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Sony to Stop Producing Smaller CRTs
NerveGas writes "Sony is apparantly going to stop producing 17- and 19-inch CRTs, in favor of LCDs. It seems a bit soon to drop CRTs completely, seeing as how LCDs still have less than 30% of the market share. Maybe since their patent on Trinitron screens expired, they're not able to command ridiculous margins any more." Smaller CRTs? I've got a couple 19" Sony monitors here, and I've always considered them to be a good size.
If you look at the prices of both 17" and 19" CRTs, you'll see that there isn't much room for profit in making that size monitor. Sony's resources are much better spent making LCDs and large screen TVs.
Hopefully this will be an incentive to drive the cost of LCD monitors down.
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I refuse to by a monitor that loses definition at odd angles, has a hard time with the color black, and is only sharp at one resolution. I especially refuse to buy them when they're twice as expensive. The only benefits are power use and desk space...two things that rank very low on the ladder of importance for me. I'm certain a LOT of other people feel the same way.
I'll form my OWN solar system! With blackjack! And hookers!
IMHO they really are, as long as space is not an issue. The contrast, brightness, sharpness seems to be better than LCD. In addition LCD screens have limited viewing angle. I agree LCD screens look cool, consume less electricity and space. But thats not good enuf to completely dump CRTs, esp if they are *cheaper*
Okay, I'm not gonna buy an LCD screen anytime soon and neither is anyone else I know (but I would like one). But consider companies that require large monitors - they DO exist. For example, petroleum and minerals companies need their employees to inspect large amounts of geographical data as quickly as possible. Quite often they have many 19" to 21" monitors, and one or two 25"+ beasts.
... I don't think they'd be too worried about losing CRT sales. And CRT sales are declining - it's not a growth market. In fact, in five years time you may not be able to buy brand-new CRTs any more. Why would you want to hang around in such a market?
Now, if they're going to have all of these huge monitors, they may still want to be able to use their desks. So LCD screens that take up a small fraction of the desk would be a great improvement upon CRTs. And besides, the trend in screen sizes has always been "bigger IS better". So perhaps Sony is going to restrict itself to the upper-end of the monitor market.
But let's face it, Sony can afford to do this. They have the PS2, MiniDisc, a reputation as a maker of top-quality stereo equipment
And if they get an early start on LCD monitors, they may end up in a similar situation ten years down the track to what they had with the Flatron. They may corner the market with some technological gimmick just like before. At least this way, they're giving themselves every chance.
This sig intentionally left bla... dammit!
Who's got the whiteout?
I doubt any conspiracy theories are in order. It is more likely that sales of lower-end CRTs are dropping to the point where there's no point in making the effort.
I doubt that the big CRTs are going anywhere, at least until LCDs get cheap.
Remember that Sony can't "force" you to buy a higher price LCD as you can always buy another brand. The fact that there taking the smaller ones of the market means that they feel that they won't lose very many customers.
The cake is a pie
sorry, lcd's are still too slow to refresh. there is a visible lagtime (in milliseconds) when dragging windows and scrolling, especially when there is a big contrast difference between the surface that was visible and the one that replaced it (after-ghosts). i dunno about you guys, but i find it rather annoying. i'll be sticking to my 100hz crt for now.
I just bought a 19" Sony E440 like 4 days ago. And while it was more expensive than the other 30 monitors sitting next to it on display, I could easily tell the difference in the vividness of color, and the sharpness of the resolution between the Sony and the other makes. And if your a computer nerd who spends all day infront of a computer, and only wants 1 monitor, wouldn't you likely get the nicest one out there?
Why stop producing these Sony? There are plenty of people out there who will pay the "premium" for the superior picture. Or am I the only one?!
Reduced eye strain.
If i'm not mistaken, mitsubishi already did with their Diamondtron series....
However, I prefer LCD screens for reading text. The square pixels and sharp edges lend themselves to that sort of purpose.
The interesting thing is that eventually everyone at home will be looking at my photos online with LCDs anyway, so it can't be ignored.
I just hope that as an artist I'll still be able to get CRT screens until LCD's have advanced to a point where they are acceptable, or DLP or other promising technology has taken over. I personally swear by the Sony 21" FD trinitron. We still use CRT's for everything in the effects industry, however I have seen the (very nice! IMHO) 22" Apple cinema LCD displays being used at a print studio facility in San Francisco that was producing the Macy's christmas catalog while I was visting. I asked them about the color and gamma shifting issue and he said "Yea, we just have to make sure and look at them dead center, and then it's okay." And in the final checking room, there were computers with CRTs and hoods on the monitors for fine tuning anyhow.
For now, my ultimate dream monitor is still the Sony FW-900 24" widescreen CRT display, and it's down to about $2k now.
--Mike
I can tell you that those two things (well, one does, anyway) rank pretty high on a large organization's list. For example, I can tell you that any new computers which come with monitors bought by UCSD's CS dept have to be ordered with LCD monitors now. The power savings are pretty big, even though it may take a while to phase in the new machines and their flatpanels. A couple friends in various other large companies have also seen this trend.
My guess is that Sony is merely catering to business needs and pressures and not thinking of home users as much.
-B
Ash and Hickory, straight-grained and true, make excellent bludgeons, dandy for the cudgeling of vegetarians.
When they can charge 2250 bux for a 24 inch GDM-FW900 Wide screen monitor (2304X1440), compared to 250 bux for a 19inch monitor, its an easy to tell where the profit is.
BTW, We have these on triple headed sun boxes, man they are great. I'd love to have one at home, dvd, hdtv and games, oh yeah... Too bad its artificially priced high, you could buy 2 21 inch LCDs for the same price.
You know, I could have swore I hit submit on this...
Anyways, my LCD rocks. 17" LCD with built in TV tuner for 800 USD... and worth every dime. I live in a dorm room, so my deskspace is at a premium. I'm a computer geek and coder, so the lack of eyestrain is DEFINITLY worth it.
Refresh rate? 80 hz max, although I usually run it at 75 hz.
Resolution? 1280x1024. My biggest sticking point since I have a habit of running monitors at 1600x1200 if they are larger then 17".
Color depth? My god it is beautiful... I can't go back to a CRT because of how it looks.
Power? My UPS lasts a hell of a lot longer now...
The space saved is immense. I can play PS/PS2/Whateverconsoleyouwant games in a picture in picture if I so desired. My LCD rocks.
I just saw a LCD for 350 USD the other day. 17". Wow.
A side note: LCDs are measured in viewable sizes, so that 17" CRT is only really a 15.9" (or whatever) viewable, but that 17" LCD is really a 17" viewable.
--- Ãther SPOON!
You're better off not lugging your computer home on breaks. Keep it at college, and keep an older computer at home. If you're a computer-oriented individual, you probably got your new computer well before your old one ceased to be functional. An extra 700 dollars is a waste (and if you're in college, you need your cash). Pick up a cheap CRT to keep with your old box, use an old keyboard and mouse (hell, if you don't have one you can get one free after rebate from any computer store). You shouldn't need much for a weekend (or even week) break, just net access. If you can't live without the latest game for Thanksgiving weekend, you should seek help (and get some hobbies/friends while you're at it).
GL
That only worls if Bar INC has a monopoly on that product. Otherwise a second company Baz INC prices FOO at $8 to start with. A, B and C buy from Baz INC which make $24. Bar INC sells nothing and goes broke. Baz INC then buys Bar INC for $1 and sells off the remaining stock at $5 each to D and E.
I used to be a Sony customer. I bought a 200-CD changer, a 19" CRT monitor. Now I promised myself to NEVER buy anything from them again.
Why? Because of their stupid anti-piracy politics. They are one of the main RIAA members, one of the main supporters in the lobby that approved DMCA, one of the main supporters of that stupid DVD zone, one of the creators of that stupidest "copy-protected" disks (they can't even be called CD's, according to Philips, that holds the CD patent).
So, even if their products are good, even if I can't find anything better, even it they are the last brand in Earth, I'll boycott Sony.
Will you ? Will you give money to a company that screws its users ? Will you support DMCA and RIAA ?
What I cannot understand is that most LCD have only 1024x768 resolution or maybe 1280x1024. With 19" CRT you can have a nice resolution of 1600x1200. Where are the cheap high resolution CRTs? HP Omnibooks have 1440x1050 and a 15" display size. And the screen can't be that expensive, because the whole Omnibook is quite cheap, but LCD panels at that resolution are really expensive.
- Raynet --> .
The thing that bothers me about LCDs is not the response time. A lot of people seem to be bothered about it, and say that playing games is not feasible on LCDs, but even though I notice the ghosting a bit, I can't really say it bothers me all that much, at least not on the newer displays. No, what bothers me is always the resolution. Sure, a 17" LCD usually has the viewable area of a 19" CRT, but on my 19" CRT I can run 1600x1200x85Hz, and every 17" LCD I've ever seen is 1280x1024. Give me an LCD that'll run 1600x1200 at <= $500 and I'd be all over it...
I don't get why in laptops they make the resolution uber-high (well, PC laptops anyway, Apple is a different case) and then make the desktop LCDs with such low resolution.. I mean you can barely even see stuff on those Dell laptops with 15" 1600x1200 screens, for crying out loud!
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Trinitrons are not that great. As a gratuitous example, consider those two horizontal lines that run across the screen at roughly each third of the screen. Annoying.
There are CRT flat-screen displays out there for far less money - why would you want a Trinitron?
OTOH you'd be better off going LCD in any case. No radiation, more usable desk space, sharper picture (at the expense of refresh rate and scrolling picture clarity) and easier on the eyes - LCD is the shit amigo.
Regardless of what Sony would have me do, I will replace my trusty 19" CRT only when a display with OLED technology become available at a reasonable price-point.
Vibrant colour, excellent resolution, quick refresh, cheap to manufacture and makes an LCD look chunky. Sony just wants to make money off LCD before OLED comes along and forces them to write off their LCD investments.