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Display Format Technologies Comparison
An anonymous reader writes "The differences between LCD, Plasma, DLP, LCOS, D-ILA, and CRT are revealed, as well as their associated advantages and disadvantages, as Audioholics post a new version of their Display Technologies Guide With advances companies like Intel (LCOS) and Texas Instruments (HD2+) are making in chip technologies and cost reductions, one wonders just how soon CRT based TVs will become an antiquity we discuss with our grandchildren as they install their new high resolution, lightweight, affordable displays on their walls."
CRT's are a thing of the past now. Flat screens, and LCD's are the things of the present. I've got a flat screen monitor, and it's a lot clearer than any CRT I owned in the past.
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http://spaceruckus.web1000.com
These guys are putting together a free 3D action/adventure game.
Free Wii Points
How much is the power consumption on this? Are they OLED (organic LED) based?
I think power consumption is a quite important and underestimated factor nowadays. It will get more important.
Always good to shoot for good Ausio/Video Equipment like speakers and monitors, since they last longer than PC internals and they aren't pushed into obsolecence as quickly. I'll keep using my 17" CRT monitor untill it dies. Then I'll look at a 21" perhaps...
If my answers frighten you, stop asking scary questions.
Plasma sucks!
After paying an arm and a leg for a Plasma screen, I can honestly say that it sucks... worst dollar to value ratio ever. The resolution is okay (I'm not talking about the gateway/circuit city peice of shit that has EDTV resolution)... the picture isn't anywhere near as good as you can get with LCD or DLP... I really don't understand why Plasma still exists!
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Programming is like sex... Make one mistake and support it the rest of your life.
I liked the wording used in the article... at this rate maybe hdtv will finally be widely available when we have em (not counting you really old geezers that are already near that time of course).
Hmmm... Pie...
I not before heard of these CRTs you speak of. Sounds like its time to upgrade the old audio cone.
Wake me up when the industry figures this out. Now _that_ will blow everything out of the water.
My favorite display format technology has always been paper.
"Come on, let's go drink till we can't feel feelings anymore."
They forget to mention projectors, you get a bigger image cheaper than plasma
Great! However it will still show crap on whatever screen it's made of.
Where do i remember them.. oh yeah they made by 60 * 80 black and white display on my graphical calculator...
oh and it does blue if you can program z80 assembler
While an LCD monitor has much to recommend it on the grounds of space saving and visual clarity, I find one arena where it is left in the dust by a CRT: game playing. When rushing around in a FPS, the picture on an LCD monitor turns into a blurry, muddy mess; on a CRT, by contrast, it remains crisp.
In an unrelated but related point (think "tea and no tea"), I find that optical mice are great for day-to-day work, but fall down during FPS play: when you figure that someone is filling your back with lead, and you need to do an instant 180 degree turn, an optical mouse simply can't handle the rate of movement. A traditional ball mouse is the only choice; however, you have to make sure its clean so that the ball doesn't jam when being rolled at high speed. A good tip to keeping your balls clean is to rest your beer on a different table to your keyboard/mouse.
Tubal-Cain smokes the white owl.
I won't buy CRT rear projection or plasma because of the burn in problem. Why is noone looking to fix this major problem with these types of TVs, that prevent much normal use? For now, I'm sticking with a 36-inch Toshiba picture tube set. (which Consumer Reports rated a 'best buy' in traditional CRT televisions) LCDs are AFAIK the only 'new' technology immune from burn-in. (traditional TVs aren't completely immune from this problem, but it is unlikely to happen with normal use) Also, plasmas degrade over time, and in 10 years are completely dim to the point of being unwatchable. So, devide your price of the plasma ($3000) by ten to get a price of $300/year for your plasma TV. With LCD projection, there is the extreme high cost of bulbs. Why should a bulb cost so much anyway?? The hourly rate of an LCD projector can be in upwards of 30 cents. Is there a way to win?
High Definition Goat- DAMN!
Just another thing to pass on to our children? (Back in the day of Goatse...)
So Which Display Technology is Best?
LCD vs. Plasma Screen TVs: The Flat Picture
As I mentioned above, the Plasma TV has the edge only in terms of size, brightness and, currently, slight refresh rate advantages. Of those parameters, LCD is quickly catching up in terms of refresh rate and will eventually support larger sizes (the largest LCD display is 57" and is manufactured by Samsung). Once this happens, Plasma will lose its edge and LCD technology will win out. As many of the CRT manufacturing plants are slated to convert over to LCD (Sony decided to quietly phase out its 17" and 19" CRT displays by March of this year), you can imagine that the technology as a whole will benefit from smarter, more efficient manufacturing processes. As this happens, prices will continue to drop and the smaller LCD market will drive larger flat panel display products into the homes of consumers.
DLP vs. LCD vs. LCOS Rear Projection Televisions
This is where the competition gets interesting. This is essentially a battle between Texas Instruments, Intel and all of the LCD manufacturers (Sony, Philips, Toshiba, Samsung). Many companies are hedging their bets on this one (Samsung manufactures all 3), however the real winner will be the one who can produce the best picture at the lowest cost. My bet is on DLP or LCOS. DLP is currently in its third iteration (HD2+) and will have its fourth generation product (xHD3) out, or at least announced, by the end of the year. The advances in DLP both current and forthcoming are exceptional, but so is Intel's LCOS chip which is essentially a densely-packed LCD - creating a finer picture without any of the "screen door" artifacts found in many LCD displays. Intel has claimed that LCOS will enable 50-inch HDTV displays for less than $2,000 within a year.
LCD rear projection does have some advantages, however. It is being developed further and further and will benefit from rapid price drops as manufacturing ramps up and technologies improve. Right now you can find large, HD-ready LCD-based RPTVs for under $1500. A similar DLP or LCOS version (currently) will cost you at least $1000 more.
The Cost Factor: How Much Do I Spend?
How much do you have? Seriously, though, budget and intended use will determine the direction you take in what technology you choose. Those with the strictest budgets will want to break into HDTV via LCD rear-projection or CRT rear projection. At this price range ($1500 - $2000) CRT rear projection will most likely be the better performer, but at the cost of weight and power consumption.
If you are desperate for flat panel, it's going to be a question of size. LCDs cost more than Plasma TVs at equal sizes. The reason for this is production yields and undersupply. There is currently a condition of undersupply for many sizes of LCD displays due to the number of manufacturing plants available and the current configuration of those plants. Couple this with lower yields on larger display sizes due to burned out pixels and quality control, and you have a demand situation which forces LCD prices up for larger displays. A fair estimate would be that above 30" an LCD TV costs at least 30-40% more than a comparable Plasma display. If you want the benefits of LCD you will have to pay for it - and we thought Plasma was expensive!
If you are made of money and want the biggest flat panel around, Samsung and LG have been battling it out for years, but Samsung has won largest in both Plasma and LCD this year. They unveiled a 57" LCD TV and an 80" Plasma screen, both are top in their category and are priced at... well, more than you want to know.
So, as always, the choice is up to you. Spend your money wisely, and keep your eyes peeled for the new technologies as they break into the marketplace. Competition is always good and should do well to make all the technologies strive for better performance and lower costs to the consumer.
Why? Because LCD displays suffer from "motion flicker". Black letters on a white background appear to have "double thickness" while you're scrolling or dragging a window around on the screen, rapidly switching between double thickness and single thickness. I have a dual-screen setup with my laptop, using my laptop's LCD screen and an external CRT simultaneously, and I can say for sure that this doesn't happen with my CRT. I don't use this for gaming, so I don't know if the gamers out there call the effect something else, but that's what it looks like to me.
I am typing this from a 19" CRT screen that costs just #150 for a 1600x1200 desktop. A LCD of that size and resoloution are over #1000! I dont need the space savings, Desks are cheap, LCDs are not!
I prefer the lcd only because I dont really know much about the others and therefore can only comment on the lcd. I feel that they made lots of improvments with lcd screens over the years. I love my lcd screen on my powerbook and it has lcd screen which I love, and the only thing wron with it is the connection which causes the sscreen to tweak but has great resolution. I would really like to understand what all those acronyms stand for like DLP, LCOS mean
MonkeysKickAss
System administrators (especially UNIX sysadmins) probably spend a lot more time looking at console-type displays (eg: xterms, kterms, what have you) than other users, which means many hours a day looking at a stereotypically black little box with small white writing on it. That can really make your eyes tired. What type of display do sysadmins prefer? Once I started using a laptop for a lot of my work, I found it really difficult to go back to my CRT-based desktop at home. Terminal fonts just looked...fuzzy. Doing a lot of command line work on an LCD is a pleasure for the eyes. Are there any hardcore apt-get users out there willing to comment? If you need to spend a day with dselect upgrading your cluster or whatnot, do you prefer an LCD panel or a CRT? Or perhaps the new VRML apt-get interface and a pair of VR goggles?
The article is an excellent beginner's guide to display technology formats, however, they make that oft-repeated forcast that soon LCDs will be cheap. We've been hearing that for years. Active-Matrix displays have been in use in Notebooks for 10 years and still they are the most expensive part of the notebook. They've certainly come down in price, but I wonder why so many people latch onto this belief that soon they will be so cheap they'll replace everything. Every couple years we hear about a world-wide "supply shortage" which jacks the price of LCDs up about 20%, there are inherent limitations in the design process which require an entirely separate production line to produce a 15" display, a 19", etc... What about Hot-Pixels? How happy would you be to spend $10k on an LCD display that has hotpixels?
-- I'd give my right arm to be ambidextrous
the only way to go for non CRT TVs. plazma and LCD get burn in, and right now cost way to much for that to be ok.
I am the Alpha and the Omega-3
The only new display tech I've heard of and it's not there. Figures.
If Kodak is in charge then it is doomed. They are the modern day xerox when it comes to marketing what they make. Hell, they had to move production of film off shore because they could no compete with Fuji Film because Kodak said it is too expensive to make film in the USA. Fuji Film is made in America.
Who knows just how long before CRT technologies die. I bought my 80cm TV for AUD900 a couple of years ago. I didn't care about HD or flat screen - I just wanted something with a bit more size and that was the most money I could justify spending.
Technologies can get very cheap very quickly but then again they may not. The key factor will be price, particularly for larger units, as the main driver for when CRT technology dies. Predictions like this just don't make sense.
These posts express my own personal views, not those of my employer
I still can't figure out why the gamma on the PC and the Mac are so far apart. Hell, the gamma on a windows system is much lower than a Mac and even darker than a CRT TV!!!
Why is this? And why is there not a universal standard by which a display is to be callibrated. Sure, you could argue that there is already 3 standards, but my question is why not just one standard?
As a visual artist I find it irritating to have my imagery appear darker on a PC and when I play a DVD, I notice that the display on my Mac is much brighter than my TV.
I'm sure movie producers and directors get annoyed by this as well.
By setting an international gamma/color calibration standard, all visual media would benefit not only because of consistant display but lowered production costs as well.
Gee, with all of these new, flat monitors and TVs, my cat loses out on the most comfy, warm place in the house.
buy a CASIO
Even hard core gaming sites like Sharky Extreme are now recommending optical mice exclusively in all their hardware guides.
hi, i like lcds because i can gloat to my friends who use crts
+1 Insightful
Rather they will be walls.
Then finally I can sit with the family and never be alone!
*drool* mmmm, distopic society
new high resolution, lightweight, affordable displays on their walls
No, my friend. When I have grandchildren, we will most likely have in air displays, or single glass-like panes that are suspended from weird places. Think StarWars, Minority Report, Halo, etc..
'/dev/wit' is not available.
I'm so sick of people trying the predict the end of the CRT, and how digital displays will take over. ...) that can rival a CRT when it comes to what matters most: quality.
I have not seen ONE digital display (whether it be LCD, Plasma
CRT screens just look better. The colours are always alive, blacks are black (not grey), and white are white.
Every plasma screen I have seen, sharp though the image may be, is horribly grainy when it comes to colour. It's just like watching something in 16 bit colour.
The CRT has been around for almost a century (I might be wrong), and you know why? Because it works. It doesn't need to be replaced, so please stop trying to bring forth its demise.
I fear that one day, there'll be a generation out there who will never have known the quality of a nice CRT, the beauty of film, and the smooth sound of a nice vinyl record.
The article was slashdotted, heres my personal guide:
CRT - Still probably capable of the best picture for now (especially at the high end, think G90). Requires much more maintenance than digital technlogies (convergence, etc.). Essentially infinite on/off contrast, not quite as good ANSI contrast. No screendoor. High end guns capable of fully resolving 1080p.
DLP - Best contrast numbers of the digital technologies. Consumer units limited to 720p for now. Screendoor is pretty limited. Some people may see rainbows on one chip devices due to color wheel (pretty limited on new HD2+ machines). Most machines not terribly bright when compared to LCD. Limited to projection devices.
LCD - Poor contrast, very hight black level. Most screendoor of the digitals. Can be in projection or panel configurations. Considerably less expensive than other digital techs. Scales to higher resolutions than DLP for now.
LCOS - Least screendoor of digital technologies. Often appears "smoothest" or most like a CRT to people. Contrast numbers not up to DLP's standards. Not a large number of LCOS unites on the market for now, but looks like more will be coming soon. Many see it as the ultimate sucessor to CRT rear-projection.
Plasma - Least bang for the buck of the digitals. Only a flat-panel technology, no projection. Reletively poor contrast numbers.
You obviously haven't use the newer ones then. Im using the newer Logitech Mx 300 and NEVER had had the movement skip a beat. Hell, even at the desktop, I can't make the cursor skip either no matter how quickly I twitch my wrist!!
Life is not for the lazy.
Dell 2000FP (25ms pixel response, 1600x1200). Near the height of LCD nirvana until the 2001FP (with 16ms pixel response!) came out. You can get these for around $750.00 a couple of times a year, which is half the price I paid for the viewsonic 21ps I replaced.
These things are beautiful. Developing on a perfect 1600x1200 desktop is so easy on the eyes. My 25ms response IS A MINIMUM for gaming. I suspect even 16ms will have a leg down on CRTs, but once they get that fast, even the hardcore gamers will use them. I have not found the non-native resolutions to be a problem like the ghosting. If you do 75% desktop 25% gaming LCDs are already here. I suspect next years crop will all be 16ms or less and LCDs will have arrived for everyone.
The newer technologies are nice in that they are thin and all, which is especially good for monitors. But, they do still have their drawbacks. LCDs don't display black as well as a CRT, making watching movies with dimly lit scenes annoying. LCDs have a very clear picture, but lose some of that sharpness if not run at native resolution or another that divides evenly into it (interpolating from one resoution to another causes slight bluriness or jaggedness of the pixels). Also, I have doubts as to whether the time between failures on LCD backlights is as good as CRT picture tubes.
Plasma is kinda neat, but has a reputation for burn-in and slowly losing brightness over time. If I was to buy a multi-thousand dollar TV, I'd want it to work for 8-10 years until the next big thing comes along.
For now, I'm still a CRT user. 35" Sony Trinitron for TV watching, 21" ViewSonic professional series for the PC. Keeping an eye on the new technologies but they're not quite "there" yet as far as I'm concerned.
When I bought my last system, I could have bought two decient 17" CRT'S for the cost of 1 19" LCD display. So I am now sitting in front of two 17" CRT's and I have twice as much desktop space.
Oh happy me!
I think alot of people compare their old 15-17 inch CRT's to recent LCD's. I just got a sony 19inch trinitron and i must say it looks better than my parents lcd. the image is much clearer and there is no ghosting during high motion like moving a window, plus it was cheaper. I don't understand the need to save 12 inches of space, not to mention people don't set their refresh rates to something higher than 60hz
http://www.avsforum.com/avs-vb/showthread.php?s= &threadid=361807&highlight=DLP
My 42" HDTV-ready 16x9 projection TV cost $1300 over a year ago. Comparable size plasma is a minimum of $3000! Plasma, LCD, and DLP restrict you to a single optimum resolution, whereas CRTs (and thus projection TVs) are infinitely variable. Probably your best best is to stick with a CRT until all broadcasts are done at a specific HDTV resolution, then buy a DLP projector that handles that resolution. If you really think it's worth paying twice as much for something because it's only 4" deep instead of 24" deep, consider this: how much would it cost to build that CRT-based screen into your wall so that it looks like it's only 0.5" deep? My projection TV fills up the alcove over the fireplace very nicely; a plasma or LCD would just have 18" of empty space behind it..
"Freedom means freedom for everybody" -- Dick Cheney
17"? I think, my chum, if you don't have room for a 17" monitor, then you are in completely the wrong market for the techonlogies being spoken of here. We are talking home theater technologies, not desktop. We're talking HDTVs in the 40"-70" range.
For the home theater, CRT is dying. It's power hungry, it's space hungry, and it's heavy. There are only two things that CRT technology has going for it over all other HDTV technologies: (1) price and (2) the ability to easily change resolutions. Only the first of those two matter outside of the PC monitor world.
If it's for-profit but free, you're not the customer -- you're the product (e.g., the Slashdot Beta's "audience").
how soon CRT based TVs will become an antiquity we discuss with our grandchildren as they install their new high resolution, lightweight, affordable displays on their walls
First,Find Me a Girl.
Wanted : A Signature.
oh... and we liked em!
From excellent karma to terible karma with a single +5 funny post...
One aspect of display technology that I don't hear discussed often is the need for multiple resolutions. As a software developer, and a GUI developer at that, it is important to me to be able to quickly view my work cleanly in all standard resolutions to see how it will appear to the end user. Fixed-element displays such as plasma and liquid crystal are simply useless for this: yes, a good driver will attempt to interpolate but this produces garbage from a developer's standpoint. I have resisted attempts to put me on a flat panel because it will interfere with the quality of my work. And even if I did end up with an LCD for text-editing, you can bet I'll have a dual-display system so that I can still view the output on a CRT.
The higher the technology, the sharper that two-edged sword.
right now is one of those times.
i think midnight is the deadline,
2001fp via dell business..
every day http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Special:Random
As LCD monitors get bigger, the viewing angle problem gets more severe. I just got a ViewSonic 19" LCD with supposedly good "viewing angle" specs. The problem is that you normally sit within 2 feet of your monitor. At this distance, your eyes view the top of the screen at a very different angle than the bottom of the screen. With a large LCD like this, there is absolutely no way to view the screen without severe differences in color... the monitor is just too big and you are sitting too close to it. I find myself constantly adjusting the monitor, or raising and lowering my head to try and read things.
This is a problem I never noticed on my smaller (laptop) LCDs, simply because the monitor is much smaller.
Obviously this wouldn't be a problem for an LCD in your living room, where you view it from quite a distance. But large LCD monitors are a problem. (At least mine is!)
The organic-based displays come out. Flexible, brighter than LCD, superior to plasma (no burn-in).
OK, OK, I'll wait until the organic displays are around for a while and their price reaches non-astronomical levels. That should be in about 7-8+ years from now assuming a soonish release.
In Bushworld, they struggle to keep church and state separate in Iraq as they increasingly merge the two in America.
I don't think that's the point. Remember when 640K was good enough? Your idea of good enough is probably not the same as my good enough. If you can get a CRT for $200 or an LCD for $500, then why would I buy the LCD when the CRT can get a higher resolution, better contrast & crispness, and of course be 1/2 the price? Just to brag to my friends? To have the latest & greatest? Bah! They'll replace my Trinitron when they pry it from my cold, rotten desk!
" one wonders just how soon CRT based TVs will become an antiquity we discuss with our grandchildren as they install their new high resolution, lightweight, affordable displays on their walls.""
When we stop gutting the middle-class that normally buys such things.
I use a logitech optical trackball and I have to move it pretty damn fast to make it spazz out (Although I can still do that if I put my mind to it.) However with the acceleration set correctly, I can do a 180 degree turn with a single thumb movement and still manage the precision necessary to use a sniper rifle. Not that I play many FPSes on Linux these days...
I'm trying to teach myself to set people on fire with my mind... Is it hot in here?
I've had my rear-projection, CRT 51" big screen for nine years now (A Prologic). There isn't ANY discernable burn in on this set. I also consider it cheaply made--lots of plywood used in constructing the massive case, for example. I'm looking forward to an LCD the same size as my current set in 16:9, meaning I'll have to get a 62" diagonal to get the same height I have now. But as far as burn in on this set? It hasn't happened.
How about a moderation of -1 pedantic.
My main machine that I use for photoshop, games, anything that requires high power stuff or colour accuracy is using a 19" CRT at 1600x1200. (and profiled with a spyder)
:D
I develop on my old Dell 5000e with its beautifully sharp 15" 1400x1050 LCD. its bitingly sharp. its colour rendition sucks. if you have just a black screen you can see differing levels of gray across the screen which move when you move your head.
for the home cinema im using a Seleco CRT front projector (4500 new and something like 50kg). ok i cant move it around without causing myself agravation (setup is a pig) and a hernia, but its better than lcd projection and seeing the bloody chicken wire and changing the bulb 3 times a year.
btw - lcd rear projection tvs are like having some disease where you cant focus properly - and they have a hot spot in the middle, the edges vignette, especially on wide screen versions.
the bedroom has a 32" widescreen for watching pron on
I've had my plasma display (a Panasonic 42") for about two years now (bought from Dell). It's so sharp and clear (3000:1 contrast ratio) that everything looks fantastic. I've seen LCDs and DLPs and I'm not impressed by them. The plasma cost about $4k two years ago and now can be purchased for under $3K. The plasma hangs on my living room wall and takes up no space, so kids have the whole room to play in. No more big screen TV box to take up half the living room space! I haven't had any burn-in issues. No adjustments are needed to fix geometry issues, as are frequently needed by RPTVs. My last RPTV had focus issues - some parts of the screen were most in focus then others. Plasma has none of these issues. My only complaint is that black levels are better on CRTs. But, the blacks are much better then LCDs. DVDs look fantastic and regular SDTV broadcasts are acceptable. Of course HDTV looks fantastic.
I use 4 desktops on a daily basis - different OS, video card, drivers, etc. with a Belkin KVM switch. A CRT can jump between these with no problems - the two LCDs I tried would look great on one unit (after tweaking), but look like absolute crap after switching to another box. Any solutions for this?
"I fear that one day, there'll be a generation out there who will never have known the quality of a nice CRT, the beauty of film, and the smooth sound of a nice vinyl record."
The generations that remember will be DEAD.
In the final table, the author chose not to highlight the winning cells if they happened to be for CRT solutions. CRT is a winner in 5 of the 12 catagories: Contrast Ratio, Brightness, Longevity, Burn-In, and Viewing Angle. More than any other solution.
I know that Direct View (and Rear Projection) CRT's days are numbered, but as of today, no other solution provides the same picture quality, at any cost. It will be at least 3 more years before videophiles start making the switch to something better. I'm guessing the winners will be DLP and Carbon Nanotube Field Emission Displays.
Interestingly enough, you've just made the case for a lot of "downtown" and otherwise space-limited businesses. There are plenty of cases in the commercial world where saving an extra square foot of desk space, which allows thinner desks, etc, can end up saving quite a bit of money over the expected life of a monitor. Especially when you add in the electricity and cooling savings.
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
I've been developing on LCDs for years now. When you adjust the resolution, set the monitor to just center it rather than trying to scale to fill the screen. That way, your 1600x1200 monitor just has a large black area surrounding the 640x480 test screen. Way simple.
You're special forces then? That's great! I just love your olympics!
What ever happened to OLED screens. They werre supposed to be the next big thing as far as display technology goes.
http://www.wave-report.com/tutorials/oled.htm
These guys think that LCD standing for Liquid Crystal Diode. Sad.
Yeah, I'm dealing with gamma differences in my art, too. Do me a favor and help me study the range of gamma values out there by completing my online gamma test.
All this new high-res stuff is great, but there is the problem of the existing installed base and lowest common denominator. I can't speak for the consumer market, but my research on digital cinema shows that the standard is DLP running at 1280x1024 with the appropriate anamorphic lenses to achieve the correct screen ratios (1.85:1 and 2.35:1). This looks to be the standard for some time to come based on the cost of the installs. The theater I work for, back in 1999, priced a single projection head (no lamp, lenses, disk array, or sound system) at approximately $250,000. We choose to stick with the existing film system based on that and not upgrade. With the prices like that, it is likely that large scale installations will remain at that low resolution for some time come based on the costs of upgrading. ** disclaimer - it has been a year since I last did any serious research on pricing for digital cinema. The standard is still 1280x1024 pixels
I've seen a lot of people commenting on why they prefer CRTs to LCDs in terms of desktop monitor use for computers in terms of price and whatnot. I was under the impression from the article that this is mainly about big-screen television sets. I don't see any problems with a $2000-$2500 price tag on a good 50"+ LCD big-screen.
This post sponsored by Ninja Burger. "
I would imagine that the day that I discuss that with my grandchildren will be at LEAST 20 years away, as I am currently single, and have no illegitimate children (that I've been informed of).
The combined frame buffer and display gamma is targeted to be 1.8 on Macs. This is done primarily through careful measurement and generation of calibration profiles for various displays.
The LCD panels have a non-gamma transfer function that's roughly linear (gamma 1.0). The actual transfer curve is S-shaped, something like a lazy integral symbol. Calibration for LCD panels is done through a compensating table lookup, rather than through a simple gamma equation.
The Mac OS X System Preferences Displays panel includes a Color tab, which in turn offers a Calibrate... option. Try running through the Calibrate sequence in your video viewing environment.
To obtain the best results for video viewing, which is often done under different environmental conditions than interactive computer use, use this Calibrate option in conjunction with a good video standards DVD in the desired viewing environment.
Even the THX Video Adjustment offered on 'THX Certified' DVDs is sufficient, when used with ColorSync Calibration, to produce reasonable results on Apple Macintosh displays.
one wonders just how soon CRT based TVs will become an antiquity
Sony got out last year...Samsung gets out this year. Been there, know that...
The parent is correct, large LCDs are being seen now because of the change in Fab processes. It is going to change again real quick. The generation 6 and 7 plants are now being built in Taiwan, with an expectation of opening by fall '04, winter '05.
The parent had one mistake in the story, the fabs are not one meter, but now with G7 plants will be 5-6 meters on a side, with a thickness of a few millimeters. The entire process is done without the use of human hands, the glass is too thin for a human to move without breaking. The wafer process is extremely cheap en mass, letting the price of LCD's slip down. The 40 inch LCD displays are now about ten grand, because they use most of a wafer, the G7 will allow 90+ inch lcds, and will have them be even cheaper than the current 40 inch ones. The industry hope the price decrease will allow for quality to go up, ad the human element is minimized in fab, and the large wafers will decrease the cost to replace flawed models. There may be a few new flaws of course, sagging glass is now a problem with that big a display.
I'd say more, but my guild is raiding.
I am glad that the CRTs will go away real soon,
after I switched to LCD for all work-related viewing needs,
my eyes are now so much less strained that I tossed my "computer glasses".
I do graphic art and web design and as a person who makes a living creating things that have to look good on peoples monitors, I have tried to keep up on the merits of the different display technologies. In my experience CRT is still the way to go
Not to long ago I got myself an brand new apple with one of the high dollar diplays and it is really pretty, but now that the "newness" factor is wearing off, I find myself doing a lot more design on my high end CRT again.
The reason for this is that LCD monitors tend to look "softer" which is great for most use, but it leads to graphics that look great on an LCD monitor, but seem unrefined, or just do not look "right" on a CRT.
What it really comes down to is that no matter how good the image looks on my display, I have to have something that will look good the the client, and that means using the same type of display.
LCD displays still seem much nicer for reading text on or for most other casual use, especially with reading black on white because it's not so much like staring into a light bulb.
The smaller size argument for LCDs still seems strange to me though. I guess it's because I don't go to a lot of lan parties, but for me at least, once you have your monitor set up someplace, how often do you really move it?
Famous Last Words: "hmm...wikipedia says it's edible"
They list CRT's top resolution as:
720x540p
1080i
Why would they be limited to 540p?? I have a CRT that natively displays 1080i, 720p, 1024x768p, and 1280x768p.
There are many rear projection CRTs that display 720p and above (I hear some support 1080p, but I have not seen any).
A lot of people doing comparisons on CRT vs LCD.. A lot of what matters is your refresh rate + resolution.. My prostar laptop can do 1600x1200 at 120Hz.. Yeah, that's fast.. It'll go all the way to 200Hz at 640x480.. Only down side is that I have one hotpixel that's green, on the far far right of the screen(It's in the shaded left area of the scroll button). I work selling TVs, and I look at them all day long.. from my experience the DLP picture quality is far beyond that of LCD, mostly in terms of contrast ratio. The plasma looks nice, if you're sitting far enough back, but get close to you, and it's very poor. We haven't gotten a LCoS display yet for me to tinker with and judge, but they seem promising. It's nice to judge and debate about what technology choice is the best right now, but in truth, very few televisions currently on the market are a great buy, in fact, I tell all of my friend and family to wait as long as possible right now, for HDTV.. Reasons include the fact that older tv's are becoming obsolete as far as picture quality, the lower resolutions of most of todays HDTVs (We only sell one that I can think of off the top of my head at Sears that will do 1920 or whatever, and it's a 73" Mitsubishi), and the declining costs. Don't worry about your CRTs going away, we still sell far more of them than anything else, and people aren't nearly ready to pay several times more for less picture quality AND a smaller screen. CRTs are going to be around for years still.
amen to that. After I read a bunch on the web recently about the various technologies available and new systems, I started considering an upgrade to my 60" rear projection crt HDTV system. Every system I saw (plasma, lcd, dlp) had an inferior picture.
The only system I saw with what I would consider to be a superior picture was a $11k projector, and I'm not sure that would even be better wihtout me spending another $10-$20k on building a proper room for it.
The biggest disappointment to me right now is lack of HDTV content, especially with regard to recorded movies. Its hard to watch a dvd after seeing some films in hdtv format.
Bottom Line :
LCDs better for long hours work environments text processing for example, less strain on the eyes.
CRTs better for gaming/graphic workers.
Dual LCD/CRT solution for PC is one of the best for IT Professionals or enthusiasts.
LCD TVs too expensive, not sure they'll last as long as CRT. So it's a gamble.
And Plasma sucks.
Trolls dont like to be Flamebait, because they burn so well. Protect our Troll heritage!
After Viewing All other technologies (at the time), I purchased two televisions - One A CRT Projection Sony (HDTV) 46" and a Panasonic Plasma (EDTV) 42" (both highly recommended on almost every method of research I performed). Hands down, the Panasonic kicks the Sony's ass, I have NEVER seen a better picture (I've only been to best buy, circuit city and The Big Screen Store, and there ilk). The real word black level performance (eye candy view) is just as good. Matter of fact, I bought the plasma just because the room that it's in was so small. I planned on using the Sony most of the time, especially for movies. The plasma is so much better, the CRT justs sits there most of the time.
With resolution at least comparable to CRTs, lower power consumption than plasmas without their reduced lifespan (burnout), inexpensive manufacturing and small form-factor, I think this is going to be the best bet when debuted by Toshiba/Canon next year (2005). See here and here for more details on Surface-conduction Electron-emitter Displays.
CRTs are the way to go when you're editing images. LCDs can't reproduce the same range of colors that CRTs can. LCDs lean towards the blue end of the spectrum and have difficulty with wamer colors.
But all share one common weakness:
All still require some sort of external box to get digital TV.
Yes, a couple are claiming "Digital Cable Ready" and "CableCard Equipped" but no CATV provider is offering this on any widespread basis. None of the CATV companies even have info on their sites about this future technology.
Imagine how pissed off you will be when you just dropped $4000-$6000 for a Plasma/LCD/DLP wonder TV that requires the use of a Set Top Box only to find it is obsolete once the manufacturers figure out how to deploy DCReady and CCard.
The delay is simply due to the fact there is a huge dollar value of non-DC-ready sets in inventory.
As soon as true DCReady sets are on sale and cable providers offer support for them, the bottom drops out on the value of any set not so equipped.
How do you market a natural evolution of current products when it so decisively obsoletes the current array of offerings?
Maybe it means I will get the chance to buy a non-DCReady 50" plasma for $999? I'd suffer with the STB for that.
LCD: Looks great, but costs a fortune if you want even a moderately large screen.
Plasma: Boy, these look like crap. Low contrast, poor color range, weak blacks, still pretty expensive.
Rear projection: blurry and dim. Never understood how people can tolerate these.
Front projection: Great if you are a dedicated videophile with a darkened home theater. Otherwise, forget it. And be sure to factor the cost of replacement lamps into the price.
CRT: Ancient technology, destined for obsolescence, weighs a ton. But you get the best picture for the least money. Still the best choice unless you have lots of money or want a really large screen.
I'm VERY curious because I sit in front of this 21' CRT a LOT and quite frankly the thought of it gives me the creeps.
DigiUpdate has a guide to high definition displays, which focuses on commercially available technologies.
I'm looking to replace my television, which is a 19" Sanyo (heh) I bought in 1992. It doesn't even have phono (RCA) inputs in the back, only a single coax for cable. It's "cable-ready", you see. Even the remote control is broken.
Here's what I want to do on the new TV:
What I don't need the TV for is:
Yes, I live alone. :)
My entertainment center has a shelf which is 36" wide, 28" tall, and 19" deep, so the thing would need to fit in there.
And I'm a public school teacher, so my budget is not huge, but if I got something I could use for a decade or so (like my current TV), I'd be willing to pay a little for it.
Any suggestions? (Note to self: ask Slashdot for display device tips. Don't bother asking for relationship advice.)
Graham "Teach" Mitchell, computer science teacher, Leander HS
I bought an optical mouse pretty much right when they came out, one of the MS Intellimouse jobs. I was sick of getting gunk in my mouse. It worked quite well and, dispite popular belief, I used it in games, and to a high degree of proficiency. BUT it wasn't perfect. I had to train myself to a maximum speed of movement, which I couldn't exceed. If I did, it'd skip and I wouldn't aim where I wanted. Not a problem, I turned up my mouse sensitivity, the accuracy of optical more than made up for it.
Now, however, it's not a problem. I have the 3.0 incarnation of the MS mouse, and I can move it as fast as I like, in any direction, no problems. It's got a much better, faster camera in it, and can track as fast as I can move my hand. I am told this is true of all other deceant current optical mice as well.
Given the advantage in precision, the resistance to performance problems caused by dirt, and the small price difference, I can't see not having one.
I want it to fill the damn screen
That's why you use integer scaling ratios greater than 1:1 on those displays that support it. For your example of a 21" display that displays 640x480 in a 5" diagonal window, try setting the scale_factor to 4:1 and the resample_method to nearest_neighbor, and it'll use 20" of your display. (No, I don't know what your LCD panel calls the settings.)
for the kind of work I do, I need to be able to easily examine artwork at the pixel level
Many pixeling programs allow for zooming in on the image you're editing. Some older programs such as Microsoft Paint and Neosoft NeoPaint disable some tools in a zoomed window, but the modern programs such as Photoshop and GIMP don't.
I heard, espically for blue, it was pretty poor. Like only a few thousand hours. So you maybe see it in something like cell phones that aren't expected to last that long, but won't reallly work for TVs (I mean I have a TV from 1982 that still works acceptably well).
I originally was all psyched over LCOS. But with the problems they've had with it and the price I'm now looking toward buying a DLP based tv later this year. Toshiba is dropping its LCOS line (has discontinued it already) and will be releasing a ton of DLP based models in a few months. Initially with the 6 panel color wheel, but then the 7 panel one.
I would never get an LCD tv. The black level is trash.
If you've got the space stick with CRT, but if you want something skinnier go with DLP. Should be interesting to see what Intel does later this year with LCOS but I wouldn't touch it just yet.
pencil and paper: n.
- paper.html
An archaic information storage and transmission device that works by depositing smears of graphite on bleached wood pulp. More recent developments in paper-based technology include improved 'write-once' update devices which use tiny rolling heads similar to mouse balls to deposit colored pigment. All these devices require an operator skilled at so-called 'handwriting' technique. These technologies are ubiquitous outside hackerdom, but nearly forgotten inside it. Most hackers had terrible handwriting to begin with, and years of keyboarding tend to have encouraged it to degrade further. Perhaps for this reason, hackers deprecate pencil-and-paper technology and often resist using it in any but the most trivial contexts.
http://www.catb.org/~esr/jargon/html/P/pencil-and
If my answers frighten you, stop asking scary questions.
I found it hard to put too much faith in these guys after I read this bit:
-- Snippity --
What are phosphors? Phosphors are chemical compounds on back glass that emit the visible light that makes up the picture we see. Hit them with light and they react by producing an amount of red, green or blue. On a direct-view television (CRT, or cathode ray tube) the phosphors are on the front glass and are excited by a beam of light from the cathode-ray. On plasma monitors the phosphors are excited by UV light produced by electromagnetically charged plasma.
-- Snippity --
Oh, yes. Phosphors are excited by a beam of light from the cathode ray. Because, after all, we wouldn't want to use a beam of electrons, because then we'd have to use electromagnets to aim it, instead of using... uh... gravity! Yes, there are microscopic black holes in your TV, moving around to steer this beam of light.
And they call it an electron gun because... uh, because...
Oh, hell with it. Anyway, kudoes not only to the author for being clueless, but for the editor for being either clueless or supremely oblivious.
-fred
Sign #11 of Slashdot overdose: You see the phrase 'moderate Republican' and you wonder if that would be a +1 or a -1.
...the race will come down to between DLP and LCOS digital technology, especially with technology improvements that will make them far less expensive.
Unlike CRT's, DLP and LCOS suffer no "burn-in" image problems, and of course there is no such thing as convergence problems, either. And they can be made potentially cheaper on the per inch (diagonal) basis than direct-view LCD or plasma displays, and changing the illumination bulb is a US$100 proposition every 8,000 hours or so.
Yes, direct-view CRT's still win when it comes to contrast, but the sheer mass of CRT's make them impractical for displays beyond 40" (diagonal).
I've been looking around at various monitors (RP, flat panel, FP, and conventional) and have to say based on what's currently around I'm going to go with DLPRP, at least for home theatre applications.
Plasmas are too expensive, don't seem to have many shades of colors (everything seems too bright, and doesn't have the subtle variations of other monitors) and significantly burn out over their life time (the colors go very very dull until everything looks grey).
LCD is my choice for computers, mainly because they have been best optimized for them in terms of resolution and response. However for home theatre purposes they can seem a little flicker, their colors seem more dull than some of the other options (like 6 segment color wheel DLP) and are less bright. LCDRP/FP also normally have a significant screen door affect which makes images seem to pixilated. LCD's are also said to burn out over long periods of time, although to a lesser extent than Plasmas. LCD flat panel's also come in too smaller sizes.
CRT's have dull colors, they like plasmas burn out over time; they have flicker images, and are harder to focus on for long periods of time. They are also restricted in screen size.
DLP's are currently a great way to go, the newer machines have spectacular resolution, color, a clear crisp image. The 6 segment 5X boxes have no visible (at least to humans) rainbow affect, and some companies are starting to release 6X units which will have the best refresh rates on the market as well. They will never burn out as well, in that every time you replace the lamp and clean the color wheel, it will be returned to its original specs. DLP's also have a much less noticeable screen door affect than LCD. DLP's resolution with the next generaton chips will be better than anything we currently use. Contrast ratio and Brightness is right up there with the best as well.
DLPRP seem the best of the bunch because they have a much thinner box than other RP's or CRT's. They can be viewed in all lighting levels. RP's also allowed much bigger images than flat panels, or at least have the potential to. They don't burn out, and most people doing random viewing tests say they have the 'most pleasant' picture.
I haven't tested the LCOS methods, so can't really talk about them, also note my assessments have been based on HDTV standards and the Blue laser DVD standards that will come in the future.
The best of the DLP's that I have been able to look at are made by sim2.
VENI, VIDI, VICI, DIXI
I've always been a big fan of front projection. Nice cinema feel...
With the advances in DLP (SRC color wheels, etc...) they are looking really tempting.
Lots of good info can be found here...
http://www.projectorcentral.com/
A viable replacement for projector lamps?
Maybe with a molded lens?
Why did GEAR crush RDP?
And yet, everyone tells us that CRT's are going to become extinct. They have the brightest and the best image, they have a unique variable resolution, and all the problems of portability are soluble, but nobody in the industry seems to want to bother, because CRTs simply aren't fashionable, and the makers are just sitting around, waiting to die. C'mon, folks, snap out of it! Gimme my flat monitor, already!
I think that's probably a personal taste question today.
For me, I don't usually bother to print out long pages and I'm quite happy to read extended documents on my screen. Then again, I've grown up with computers all my life, and my screen is high quality and well-configured for good readability: sensible resolution, very high refresh rate, screen-optimised fonts in comfortable sizes with anti-aliasing, etc.
However, the research shows that most people taken from across the population as a whole still read much faster (around 1/3-1/2 as fast again, typically) from paper than from a computer screen. AFAIK, no-one has yet established whether that's down to the innately superior qualities of paper over backlit screens, poor configuration of most people's screens, the "what you're used to" effect, or just plain, old-fashioned personal taste.
Incidentally, I do find some documents much easier to read on-screen than others. Using well-hinted fonts like Verdana and Georgia really helps with web page reading ease, for example. On web sites or downloaded reports with nasty formatting, I do still fall back on printing the thing out occasionally, and probably would do so more often but for the lousy printing capabilities of nearly every major web browser.
If you disagree, post your argument. (-1, Overrated) isn't your personal censorship tool for views you don't like.
Something I haven't seen so far in this thread is a discussion of "accuracy". That is, picture quality and color temperature can be measured objectively. Filmmakers produce a film to look a certain way in the theater. Any display type which causes the film to look different is "inaccurate". Color temperature should be 6500k, etc. As far as I know, and as far as I can tell, no other device is capable of producing a more accurate reproduction of original films than a CRT. Blacks are black, shadow details are maintained, color can be perfect (although most sets are cranked with WAY to much contrast off the shelf), and action is smooth and "film-like". As an owner of a 7" Electrohome Front Projector, LCD's, in my opinion do not come close, nor do Plasma's (granted, I have a light controlled environment). DLP's are the only projectors which I feel are coming close to matching the CRT's, although I am bothered by the very grayish blacks I've seen displayed on most CRT's. That does not mean CRT's are the best solution. For instance, I'm considering a DLP as a compromise because of the burn-in issue if I want to play video games. There's also times I'd like to watch TV or movies with some lights on (while I multi-task =)). Finally, I get tired of warming up the projector and converging it everytime I want to watch a movie. The ease of a DLP may begin to outweigh the better pic. quality of a CRT for me soon.
I have to say that you're the one who is confused here. Do you know what interlacing really means?
It means that each individual pixel by itself only has to refresh 30 times per second, but the image as a whole refreshes 60 times per second. This is accomplished by refreshing half the pixels on the screen each time, and doing this for 60 times per second.
In other words, a 16ms per-pixel response time is way more than enough to display 60 fields per second interlaced without blurring.
You are also (deliberately?) confusing screen refresh with motion refresh. No LCD in the world uses a screen refresh of 60hz. The 60hz refresh time for LCDs only applies to changing images. Static images on an LCD have effectively infinite refresh rate because of the inertia of the crystal state.
Moreover, computer video often does not use any interlacing at all because the video on a DVD is often encoded as full frame progressive non-interlaced video with subsequent interlacing added by the DVD player when (and only when) displaying on a normal television set. In these situations, computer playback yields a cinematic rate of 24 frames per second with no absolutely no field level interlacing.
In fact even video which is encoded interlaced often allows the original progressive frames to be recovered 100% perfectly using inverse telecine techniques. I wrote the Linux Digital Fansubbing Guide and I have watched a lot of digital video which uses telecine -- I know what I'm talking about here.
I should note that I'm not really trying to defend LCD screens here. I find LCDs perfect for text and office work but I do not use them for video work, not because of refresh rate, but because of color accuracy (or lack thereof). However I do feel that your reasons for rejecting LCDs are not based on any legitimate or correct reasons.