Panasonic's Toshihiro Sakamoto shows latest leap in TV screen sizes--to 150 inches

In his keynote address at the International Consumer Electronics Show here in Las Vegas, Toshihiro Sakamoto, president of Panasonic AVC Networks and senior managing director of Matsushita Electric Industrial Company, went for the wow factor when he unveiled a 150-inch plasma TV screen, the largest demonstrated by any company to date. (The previous record for plasma was 103 inches, held by Panasonic; Sharp has gone to 108 inches in LCD technology.) These giant screens arenâ''t big sellers, but they do win their manufacturers bragging rights.

Sakamoto also unveiled a gizmo that has long been wanted and possible, but attempts to create it have raised copyright concernsâ''that is, a Tivo-like television recorder that can leave the house and make recorded content portable. Developed in partnership with Comcast, the device is a combination cable box, hard disk recorder, and portable DVD player. The hard disk recorder/DVD player component snaps off of a base station for use on the road, in the plane, or whereever. I donâ''t have all the details yet, but my guess is this product will avoid the fate of previous attempts to space-shift as well as time-shift TV because the recorded television is locked to the box, that is, cannot be copied over to another device, like a computer or ipod.

Sakamotoâ''s presentation featured a successful demonstration of in-room wireless networking of high definition devices, sending data without compression. (Sony, at its press conference yesterday, attempted a demonstration of a new technology for close proximity networking of high definition gizmos, it didnâ''t work on stage, but redeemed itself at its booth.) Wireless HDTV networks are likely to emerge as a major theme of the Consumer Electronics Show, which opened this morning.