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LCoS Shoot-Out Results
mikemuch writes "DisplayMate founder Ray Soniera has revealed the results of his LCoS HDTV Shoot-Out. He puts five HDTV's through a slew of test pattern measurements, and then lets 34 real people, including home-theater lay people and experts, conduct jury tests and make comments. There was one case where the experts gave low marks to a display that the lay people loved. From the article: 'We spent some time trying to understand why the consumer panelists rated the JVC Consumer unit so highly. It had the lowest objective on-screen resolution of all of the units, because of internal signal processing, but a number of consumer panelists commented on how sharp it looked. The copious artifacts and significant edge enhancement produced so much artificial texture in the image that some panelists interpreted it as superior sharpness. All of the Video Experts recognized this effect and gave the unit the lowest score.'"
The reason is that depending on the type of screen you have, those 'black bars' on the left and right can cause burn-in lines.
Yes, i know burn-in is not a huge problem with newer displays, but when 80% of your ungodly amount of TV time is in standard-def viewing, then you still do have a problem.
Han shot first.
The problem is that a 64kb stream sounds the same (roughly) as 192kb when you're using $5 wal-mart headphones or the free bundled speakers that came with your $299 after-rebate-special PC.
Mackie HR824s or some Sennheiser cans would still blow those peoples minds. But then again, i've seen people who STILL can't tell the difference...
Han shot first.
It is really too bad Sony wouldn't send out a unit. Their SXRD line-up, right now, is probably the best consumer grade TV out on the market.
I have been in awe of LCoS since it came out, when Toshiba's failed attempt at releasing it. Toshiba had some major problems out of the gate and I don't think it helped their price tag was $8,000 for the 50 some inch and $10,000 for the 60 some inch. They did look great though, dispite the problems.
Then JVC hit the market with one, re-naming it to HD-ILA. Not exactly sure why they renamed it, maybe to disassociate themselves from the failed Toshiba LCoS sets? They looked great when compared to DLP, LCD and even plasma, though they still were on the pricier side. My only complaint with them is they were JVC, a company that I would put in the middle of the road as far as quality. I also hate this new trend for silver TVs, but those two were only minor issues with one just being a personal preference.
Then Sony came out with their renamed LCoS, the SXRD. Sites like AVSForum were all the buzz with these new sets. When I finally got to see one in person, it was a dream come true. LCoS overall is a better technology that DLP and especially LCD. DLP maybe able to make a surge in taking LCoS's crown once we see 3 chip DLPs sets and at "affordable" prices. I use affordable loosely, as $4,000 for 50" and ~$5,000 for 60" isn't exactly "affordable" for everyone, but for videophiles, it is.
I have not heard of the other companies that they listed, and to my fault, I haven't been on AVSForum much recently. I would not trust them until I see some reviews, off-brands tend to not do well. Especially like startup companies like Brilla, they usually just don't have the funding or experience to make quality sets their first time around. The one company I would love to see make a LCoS set would be Mitsubishi. I am loyal to them, to a degree. They have been making big screen TVs for many years now, actually almost 3 decades now. They know what is up, when they truely entered the DLP market. I am not talking about thier first sets when DLP was brand new and never took off, but rather about two years ago when them and Toshiba challenged Samsung DLP crown only because they were the only one making DLP sets. Mitsu did it right, beating out Samsung sets hands down. Only downside, you were paying a little more for a Mitsu DLP. Toshiba also did a great job at DLP, I would rank them Mitsu, Toshiba and then Samsung in overall DLP quality, though the new pseudo DLP/LCD 3 driver 1080p Samsung set is pretty impressive.
The sad thing is, I think LCoS is only going to have a short life as the technology to get. SED and OLED are on their way. SED is suppose to actually rival CRT picture quality for about the same price with out the size and weight of CRT. Something plasma and flat panel LCD is unable to do and probably will never be able to do. Though, for the time being, LCoS is the way to go and if you can't afford the Sony SXRD set. JVC's are still great sets and for much less. I think their ~50" is going for about $2,500 or maybe even less.
The actual color is not the problem. The problem is its a static image. Not even so much the static 'black bar', but edge of where the bar meets the moving content. If the whole thing was black all the time, average joe wouldn't probably be able to tell there was a burn-in at all. its just that there's that hard edge.
Han shot first.
But, the picture isn't sharper, it actually degraded with extra noise. I suggest you turn the "Sharpness" all the way down on your TV, and leave it there for a month. At first, the image will look "soft" and not as "crisp", however it will be free of the noise that is distorting the image. After your eyes adjust to watching TV without this added distortion, you'll realize that the "Sharpness" adjustment should have never been added to TVs in the first place.
Also, the "brightness" adjustment actually controls the peak black level (how black black is), and that "contrast" controls peak white level (how white white is). Both of these adjustments proper settings are no where near where they should be, when you pull a TV out of the box. They are preset for what "looks good" under the fluorescent lighting in stores, not your living room.
I bought a copy of Video Essentials, and have been adjusting my sets with it, and the results are amazing. Neighbors, that had better sets then the one I use to have in my living room, would ask how I got my cheap, low end set to look better than their higher end sets.
Trust me, get a hold of a DVD like V.E. and adjust that Wal-mart set of yours. You'll discover two things. First, that Wal-mart set is cheap for a reason (It won't hold black level, and color/tint won't set even close to correct.) And second, after adjustment, it will look better than name brand TVs out of the box.
My karma is in a nose dive
He actually comments on this point in the previous article in the series http://www.extremetech.com/article2/0,1697,1923419 ,00.asp--so you're both right!:
"Why are these TVs so bright? Why are the manufacturers putting in bigger lamps and special higher gain screens to make these already way-too-bright TVs even brighter? I know they've all read the earlier articles, so why are they doing this? Sadly, the reason is that in a retail setting, brightness is frequently a deciding sales factor. So, like it or not, the manufacturers have to build their sets to be as bright as possible in order to be commercially successful.
I spoke at length about this with Steven Lopez, manager of the Nashua New Hampshire store of Cambridge SoundWorks (a specialty AV chain based in New England). Steven expanded upon what the manufacturers had already told me, "The unfortunate truth to selling TVs on the sales floor is that bright sets attract the mass consumer. The most accurate sets may not be the most appealing. The brightest units simply make the other nearby sets look anemic and old, kind of like the tired CRT they are replacing. Often that's enough to tip the scales in a sale, regardless of the price range involved."
Liquid Crystal on Silicon. It's a reflective (as opposedt to transmissive) LCD technology. You basically get all these liquid crystal mirrors to play with, where the rest of the logic on the silicon switches the mirrors rapidly between "reflect" and "absorb" thousands of times a second. (Similar to how DLP works, but instead of actual mirrors rocking back and forth, it's just LCD switching on and off, playing with light polarization.)
Program Intellivision!