CE Pro produces a list of the top 100 custom electronics dealers every year, ranked by revenue.  Then they take that information and ask each of those dealers what their favorite products are to sell in a bunch of different categories.  They call it the Top 100 Products Analysis.  We go over this information every year not because we believe these are necessarily the best you can buy, but because it provides some really good insight. 

 

We came across an article recently at cable360.net entitled From Nature to News: HD's Learning Curve.  The article got us thinking about how far HDTV has come since we started the podcast, and how much territory is still left to cover.  The article focuses on the nonfiction HD programming available today - everything except sports, that is.  Sports has always dominated HDTV, but the landscape may be changing.  Much of what was in the article answers any argument as to why a reality show, like Survivor, isn't in HD.  We talked about that at the beginning of June.

If you think about it, custom dealers want to make money.  So we can imagine that the products on the list provide them with a pretty good margin.  But we can also assume that the products are reliable and high quality.  Dealers won't want to hassle with constant returns or tech support just to sell a product with high margins.  Those returns and tech support kill any margin you may have had.  Curiously, HD-DVD and Blu-ray weren't mentioned.

Here are a few of the categories from the list:

Receivers:

• Denon (34%)
• Integra (30%)
• Marantz (29%)
• Yamaha (23%)
• Sony or Pioneer (14%)

Bookshelf Speakers:

• Klipsch (24%)
  
• B&W (22%)
  
• Triad (17%)
  
• Boston Acoustics (11%)
  
• Speakercraft (10%)

Floorstanding Speakers

• Klipsch (28%)
  
• B&W (22%)
  
• Triad (12%)
  
• Meridian (10%)
  
• Canton (9%)

DVD Players

• Sony (35%)
• Denon (30%)
• Integra (26%)
• Marantz (25%)
• Pioneer (16%)

Front Projection

• Runco (45%)
• Sony (40%)
• Marantz (15%)
• SIM2 (14%)
• Infocus (14%)

Rear Projection

• Sony (49%)
• Samsung (30%)
• Mitsubishi (25%)
• LG and JVC (8%)
• Toshiba (5%)

LCD

• Sony (51%)
• Sharp (47%)
• LG (32%)
• Runco (17%)
• Samsung (11%)

Plasma

• Fujitsu (40%)
• Pioneer (36%)
• LG (33%)
• Runco (29%)
• Samsung (16%)

The High Definition Learning Curve

When the HT Guys first converted to HDTV Guys, ESPN HD and Discovery HD Theater were two of the huge motivating factors.  Most primetime shows weren't in HD yet, there wasn't really any news in HD - HDNet had their news show, but it wasn't one we would normally tune into like CNN, Fox News or the local affiliate.  Watching a baseball game like you were in the stadium, seeing all the tiny hairs on a spider's legs, or getting motion sickness riding a roller coaster were what really blew us away.  But back then everyone called us crazy.  They all asked why we'd spend so much for TV sets when there was "nothing to watch" in HD.  Slowly but surely the primetime shows all went High Def; 24 took a little while, but when it came it was great.  Now there's local news in HD, dedicated niche channels like Food Network and HGTV in high def.  Pretty much everything you could want.

Some key points from the article:

• Households with HDTV services surpassed 27.7 million U.S. homes last year.
• 20% of the audience for the 11-part hit series Planet Earth came from viewers who watched it on Discovery HD Theater, which accounts for only a fraction of all Discovery watchers.
• "From resolution to 16x9 to 5.1 audio, HD allows the pictures to tell the story and the reporter to complement it, rather than (vice versa)." -Mark Cuban
• "The problems we'd been running into with HD cameras is that they tend to be heavier and less flexible in how they move around" -Josh Derby, director of production technology for Discovery Networks
• The network switched to Sony's XDCAM HD, a lighter-weight, more portable, disc-based camcorder.
• "Now that there are decent $1,000 consumer models, we can afford to blow up a few in the name of the show," -Josh Derby
• "Between the tape stock and postproduction work, it can add at least 20% more to the budget of a production," -Clint Stinchcomb, EVP and general manager for HD at Discovery Communications
• CNN said in April it would use Sony's XDCAM HD units to conduct some high-definition reports from the field as well as in its studios.
• Rather than convert its standard-def footage to hi-def, National Geographic Channel actually shoots all its footage in HD and then downgrades to standard for simulcasting.
• Discovery HD Theater will double its offerings by year-end 2008

So we'll see CNN in HD this fall - expect Fox News to be very close behind.  After that, what's left before people give in and admit that there's plenty to watch in HD?  With the new XDCAM from Sony, there's no reason all of these channels can't be in HD by the 2009 cutoff.  Here's what we can think of:

• Most Reality Shows
• The rest of the Discovery Networks like Animal Planet, TLC, Science, Military, etc.
• Kids programming like Disney, Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, etc.
• Specialty channels like History, Comedy Central, Spike, SciFi, etc.
• Daytime programming ... but honestly, who wants to see Jerry Springer in high def??