Video Asylum

Posted by unclestu52 (D) on September 14, 2007 at 20:42:11

In Reply to: RE: LCD TV technologies to enhance the picture posted by The Sound Guy on September 12, 2007 at 10:48:53

LCD technology patents are largely held by Sharp and they have been one of the leaders in the flat screen technology. Sony unfortunately elected to stick with the CRT technology for a long time and were rather confident since they held 25% of the world market at one time. Their attitude is similar to Microsoft, whereby they are unwilling to pay royalties to others in order to use other patents and technologies developed elsewhere.

Sony has rushed in, and developed some key patents in LCOS technology, but Hitachi, IIRC, also has patents there also. It may interest you to know that Hitachi actually OEMed about 90% of the Japanese production of picture tubes and has recently bought out a major LCD or plasma factory.

Panasonic and Pioneer seem to have placed their R & D into the plasma technologies. Panasonic, Fujitsu, and NEC were the earliest of the plasma producers and have a significant manufacturing experience with that technology. However, while early production was somewhat limited by the military uses and their restrictions, the manufacturers producing high def sets have grown significantly. Virtually every major CRT manufacturer has dropped their models. Vizio, once primarily a computer monitor specialist is determined to claim a significant niche in the flat screen market. Sam Sung of Korea, has won a $2 billion contract from Sony to OEM Sony's LCD sets.

These days every unit is computer controlled. however, much like DD and DTS many employ identical chipsets. You will see this in the kind of optional features each set offers. Typically a lot is revealed in the number of screen size options. Typical sets offer only four options, but to have more options and the capability of zoom features require significantly more computer power.

Always check true native pixel resolution, and also double check the pixel turn on/off times or refresh rates. The highest number of pixels and the quickest times usually yield a superior picture. Also cosider service records. Philips recently had a 100% recall on every plasma set they made.


Good luck,


Stu