Mitsubishi U.S. CE operations will limit direct sales to a roster of dealers numbering only in the “mid-teens” and shift other retailers to distributors, in a restructuring that will cut 170 jobs by August at two warehouses and its California headquarters, dealers briefed on the plans said.

Dell isn’t opposed to a ban on the export of electronic waste to developing countries, the company said. It commented on the Obama administration’s efforts to draw up a national framework on how to deal with e-waste generated by federal agencies. That policy, along with Dell’s support for a proscription on the use of prison labor to process e-waste, aligns the company’s position with those of environmental groups such as the Basel Action Network and the Electronics TakeBack Coalition (ETBC). Industry-supported organizations such as R2 Solutions, which operates the EPA-endorsed R2 certification program for e-waste recyclers, are against a total ban on exports to developing countries.

Hastings Entertainment said same-store sales declines in categories including videogames and music offset growth in electronics, movies and several other categories. Total same-store sales for Q4 fiscal 2010 ended Jan. 31 dipped 3.2 percent from Q4 a year ago, while revenue fell 8.9 percent to $160.5 million and profit tumbled to $3.8 million, or 43 cents per share, from $9.1 million, 94 cents.

Whether the FCC should promulgate rules for TV antennas came up in several filings, posted to docket 10-235, on a rulemaking notice setting the stage for the agency to hold incentive auctions if it gets congressional authority.

Marchon 3D is planning a staggered rollout of 3D-ready prescription glasses, the company said Monday. Marchon has been working on the designs for 18 months, testing them for “proof of science” prior to going into production with larger quantities, David Johnson, president of Marchon 3D, told Consumer Electronics Daily. The company hopes to have completed the test mode and to begin putting lenses in frames “and have people wear them,” by the end of May, he said. Testing is being handled by VSP Optics, Marchon’s contract lab partner.

A federal judge set a hearing for March 31 as GE Commercial Distribution Finance seeks to seize inventory from Sixth Avenue Electronics after the retailer defaulted on a $6.37 million payment. U.S. District Court Judge William Martini, Newark, N.J., scheduled a hearing on a proposed court order to seize inventory from Sixth Avenue. Sixth Avenue has rapidly closed stores in recent weeks, leaving the Philadelphia market and shrinking to 10 stores from 19 at its peak. Sixth Avenue is holding $5.5 million inventory as part of a four-year-old financing agreement with GE. GE sued Sixth Avenue March 14 for breach of contract.

The EPA last week released standards for recognizing the “most efficient” products under a “Top Tier” program that it’s piloting as an extension of the Energy Star brand. TVs, clothes washers, heating and cooling equipment and refrigerator-freezers will be eligible this year for recognition as “most efficient” in their product categories on a “pilot basis,” said Ann Bailey, director of Energy Star product labeling. “The goal of this new effort … is to drive more energy efficient products into the market more quickly,” she said.

Enabling a “good user experience” will ultimately “make or break” 3D as an entertainment medium, said Philip Corriveau, Intel Labs principal engineer of interaction and experience. He spoke during a symposium in New York last week on 3D vision and health sponsored by the American Optometric Association and the 3D@Home Consortium. An experimental psychologist, Corriveau has been studying the human factors involved in driving the adoption of 3D in the home, both for Intel and with the Vision Performance Institute at Pacific University.

LG Display purchased 8th-generation OLED manufacturing equipment and will start making 30- and 55-inch TV panels in 2012, Universal Display CEO Steven Abramson told analysts. The 8G production facility, which will be in the same building in Paju, South Korea, that houses a 4.5G line, will have monthly capacity for 24,000 substrates, he said.

Japan semiconductor facilities that suspended manufacturing after the March 11 9.0-magnitude quake won’t be able to start full production again until the aftershocks completely stop, IHS iSuppli said. With every tremor exceeding magnitude-5.0, equipment “automatically shuts down,” it said.