LG’s latest is the LH55 series of LCD HDTVs, and they’ve started to ship after making a debut at CES earlier in the year. This new line uses the advanced 240Hz technology. The series features TruMotion 240Hz which increases response time, making your experience smoother and giving you a more natural picture.

Some other features in the line include a 80,000:1 dynamic contrast ratio, ambient light sensors and four HDMI inputs. You can pick up the LH55 series in 37″, 42″, 47″ and 55″ models, which will cost you $1,399.95, $1,799.95, $2,099.95 and $3,899.95.

Samsung’s latest 55″ LN55B650 LCD HDTV is no slouch, boasting a 100,000:1 contrast ratio along with full HD resolution (1080p) for the crispest images possible. We’re talking 120Hz and support for Medi@2.0, which allows viewers to receive content over Yahoo! and Flickr directly on the screen.

It’s also DLNA-certified, so you’ll be able to connect to your computer’s personal media collection remotely and watch it on a huge screen. What would it be without a USB 2.0 port? You’ll get one so you can share images with others in the living room and bore them senseless.

If you are the environmentally friendly type, the Loewe Art SL HDTV has just been introduced and you’ll want to check it out. It’s touted as the greenest HDTV from the company to date. And it doesn’t sacrifice specs and design.

This 1080p LCD display comes with an Eco Mode that lets you control how much power it uses and the automatic light dimming uses up to 20% less than when it runs normally. In standby mode, the Loewe Art SL sucks just 0.7 watts. As you might expect, these power saving features don’t come cheap.

Sony introduced the Z5500 line. A trio consisting of 40-inch, 46-inch and 52-inch models, the set boasts Motionflow 200Hz technology, DLNA certification, the outfit’s BRAVIA Engine 3, its own ‘draw the LINE’ design concept, a 1080p panel and a CI Plus interface.

You’ll also get an integrated MPEG-4/AVC HD tuner, BRAVIA Sync (HDMI-CEC), an auto shut-off function, a dedicated ‘Energy Saving Switch’ and AppliCast, which lets users access a range of online services (RSS feeds and all sorts of other widgets) via the built-in Ethernet jack.

Samsung has announced the 46 and 55 inch B9000 HDTVs which are apparently the follow-up to the A950 models of last year.

The latest additions feature LED backlights with localized dimming, Medi@2.0 with YouTube/Yahoo! Widgets, built-in USB port, DLNA functionality and a wireless connection to the external media box similar to Sony ZX1. As usual, nothing on pricing or availability just yet. Stay tuned, we will likely get an update very soon.

The BeoVision 8 is entering big screen territory. Bang & Olufsen’s latest is known as the BV8-40, and stretches the LCD TV to a full 40-inches diagonally and features a nice 1,920 x 1,080 native resolution.

Some other specs include 500 cd/m2 brightness, a 3,000:1 contrast ratio, six-millisecond response time, a digital TV tuner (In DVB regions) and some nice internal speakers that have been tuned for the “reproduction of human speech”. All we know about pricing is that the MSRP is touted as affordable.

You may have noticed that it’s difficult to find arcades these days, no matter how many hours you drive around blasting some Loverboy or Huey Lewis and the News. It ain’t the 80s. What’s a Pinball enthusiast to do? You make some killer pinball games yourself, that’s what!

Take one BadBoyBill, who happens to be the admin of the HyperSpin forums. He used an HDTV, an LCD monitor and a 3D pinball program to build his own 1080p pinball machine. Oh yeah. Now you’re drooling and thinking back to those days at the arcade. The cabinet he created recreates the whole pinball experience and he can play any game he wants on the same machine. That is genius. Absolute genius.

Hi-Den Vision based in Hong Kong have created the worlds first HDMI 1080p digital photo viewer dubbed the HD-0310. This gadget hooks up to your 1080p HDTV and allows images to be displayed from a memory card direct to your HDTV.

The HD-0310 1080p photo viewer is pretty compact and will use USB storage devices and Compact Flash Type I/II, SD, SDHC, MMC, MS, MS Pro, MS PRO Duo, SmartMedia, MiniSD, Trans-Flash, MicroSD and xD. It also sports video playback through the USB port. The 1080p photo viewer will also give you 16 transitional effects as well as random playback of images. If you like, you’ll be able to skip through images with the remote control.

Looks like LG has two new Scarlet sets coming, both with integrated Bluetooth. Pretty girl not included as usual. To start, the LH70 line will consist of two models, a 42 incher that’s 39.7mm thin and a 47 incher that’s 40.9mm thin.

Each will feature a 100,000:1 contrast ratio, 120Hz technology, 2 millisecond response time, a USB port for connecting external media, touch sensitive power button, DivX compatibility and an ambient light sensor to automatically adjust screen brightness to adjust to the room that you are viewing in and conserve energy.

We have heard for a while now that sales in Q4 2008 were abysmal for many retailers. The final quarter of the year is typically huge for most retailers and companies as consumers buy for the holiday season. Q4 2008 was different though and thanks to the poor global economy, not much happened in the way of sales.

Vizio issued a statement today that provided numbers for its shipments over Q4 2008. Despite what most of the rest of the electronics industry reported, Vizio had a great quarter. The company says that over the quarter it was the second largest shipper of HDTVs in America.

We all know the economy is bad, businesses are closing, people are out of work and technology and many other industries are seeing very slow sales. The housing market in many areas is virtually dead. The recession has significantly impacted TV sales.

According to DisplaySearch, Q4 2008 was the first quarter in history that saw a decline in TV revenues. At the same time revenues declined shipments were up 33% year over year. The reason for shipments increasing and revenues falling is lower prices forced by poor sales.

LG just announced the launch of it’s new LG LH30FD LCD HDTV series. The LCDs will come in three sizes, 47 inch, 42 inch and 32 inches and will feature rich finishes to compliment home interiors.

The interesting thing is that they are being promoted as energy saving devices with up to 70% reduction of power consumption when using the LCD’s unique power saving modes. No other specs yet or the pricing, but they will likely hit the Korean markets first.

This weekend marked the biggest game of the football season, the Super Bowl. The Steelers came out on top of the game and the commercials were decent this year as well. CEA says that the game drove 2.6 million HDTV sales as fans geared up to watch the big game in HD resolution.

Despite the economy, the CEA says that 2009 will be a record year for HDTV sales with 29.8 million HDTVs expected to ship. In 2008, 26.8 million HDTVs shipped and one of the things that have pushed sales of HDTVs in 2009 is that the average wholesale price has fallen by 50% to $849 this year.

JVC is introducing at CES 2009 what it calls a new category of flat panel television design – a super slim monitor said to feature a color space wider than typical HDTVs. It is called the LT-42WX70 and no pricing or release information is known as of yet.

The LT-42WX70, said JVC, was designed to reproduce the colors, detail and “texture” of high resolution images captured on digital SLR cameras. It, in fact, is designed to target digital imaging professionals and others into using high end digital cameras, though it is fully functional as well as a home television. It sports a 42-inch display in a slim body design.

CES 2009 is only days away now and the hoards of new gadgets and HDTVs that will be shown are probably showing up at the convention center in Vegas right now. Each year there are a myriad of world’s first launched at the show, and often they can only claim that title for a day, if not mere hours because of all the product introductions.

LG has laid claim to the title of world’s first TruMotion 480Hz LCD TV panel. The typical HDTV has a 60Hz refresh rate, though some are on the market now sporting 120Hz. I expect that we will see many 240Hz sets at the show and LG may not be the only maker showing off a 480Hz set.