CE and IT companies, retailers, utilities and advocacy groups said they're forming a coalition to drive consumer adoption of smart-grid technologies. Founding members of the coalition, called the Smart Grid Consumer Collaborative, include Best Buy, Control4, GE and the Gridwise Alliance. The coalition comes about after research has shown that only 4 percent of consumers have heard of the smart grid or have some understanding of it.

The first 3D TVs have barely hit retail, but price cutting has begun. Though retailers only began stocking 3D TVs during the past two weeks, Vann’s and Best Buy Web sites Tuesday already were promoting Samsung’s 46-inch UN46C7000 and the 55-inch UN55C7000 at $2,339 and $2,969, down from $2,599 and $3,299.

Allowing unlicensed wireless auxiliary devices on all TV band channels would run counter to the recommendations in the National Broadband Plan, AT&T said in reply comments to an FCC rulemaking. “The proposed rule would delay the implementation of the National Broadband Plan by requiring subsequent commercial broadband licensees to clear the broadcast spectrum of the very low-power auxiliary users this proposed rule would place there."

A 22.8 percent rise in comparable store videogame category sales for Q4 ended Jan. 31 from the year-ago period helped offset weak CE and music sales, Hastings Entertainment said Monday. Total revenue increased 5.5 percent to $176.1 million, while profit grew to $9.1 million, 94 cents a share, from $4.1 million, or 41 cents.

A federal judge gave Panasonic until April 26 to respond to a lawsuit alleging it sold plasma TVs with a “uniform inherent defect” that caused the sets’ picture quality to “suddenly deteriorate."

CE retailers support a federal energy standard for TVs, but don’t agree that state efforts to prod federal action is the way to go, the CE Retailers Coalition told Connecticut lawmakers last week. Any federal standard should be based on “thorough scientific analysis, testing and due process,” the group said, and such a standard with a “sell-through option would lessen the logistical complexities, market dislocations and regional economic variables that would inevitably result” from the energy standard being weighed in Connecticut bill HB-5217.

The huge lead that Apple enjoys in the smartphone gaming category includes a large device installed-base lead and an enormous advantage in the number of games available, but Palm, Research In Motion and Google each provided evidence at the recent Game Developers Conference (GDC) in San Francisco that they had no intention of giving up on the category.

Pioneer will ship its first Blu-ray players by mid-year using decoders it jointly developed with Sharp, including a 3D-ready model, Russ Johnston, vice president of marketing and product planning, told Consumer Electronics Daily.

Google’s reported plans to partner with Intel and Sony to bring its search and other software to TV sets and broadband-connected video devices didn’t come as a surprise to those who monitored the lobbying ahead of the National Broadband Plan, industry lawyers said. “Most companies involved in various aspects of video distribution are looking at the potential convergence of RF broadcast and IP delivery, and Google is one of those,” said Steve Effros, who consults for cable box maker Beyond Broadband Technology. “So it’s a logical thing for Google to be doing.” Google and Sony declined to comment on the reports, which appeared in the New York Times and Wall Street Journal. Intel didn’t respond to a request for comment.

Consumer demand for the gateway devices sought last week in the FCC’s National Broadband Plan is untested because no product has been developed, agreed cable, satellite and CE executives we surveyed. Assessing manufacturing costs for a simple device to connect set-top boxes to cable systems, direct broadcast satellite, telco-TV and Internet content can’t readily be done because there’s no set specification, the eight executives agreed. The plan called for all pay-TV providers to offer gateway devices by 2013 (CED March 17 p2) .