Our roving cub reporter Scott Merrill is live in Amsterdam at the Philips Research labs. His first report is on the HomeLab. Watch CrunchGear for the Surface-like Shop Lab interface.
The HomeLab at the Philips research center is a model home built to test and monitor real-world response to prototype technology. Thirty cameras and microphones record subjects as they use and interact with products for the home; then researches review the recordings to refine the products. The living room is currently configured to demonstrate ambX (pronounced “ambiex”), the successor to AmbiLight, which extends the accent lighting from around the television to throughout the room.
Didn’t Philips pull their TVs out of the US Market?
Very Interesting … but I haven’t seen a Philips TV in years!
doesn’t seem like it would work since people aren’t relaxed, i.e. if I was in that situation to be comfortable, my legs would end up on that table
what the hell is the big deal about this?
@W the amount they payed TC :p
They’re not doing themselves any favors with the brightness of that photo. It looks like it would be pretty harsh on your eyes, especially when you’re trying to concentrate on the movie.
The only scenario where I can see this being cool is to enhance the explosions in action movies although after the 3rd or 4th incident of your neighbors calling the fire department it might get a little annoying.
If I wanted to read about gadgets I’d read crunchgear. This cross-promo just doesn’t look good.
Just a word of encouragement after negative comments above.
It seems to me we have to take Philips seriously, given that they are by far the largest lighting company on Earth.
The problem is, it appears pretty gimmicky at this stage. And that’s not helped by all the marketing-speak in their promotional videos.
Still, surely it will be magic when they can figure out a way for lighting to change automatically or at a voice command.
Like, the phone rings while you’re watching a movie, and the lights in your room come up only partway when you put the film on pause; and a spotlight comes up on the phone you need to find.
A corny example but you see where I’m going with this.
Anyhow keep trying Scott, Philips is an under-reported company and their lighting efforts are noteworthy.
Best,
Toby
With all these comments on Philips, I just bought this Philips LCD TV about 4 months back… feeling little scared. Whats the big deal with the ambi-light; I am pretty happy with the fluorescent bulb that glows proudly behind the TV.
I like Mr. Toby’s idea, taking it little further… what abt the TV stops and turns into a video camera and connects to the phone, well just have to make sure I am not in boxers !!
seriously the ‘ambi’ is pretty disturbing, imagine if a family with little kids, i am sure those ‘ambi’ is gonna affect their eyes.
Philips – try harder in inventing something practical than launching gimmick idea to sell your crap TV with LED at the back or other LED products =p