The developers at VieraConnect are continuing to add new and exciting apps to the 2010 and 2011 Viera TV models. Their latest: Karaoke!

http://panasonic.net/avc/viera/global/connect_apps/detail/130 

Great to see this level of dedication to IPTV technology, Panasonic truly is the frontrunner in this field.

In our case, this was very literal, since we found out a few weeks ago that since we were the first family to receive the 3D LiHD suite, and we lived in NJ, about an hour away from the Panasonic US headquarters, we were asked if we'd be willing to talk to some Panasonic employees about our experiences so far. Included in this group was an executive director (as in board of directors) from Panasonic, Japan, and the VP of the Panasonic Networking group, one of the product managers, and our own LiHD Community Manager, Yessica!

We were extremely honored, of course, and had the pleasure of meeting these Panasonic reps and talk to them about our products, how we use them, what we'd like to see, what we'd like to see different, etc. yesterday. I'd also been learning some basic Japanese greetings over the past 2 weeks, causing some restless mornings where I'd wake up repeating 'Please help yourself' and 'I speak a little Japanese' in Japanese... they seemed to appreciate me trying at least!

Ushimaru-san had just flown in from Osaka that morning, and he was just the best. Here he is trying some of Ada's freshly-baked pecan pie, which he enjoyed tremendously.

He actually designed the ZS model cameras, and the little video-camera icon, so again, meeting him was such a great honor.

They were only able to stay for an hour, but we showed them a lot of pictures we took at the NJ Renaissance Festival over the weekend (I'll post some later this week) and our LiHD set-up, so overall it was a great visit. I'm glad I was able to get this photo-op as they left, it was once again another memorable LiHD experience!

When we got the call that we were accepted into the LivinginHD Family program, there was much rejoicing (yaayy). When Greg told us that we were the first family to get the new 3D suite, I had to spend several minutes looking for my jaw which had mysteriously fallen on the floor.

As the weeks progressed, we were anxiously waiting for the 3D TVs to arrive at Panasonic, at which point they would call us to schedule the install date. 2 weeks ago, that day came.

Initially, the plan was to have the installation take place the latter half of the week of June 7, but was rescheduled to Tuesday June 8, which happened to be my birthday, how’s that for timing?

Monday June 7, the packages arrived, which was Christmas all over again! The TV and speaker system came in their own boxes (and speaker stands), and then there was a big box which was filled with all the rest of the equipment. I couldn’t believe all the things Panasonic sent us, so very grateful. We decided to go with the high–end camcorder (HS300), since we currently don’t have a very good one, and Ada has a degree in audio/video and used to work as a video-tech. Now she can pick up her old hobby again! The GF1 looks like an amazing camera, I’ll have to take some good photo classes to make sure I use it properly. Then the ZS7 was an unexpected surprise, a very welcome one, of course  A camera with built-in GPS is going to come in handy when we go to Europe!

Also in the box were all the cables for the installation, the BluRay player, several SD Cards, a Toughbook F8, Roxio Pro Creator, Coraline and Ice Age: Age of Dinosaurs (the 3D versions), and a portable BluRay player (!). About an hour after gasping for air and thanking the fine Panasonic people, I realized something was missing, the receiver! I shot off a quick email to Panasonic and Greg and hoped they would see it quickly. Long story short, they sent the receiver via messenger the next morning, it arrived 15 minutes before Greg and his crew showed up.

Those guys were amazing, and Greg is a fountain of information, to say he knows his stuff is like saying Rembrandt knows how to paint. They got everything up and running in a couple of hours, and Greg spent another couple of hours going through everything, making sure we knew how to use our equipment. There were a few minor things that had to be redone because the audio receiver is not HDMI 1.4 compliant, which means that it won’t pass along 3D information. So the DirecTV Receiver and the BluRay player had to be hooked up directly to the TV. The BluRay player has 2 HDMI outs though, one 1.4 compliant, the other 1.3. That means that you can hook one HDMI connection up to the TV for the 3D content, and use the other HDMI port to connect to the AV Receiver, for the Surround Audio. Unfortunately, the DirecTV receiver did not have a second HDMI out, so we (that is, Greg) ended up putting an optical cable between the DirecTV receiver and the AV receiver.

So, everything is plugged in, humming, and looking and sounding just great. Only thing that’s left is getting the BluRay player on my wireless network. It comes with a wireless dongle, but it’s not accepting my encryption key. Will have to troubleshoot some more…

Once again, thank you Panasonic, Kate, Yessica, and Greg, it’s an amazing privilege to be in this program. There’s more to tell, but that will have to wait a couple of weeks.

Well, not surprisingly, but no less disappointing, a lot of people didn't show up, only had 10 folks in the evening, with food enough for 20, and we didn't even make everything.

The chocolate mice were a great hit (chocolate bites, covered in chocolate graham cracker crumbs, sliced almond ears and licorice whips as tails), as were the halloween cupcakes:

The house was appropriately decorated with various spiderwebs, witches, black cats, orange and blue lights, candles, etc. A small sample here:

The people who did come all wore costumes, some more elaborate than others, including Dexter in his kill uniform taking a hatchet to a Blue Aes Sedai: