Armani and Samsung have collaborated again, this time on a premium HDTV design. Revealed for the first time at the opening of the Milan International Furniture Fair. Combining cutting edge technology from Samsung with cutting edge design from Giorgio Armani, this is one sleek 1080p LCD television. Available in 46" and 52" sizes the tv itself is pretty basic looking (although I'm sure it has a more than "basic looking" picture) but the remote control sounds like it puts on quite the light show with "a full range of radiant backlights." Plus there's a smaller pebble-shaped remote for basic functions. Look for the smaller tv model to launch first (in Europe) this summer, with the 52" quickly following.

The hunger for art, or more aptly his wife's hunger for art, can get a man in trouble. Lee Kun-hee, chairman of Samsung, allegedly used over $64 million from a corporate slush fund to buy art for his wife Ra Hee Hong Lee who is director-general of the Leeum, Samsung Museum of Art. The big mystery is, where has the art gone? It hasn't been exhibited in Korea and its whereabouts is presently unknown. Samsung has denied the allegations but the National Assembly has approved an independent investigation. The move has caused other Korean corporations to stop buying art and caused the country's two main auction houses to report a 20% drop in sales.

One painting in question is Roy Lichtenstein's Happy Tears, 1964, bought at Christie's New York in 2002 for $7,159,500, a record price for the artist at the time. The painting is said to have been bought at the auction on behalf of the chairman's wife by Hong Seong-won, director of the Seoul-based Seomi Gallery. Kim Yong-chul, head of the legal department of the Samsung Group Restructuring Office from 1997 to 2004, has released a full list of the art alleged to have been bought with money from the Samsung slush fund as well as details of payments made to Christie's that according to The Art Newspaper, includes 30 paintings and photographs including works by Donald Judd, Gerhard Richter and David Hockney. Samsung supplied The Art Newspaper with a statement saying that the allegations are groundless and that the list is of works of art purchased by Seomi Gallery alone and that neither Mrs Hong Lee nor the Samsung Museum of Art were involved in the purchase of "Happy Tears." Where is "Happy Tears" now? Seomi Gallery first said they sold"Happy Tears" to a private collector and then quickly retracted that and told Korean reporters she still had the painting but that other works on the list have been sold to various collectors.

It's a busy few weeks for cellphone watchers as everyone wants to create the next phone that makes all the cool kids go crazy the way the iPhone has. Born Rich reports that Porsche Design is working on the shiny new gadget shown above. The P9521 cell phone is created from a block of aluminum and has a scratch-resistant screen which rotates 180 degrees, a three-megapixel camera, a fingerprint reader and a MP3 player. This baby will set you back way more than the iPhone, it is expected to sell fo $1600.

Another hot cellphone story is that Samsung is reportedly working with Armani to create a phone. The Armani phone is said to have "exclusive content" and undoubtedly minimalist design to die for.

Those at China's Olympics can keep in touch with a gold phone. Samsung will make a special 18-carat gold-plated mobile phone in China to celebrate the Olympics in Beijing. The P318 phone will be black with gold trim and gold along the bottom half of its back. The phone will only be sold in China and no launch date has been set yet.

This week took me through several different airports and so I got to see a lot of people sporting Bluetooth headsets. Starting soon, those in need of new ear candy might want to check out the WEP 420, a headset designed by Bang & Olufsen and created by Samsung Electronics. The sleek and silver WEP 420 has buttons that are hidden behind a sliding cover. The sliding cover blocks static to increase overall sound quality and comes with an attractive charger cradle. Not bad, although the blockish bar look makes it look as if you have a silver ingot strapped to the side of your head.

[via PSFK]

There is nothing like a little bling on an appliance to get you in the mood to actually do some household chores and the new Hauzen Washing Machine from Samsung certainly has no shortage of bling. The look of the machine was created by Korean designer Andre Kim. It is done in crimson and gold, with a gilded floral pattern, stainless steel door/window ring and the designer's golden crest on the front. There are no details out on pricing from Samsung, yet, but it seems possible that this particular machine will only be available to the Korean market.

[via engadget]

Samsung just announced that their crack team of millimeter-shavers has done it again with their new fangled "Ultra Edition 10.9" slider. Being two millimeters thinner than the company's previously crowned D900 and boasting quite similar specs - the 3.2 megapixel camera, along with 80MB worth of music/video internal memory (plus a microSD slot) - it looks like we're getting ever-closer to the much sought-after two-dimensional mobile phone. No price or availability yet, but our Engadget cronies predict we'll know next month after the 3GSM Congress in Barcelona.

Click through for more pictures of the Ultra Edition 10.9

[via Engadget]

At CES, Samsung had a display that featured their newest plasma TV. The Samsung FP-T5894W is a flat panel, wall-mounted TV that is completely wireless.

Up until this point, if you wanted to have the look of wireless, you would need to pay someone to install the TV and hide the wires in the wall behind the unit, which means that you ended up with an attractive look, but that you couldn't move the TV or even attach DVD players, etc. to it without attaching additional wires. The FP-T5894W has a wireless A/V center that can be placed up to 300 feet from the screen and will communicate at 150Mbps, the 802.11n wireless standard. The screen is 58-in. with 1080 px resolution and, according to Samsung, a 10,000:1 contrast ratio.

The retail release is scheduled for September 2007. List price is expected to be $5,799.

Because, apparently, there are enough My Super Sweet Sixteen types out there, gadget companies seemingly can't find enough reasons to bling up their wares, and Samsung is surely no exception. To commemorate the 1 millionth Yepp YP-Z5 unit sold, the company and interface designer Paul Mercer (he also designed the iPod's 'face) are auctioning off 10 of these 18k gold bars, which are predicted to net over $1,000 each. Go for it, if you're in Korea.

[Via Engadget]

Although they ragged us with a sneak peak of this behemoth back in August, Samsung has finally announced the official release date for the largest mass-produced LCD TV in the world to be February (actually, "February or March") 2007.

The 70-incher provides 1080p flat panel resolution with 8ms response time and 2000:1 contrast ratio – but what's even more exciting is the fact that Samsung claims that they will be manufacturing a million of the bad boys annually. Nice.

No word on price yet, but seeing as they've sort of got the market cornered here (and very well may have it cornered for a while), we're hoping they'll be nice, responsible market-creators and keep 'er well below five digits.

Via gizmodo

The Samsung SCH-B600 is a camera phone for those who want really quality pictures, not just those blurry little shots of half-recognizable faces. In fact, it is more like a camera with a phone built into it than the other way around. It has a 10-megapixel camera with a 3x optical zoom and other features that include a satellite multimedia service, Bluetooth, an MP3 player, a business card reader, and a TV-output. The phone retails for about $950.

Before you get too excited, however, keep in mind that this camera will only be released in Korea - at least for the time being.

Flat panel TVs look great, sleek and far less bulky than any ordinary TV, especially if you choose a large screen size. Unfortunately, unless you have a niche in the wall carved out for the screen - which is a good idea, but can be a hassle - there will be wires along your wall connecting the cable, DVD and any other relevant equipment. The Samsung SPD-50P7HDT Wireless is a 50" flat screen that solves these problems. It comes with a wireless AV center to which all of your extra equipment can attach. The center then transmits the signals to the screen, hanging wire-free (except for the power cord) on the wall. It's only available in Korea at the moment, and is priced around $5,000.

The latest refrigerator from Samsung has four separate compartments basically combining a side-by-side refrigerator with the two drawers in the bottom (one for freezing and one for vegetables). Each of the four compartments in the Samsung Quatro is controlled separately and cooled separately with its own evaporator and fan. The 26.4 cubic foot model with a water and ice dispenser sells for $2,648.

LG has just released their U900 phone, which is reported to be the first DVB-H phone in the world. DVBH stands for Digital Video Broadcasting - Handheld, a slightly smaller version of same technology that works for digital TV. The phone and its digital imaging technology will first be available in Italy, where the carrier Hutchinson, the largest service carrier in Italy, has obtained the exclusive DVB rights to the 2006 World Cup. After the World Cup is complete and an Italian base has been established, the phone will be marketed globally.

The screen is 2.2-inches wide and users can watch for up to three hours on one battery charge. The phone also has a 1.3 mega-pixel VGA digital camera and 58 MB memory. Rumor has it that Samsung Electronics plans to introduce a DVB-H phone to the Italian market this month, as well.

[Image OhMyNews]

One of the reasons we love watching the news coming out of CES is the one-upsmanship from the various companies. The TV wars are in full effect. Samsung debuted their 102" plasma TV only to be immediately upstaged by Matsushita's 103" version. How big is too big? We are not sure but it will be interesting to see how interior designers try to accommodate these monster designs in home decor.