Philips Working on LCD TV Ghosting

agentfive writes "Philips is working on a new lamp technology to eliminate ghosting. Ghosting is a problem in LCD TVs when tiny pixels creating the image take time to switch on and off and can't do it fast enough. The problem, widely recognized as the main drawback of LCD TVs, is apparent in fast moving objects such as tennis balls, but even slower moving images get fuzzy. Philips will do something similiar to a Cathode Ray Tube (CRT) by switching the fluorescent backlight on and off at a rapid pace."

Comments

LCD TVs are fine already

[xythis]

Here's some real number for you. If the pixels can respond to any signal within 5 ms, that means the highest framerate that can be displayed without ghosting is 200 fps (1 / 5ms = 200 Hz). Which is more than you should ever need, and a big improvement on current LCD displays (a good consumer display has a ~20ms response time; 1 / 20ms = 50 Hz, not even 60 fps, but good enough for TV's 30 fps.).

Re:I could be wrong...but

[Elder Entropist]

Yep. So they're turning off the backlight during the time the crystals are re-orienting. Replacing ghosting with flicker. Might be less noticable because of the limitations of the human eye response.

Re:Great.

[Andy Dodd]

I was just about to say the same thing.

I'd rather have slight ghosting (which on any modern LCD is not noticeable, at least for me) rather than 60-75 Hz flicker.

And unlike one of my best friends, I'm not photosensitive (i.e. gets sick in the presence of flickering lights such as fluorescents and low refresh rate CRTs). I have a friend that is photosensitive and does video editing work, and basically HAS to have one of the following:

Extremely high refresh rate (100 Hz+) CRT
or LCD

Even the extremely high refresh rate CRTs bother him a lot. I've had to reassure him when he goes monitor shopping that the fluorescents used in LCDs (almost always CCFLs) switch at rates a few magnitudes of order higher than normal fluorescent lights. (50-150 kHz instead of 60 Hz).