as possible from that angle. Apparently it is very useful for watching films if you want to lounge back at some obscure angle, but it is not some kind of magical and automatic fix to eliminate the inherent viewing angle issues that plague TN panel technology.

There is no mention of one of our favourite new features of the Samsung SyncMaster PX2370; the ambient light and proximity sensors which turn off the monitor when nobody is using it. Instead Digital Versus decided to comment on “poor upscaling” of regular resolution DVDs on the PX2370 – something that probably has more to do with the graphics card and DVD codec than the PC monitor. Still, any flaws in the image are probably that little bit more noticeable with the brilliant contrast and brightness that the PX2370 offers.

Asus’ N61 range consists of multimedia machines featuring powerful components and the latest features, including Asus’ own SonicMaster technology standards.

This is also one of the first laptops we’ve seen to feature USB 3.0, the next generation of USB technology. The N61J is a powerful machine for the multimedia user, but there are a few issues here as well. One of the laptop’s key selling points is the aforementioned SonicMaster standards.

We found that while the stereo effect was impressive, sound wasn’t as good across the full audio spectrum, and tracks generally lacked bass and depth. Although better than most laptops, we still wouldn’t use this machine as a replacement for desktop speakers.

In our experience with the N61J, the technology worked as advertised. When running our gaming benchmarks, the discrete card kicked in without any effort on our part. Unfortunately, Optimus couldn’t elevate the N61J’s gaming performance beyond middling. The notebook’s GeForce GT 325M might be based on a new GPU architecture using a smaller 40nm process, but the mainstream card is still an amateur compared to the older GTX 260M in our zero-point notebook. Moderately demanding games like Far Cry 2 are playable, to be sure, but only when run at the notebook’s native 1366×768 resolution with quality set at medium, which yielded 36.75fps.

The N61J is more impressive at productivity chores. Its 2.26GHz Core i5-430M is part of Intel’s new Arrandale family of mobile processors. It’s built on the same 32nm process as Intel’s Clarkdale desktop procs, which include an integrated graphics chip in the CPU. There are numerous other improvements the Core i5 chips offer over the Core 2 Duo, with integrated memory controller, better power management, and HyperThreading among the most noteworthy. So, despite its 800MHz clock disadvantage, the Core i5-430M performed slightly better than our zero-point’s 3.06GHz Core 2 Duo Mobile T9900 CPU in all the content creation benchmarks that are multithread-friendly. Photoshop shows no such bias, leaving the older Core 2 Duo out front.