corradoboy

If you can hang on a few months Toshiba/Canon are gonna seriously upset the apple cart and plough plasma and LCD into the ground. SED (Surface conductor Electron emission Display) as feature in here and here will be hitting the market in the middle of this year. Screen sizes will start at 55", but smaller and bigger will follow soon after. 1080p/i will be the norm, but higher resolution is perfectly feasible, but the main benefits are the contrast ratio's and refresh rates. The demo sets in the article I have posted were early prototypes running 720p res on 37" screens, but with a CR of 10,000/1, which already makes LCD and Plasma's 3000/1 seem pretty poor. Production units are expected to hit 100,000/1 They refresh faster then current CRT (I believe) so the blurring seen on LCD and plasma will be non-existent on these sets.

The image below is of screens of all 3 types showing a completely black image, taken with a 1s exposure set to 400ASA...



...as you can see, the LCD and Plasma cannot really do black, at all. The effect of this can clearly be seen, even in these quite poor digital camera pictures in the screen images below...





I will certainly be holding back, mainly 'cos I can't afford a 43" Pioneer plasma yet but if these hit the streets in the expected time frame then they promise to be outstanding. OLED is still several years away so this is sure to be the next major evolution in home entertaiment.

I know you can hang on forever as there is always a next big thing around the corner, but I have always thought LCD/plasma weren't fully up to the job as they still have never matched a good CRT screen for PQ, their obvious big benefits being screen size and flatness. If these SED's are true to their word then CRT will truly be dead, as may LCD/plasma shortly after.

Brendan Hughes

I think someone here reckoned they would take a year or two for the price to drop, and the initial unit price was expected to be £5-10k! So that's three years waiting for a bargain. Many people aren't that patient - they'll buy a plasma or LCD now, and relegate it to the bedroom in three years time when these are truly affordable.

davegtt

Yeah wait til theyre released and get another morgage to afford one. If we were holding back for the next piece of technology nobody would buy anything. I heard about 18months ago these will be taking over the market soon. as I say 18months later we're only hearing about them a little more.

Be interested what Plasma and LCDs the SED was compared against.

paulr

Does it really matter.A good film is a good film and wether its on a decent CRT,LCD or Plasma who is really that bothered.Do you finish watching Shawshank Redemption and think "if only the last scene had better pixilation".
Buy the best you can afford at the time.Thats it.

Leslie

Thanks for the tip Corradaboy. It will be interesting to see how good it is and more to the point, how expensive. I think it will be some time before HD tv is widely available enough to worry about it too much at the moment. I'll wait for my Plasma which does have an excellent picture as it is to wear out and then see whats availble then.

Les

corradoboy

The feeling I get from reading about these on the web is that Toshiba don't want to make the unit initially eliteist (sp?), prefering to go mass market, and mass profit straight from release. The production costs are reputed to be comparable or even cheaper than other technologies, so rather than sell 5000 sets worldwide to enthusiasts and make an extra £2k by overcharging, they realise that as long as their production facility is up to the job they can probably sell 100,000 of these things at similar prices to the equivelent competition annually, reaping much higher gains. As I said in my initial post, at the CES shows they are previewing these they are making claims about hitting the markets by mid '06. 18 months ago they were simply showing the direction they were heading, they have almost got there it seems.

davegtt

paulr, true but people who enjoy watching lots of films will want the best picture quality they can get and probably on the biggest screen they can get it. Otherwise we'd all be saving our pennies and have 14" telly in the living room, is that what you have? if not why not? probably the exact same reasoning for those who spend alot of time watching films etc.

The Zohan

Agreed!

Paulr, in which case why buy a Bentley or an Aston when a Kia will do the same job, people want the best they can for many reasons, quality being one of them.