November 26, 2009
Small, Beautifully Formed—But Why?
Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on November 2009 It’s slightly tricky to know who buys portable television sets these days, especially those that use the crappy 1-Seg mobile digital format so beloved of phone makers here. Still, Panasonic’s tiny new Viera has a lot going for it on the design front, so is worth a look. […]
By Metropolis
Originally published on metropolis.co.jp on November 2009
It’s slightly tricky to know who buys portable television sets these days, especially those that use the crappy 1-Seg mobile digital format so beloved of phone makers here. Still, Panasonic’s tiny new Viera has a lot going for it on the design front, so is worth a look.
The Viera MC75 has a 4.3in screen (making it not that much bigger than, say, an iPhone), 8GB of internal memory, and a slot for further expansion through an SD card. If you haven’t worked it out by now, the upshot is that the MC75 is essentially a pocket-sized digital VCR.
Panasonic says the device can hold up to 43 hours of video, whether it’s recorded from a 1-Seg broadcast (unlikely) or sourced from something like the TV at home, a camcorder or a cellphone. At ¥40,000, however, the littlest Viera is something of a luxury purchase.
