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Laser TV — the Death of Plasma?
spoco2 writes, "As reported in major news outlets yesterday in Australia (The Age, the Herald Sun), a new television technology has been developed which is touted (by the developers) as far and away superior to both plasma and LCD. From The Age: 'With a worldwide launch date scheduled for Christmas 2007, under recognisable brands like Mitsubishi and Samsung, Novalux chief executive Jean-Michel Pelaprat is so bold as to predict the death of plasma. "If you look at any screen today, the color content is roughly about 30-35 per cent of what the eye can see," he said. "But for the very first time with a laser TV we'll be able to see 90 per cent of what the eye can see. All of a sudden what you see is a lifelike image on display."' The developing company, Arasor International, is said to be listing on the Australian stock exchange shortly."
"The developing company, Arasor International, is said to be listing on the Australian stock exchange shortly."
I'll believe that it's the 'death of plasma' when I see it, not when the company touting the technology is just trying to pump up their pending IPO.
Do not stare into laser with remaining eye!
:(
Oh, errrrr damn but I'll miss battlestar
liqbase
The TV looks great, but if you read the fine print on the EULA, it says "Do not stare into the laser TV with your remaining good eye"
"I've got more toys than Teruhisa Kitahara."
..with TV's on their heads? No wai!!!
I must say I'm not too impressed with the picture quality of the plasma- and LCD TV's we can buy here in the Netherlands. Especially if you take the price into account. I'm glad I've bought one of the last CRT widescreen TV's a few years back. My old CRT IIyama monitor is also better than most LCD flat monitors you can buy today. Hopefully this new technology will deliver the colours and the viewing angles we have become accustomed to from CRT's!
-- Cheers!
Not knowing too much about optics and sensitivity of the eye, and assuming this is a genuine product, I can only assume that they are talking about a far wider range of intensities when they say "we'll be able to see 90 per cent of what the eye can see". And that actually sounds quite dangerous to me. Imagine you're in a dark room, you switch the thing on and it's showing a picture of the day sky - it would be almost like stepping outside from a dark room. It would be (temporarily) blinding!
The ability to have such intensities would be great for having a screen that is still clearly visible outdoors or in bright light, but I wonder if they're going to build in ambient light sensors which automatically dim the display to an acceptible intensity?
Or did I get the wrong end of the rod / cone?
Today's weirdness is tomorrow's reason why. -- Hunter S. Thompson
More info, but not much, can be found at http://www.lightbit.com/
TVs and CRTs, not TV's and CRT's...
-- Cheers!
But really, I'm holding off buying LCD and plasma, because they should become either much better or much cheaper.
But how are they going to attach the TVs to the frickin' sharks' heads? ...Duct tape?
living the dream
For example this:
o del_id=MDL101554
http://pro.jvc.com/prof/attributes/features.jsp?m
Where's the white paper explaining how this works? Did I miss that article on ArsTechnica?
moox. for a new generation.
Why not try forming an opinion on it based on things they've actually confirmed and denied?
Half the weight and size of a plasma TV. Uses a quarter of the power to the same effect. Increases the range of colours displayed from 30% of what we are able to conceive to 90%. Costs half the price of a plasma screen.
"Oh, but they never said whether or not they support these three completely random display connectors so obviously it's a waste of time."
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
I'm sure it will have all of that in the future. Does anyone know a more "detailed" discussion on the differences and how it really works?
Finally someone makes the next logical step and the transient-technologies like plasma and LCD will be replaced with the real thing.
;-)
Only people who bought a Plasma TV are laughing about the "Free Eye Surgery" jokes (but not because they're soo funny)
Novalux. Looks like the real deal.
HD-DVD and blue-ray are in fact far and away superior to DVD. The problem with them is DRM.
On the other hand H.264 is part of the specification (but not mandatory) on both formats.
I'm quite unimpressed of your knowledge.
I found this link on the optical information: red, green & blue lasers.
This is real, and currently the only barrier is that red lasers aren't as stable / powerful / easy to create as blue & green ones.
If Novalux have overcome this, then real TVs using this tech will be on the market in 12-24 months.
Conversion Rate Optimisation French / English consultant
Yep, that's what I've always felt was lacking in TVs.
Not higher frame rates, so it doesn't turn into a blur whenever something moves.
Not more pixels, so it doesn't look like a blur whenever something doesn't move.
Not better content, so I'd actually watch it.
No, what I've always wanted, is more bits per pixel.
Price and formfactor is what matters.
Even though Plasma looks far better than LCD, the average consumer cannot really distinguish image quality (many consumers prefer a overly color saturated SD display over a well-calibrated HD display).
They plan for this next year, SED has been planning to enter the market for several years, too.
The problem for all of them is that some companies like Panasonic are able through mass-production and new factories to really push the price down for Plasma displays.
If they can make screens even flatter and brighter and at a low price, it might have a chance to succeed.
If it is just an expensive, better looking device, it can only survive in a fringe market.
Got any details? Im curious if its like what we developed in school 20 years ago. It worked, just wasnt practical.
---- Booth was a patriot ----
Burn-in is the serious drawback of Plasma for me.
The LCD set I bought online over the weekend hasn't ven been DELIVERED yet!! Can't we wait at least until I get it before it becomes obsolete?
Even if laser tech allows one to see amazing 99.99% of what their eyes can see.. it'll just not a make a lot of difference.
We have incredibly humongous content in digital RGB, YUV, PAL, NTSC, movie reel formats. These formats contain only what you can see on an existing TV. Hence an DVD would look as vibrant on a normal plasma as on this laser.
Now of course things are not as simple, since for advertising purposes they'll scale the range up to demo the colors. If they overdo it though, they'll just skew the picture too much and receive at grotesque results.
There's a point where a tech is just "good enough" and color representation of a *modern* TFT (notice the stress) or plasma is sufficient.
Laser TV's may succeed if one or more of the following are met though:
- longer life, more durable
- less power consumption
- more portable (?)
- cheaper
This is going to be a huge-ass TV set.
Unless they somehow find a way to shrink the laser-wielding shark.
One of the major problems with using lasers for displays is speckle, the random interference patterns that develop as the highly coherent laser beam hits the display screen (whose surface is far from smooth when compared to the wavelengths of laser used). This greatly diminishes the quality of display and more importantly, anyone sitting in front of this for extended period is likely to get headache and temporary vision problems.
Extended field trails on psychophysical effects are needed before such technology is approved by FDA or equivalent regulatory organizaiton.
Web 2.0 emphasises pastel, deliberately limiting the color content to even less of what the eye can see, so presumably it's doomed. Also Slashdot after its new design. But I'd love to see this guy's original press release. Did he follow his own theory that people like more color, or was the text black-and-white?
Reduce, reuse, cycle
And out of all those colors it can display, the one that will be seen the most is green...as in the big piles of green you have to hand over to buy one when they first come out.
I want a new quote. One that won't spill. One that don't cost too much. Or come in a pill.
For me it sounds like new flavour of Rear Projection TV. Except that instead of LCD projector at back of case you have those great party lasers.
Think about ripping screen out and using it for parties...
But seriously: lasers make quite a lot of heat. If you use them for a while you need to switch them off and let them cool down. Other thing is that you need to direct laser in proper place. You need to use some kind of motorised mirrors (for rear projection like tv) or damn lot of small lasers (for lcd like tv). If you want to use mirrors - they're very delicate stuff, and if you live close to busy road - you'll finish with very blurry image everytime big lorry passes. If you use lot of small lasers - besically you'll have new flavour of LCD TV. So nothing really new.
So it doesn't sound so great after all.
"an experienced, industrious, ambitious, and often, quite often, picturesque liar" - Mark Twain
The problem with the extended colour gamut of the new system is that existing source material is based on the sRGB colour space, which encompasses roughly 35% of the eye's gamut. Anything shorter wavelength than blue, such as spectral violet; many saturated greens and oranges, and most cyans are not available, and the nearest colour is used.
We're all used to this, so when a violet flower is shown as purple (red + blue) on our displays, we don't question it. But try putting a vase of violets next to your TV and you'll see the difference.
Some proper digital photography setups try to improve on the situation using colour profiles, which is simply a lookup table to transform the RGB colours in the file to absolute colour values.
Digital cameras can record colours outside sRGB, so if you ensure your workflow never enforces that constraint, you can end up with a file that can be printed using colours your monitor can't see.
Typically, the input file (usually a raw camera file) is transformed via a device profile (representing the camera's actual spectral response) into a working space (a device-independent space for editing). Whilst editing, the image is viewed using a transform to sRGB (or your display's output profile, if you've calibrated it), but this restriction is for viewing only and doesn't change the file. Then, when you print, the image is converted via a device profile for your printer to print to the extremes of its capabilities - which may exceed sRGB in some colours (e.g. cyan), and be even worse in others (e.g. pure blue).
To make use of this new TV system, we'd need something similar - wide-gamut source material, and device profiles for each set (or simply assume sRGB as default, for backwards-compatibility). Otherwise, it's like listening to music mixed for cheap portable radios (i.e. most current CDs) on a real hi-fi system.
Ydco co
At least I didn't see a pic! I hate when they put up a screenshot of some amazing futuristic HD quality for me to see on my old CRT monitor or in a commercial on TV. I obviously can't view those pictures in their amazing futuristic HD quality... so what do they do? Blur and mute the comparisons.
For example, a Feb-16 article in Engadget...
Slashdot quality declines as the number of hot grits posts decreases. - Provolt's Law, Apr-09-2005
"Half the weight and size of a plasma TV. Uses a quarter of the power to the same effect. Increases the range of colours displayed from 30% of what we are able to conceive to 90%. Costs half the price of a plasma screen."
What, and you believe that?
It costs half the price of a plasma? Yeah, I'll believe that when I see it. You really think if this tech actually works they'll sell it that level? No. Better picture - more expensive. Smaller/lighter - more expensive. Combine the two.. get ready to mortgage your house for small one. Manufacturing cost has nothing to do with it - things are *not* sold for what they cost to produce. They are sold for what people are prepared to pay.
I guess this is related to enhancing the dynamic range of the image, not the light intensity? http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/High_dynamic_range_im aging
If so, it would not just require improved resolution of the broadcast like HDTV is doing, but also a change in the clip format. I'm quite sure most non-HDR formats today remove most of what it is not expected that a CTR of LCD screen will be capable of showing. It's a natural progression of course. very neat (:
It's nice that TV's will be able to play 90% of the colors the eye can see, but what about video cameras. Will the technology play into recording 90% of the color we can see. Currently SD NTSC is what like under a million colors. Whats the point of having a TV that can play more colors if the devices we use to shoot with can record less.
Now I know HD has a larger color spectrum, but is it 90% of what the human I can see?
Can I bum a sig?
Onr PLASMA TV For The Price OF TWO LASER TVS!!!!! Hurry offer closes Q4 2007
My Blog | Badsh
Full spectrum color wont make the programming suck less.
The linked article talks about Arasor International. If you read carfully, the real company behind this innovation is US company Novalux. Arasor just makes one of the chips.
Novalux has an interesting history. They first wanted to target long haul telecom with their technology (laser on a chip). As of 2002, they were developing lower powered lasers for short haul markets. Their web site also claims a forey into bioinstrumentation.
Certainly, this seems like a technology looking for a market. Will this be the right market? Will the products live up to claims? We'll see.
is the fact that they burn out in 3 years. Most people I know are willing to sacrifice a little picture quality (which they don't notice anyway) for an extended life of the product.
What? No photo of the laser TV? No diagram?
Why can't a company just release something? Hype the crap out of it and then underdeliver. Death of plasma? I still have rabbit ears on my 27" $300 TV.
My point was less whether I believe their hype or not, and more that I am more willing to judge things on specs that have actually been released than rampant speculation on connectivity that isn't alluded to in the article.
Basically, argue with the point I'm making now rather than the point you want to make, which I believe was made further up the comment list.
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
Seriously, isnt there some restriction on making "forward looking statements" before a stock offering?
...when we were going to see people developing laser imaging systems, seeing as how there's now red green and blue lasers out there. Guess I wasn't crazy afterall.
Friend: "The NIC is misconfigured..." Me: "No prob, I'll just telnet in and fix it." *Silence*
There's not much info in the articles...
:-) Check out SED-TV-reviews and some info from HDTV-solutions... It's interesting stuff - I've head the image described as very lifelike and just floating in the air :) Using less power than LCDs and with only 10% degradation in 60.000 hours. It's basically a flat-CRT, as far as I understand it...
What about SED-TVs? (Surface-conduction Electron-emitter Display)
They've been on their way for a long time, and how it looks like they're about ready... 100.000:1 contrast ratio, 1ms refresh-ratio, 450 nits
Any technology distinguishable from magic, is insufficiently advanced.
More succinctly termed Color Gamut.
Looks like the future will be a battle between OLED, SED and this new laser technology. If the latter delivers brighter and more efficient projectors, I'm there!
It costs half the price of a plasma? Yeah, I'll believe that when I see it. You really think if this tech actually works they'll sell it that level? No. Better picture - more expensive. Smaller/lighter - more expensive. Combine the two.. get ready to mortgage your house for small one. Manufacturing cost has nothing to do with it - things are *not* sold for what they cost to produce. They are sold for what people are prepared to pay.
Well, if most people won't pay for a plasma and they can manufacture it cheaper, then by your own logic it will be sold cheaper. Better to say they will price it at the point where they get the most profit, which is (sellprice - manufacturingprice)*consumers. If 10 times more people buy it if they half their profit margin, they would be idiots not to do so.
They sound crazy to me. I
n the first place, I seriously doubt that there's any meaningful way of measuring the "percentage coverage" of a gamut of colors, since the mapping of colors into a plane is somewhat arbitrary and there are two very different systems in wide use. I notice that this comparison of Adobe RGB vs. sRGB doesn't try to estimate any "percentages."
Neither does Poynton's invaluable Color FAQ.
Second, if we're talking about something like "area included in the CIE xy plane by thus and such system of reproduction" as a percentage of "area included by the entire spectrum," I seriously doubt that you can get a number anything like 90% with only three primaries. You're still trying to approximate a blobby blunt shape with an inscribed triangle.
The article is so vague on details that it's not clear how many primary colors are used. If it uses six primaries instead of three, I'm prepared to believe it could give meaningfully better color than traditional systems. How important that is remains to be seen. HDTV gives obviously, dramatically better picture quality (in terms of resolution) than traditional TV, but it doesn't seem to be setting the world on fire.
The big question, of course, is where one would find program material encoded with more than three primaries; it would need to be specially recorded for this system (requiring new video, broadcast, and optical disk standards).
"How to Do Nothing," kids activities, back in print!
will it play ogg ?
As usual, the news stories didn't contain any technical info and could preferably have been (almost losslessly) compressed into a headline. So, how do they make the colours? Are there several laser beams of different colours that blend on the screen? Or are the beams exciting some material (like CRT screens) that then show colours?
:-) You know, laser is narrow band.
Heh, a simple laser projector, as I think of it, with a single beam sweeping over the wall would use someting like 0% of the visible color spectrum.
Swedish plasma phys. PhD student; MSc EE; knows maths, programming, electronics; finance interest; seeks opportunities
Does it have any fricken sharks in it?
toshiba and cannon did already show working prototypes for SED ... some reviewers said the SED image is "photographic film" quality
"There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
The quote is vague but I can only assume they're referring to the sRGB color space which is what TVs today will display. So yes, it's very possible that this new TV can actually display over twice as many colors as common ones (actual hues, not just intensities). Unfortunately, from what I understand, if this TV used a different standard, then it wouldn't be backward compatible (e.g. if you plugged your cable into a laser TV the colors would be very distorted, because the signal provider expects the display to show it in sRGB).
But you'll not be able to see it.
I much prefer "Laser TV - Plasma Killer".
Killing's all the rage right now, right?
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
Novalux : http://www.novalux.com/
If you visit the site they have some nice projection technology, including video projectors that fit in your pocket. I wouldn't expect the TV would deviate from this technology and is probably a sort of laser-projector put into one package. Whether or not it's superior, we'll have to see...
I for one, welcome our new laser tv overlords.
For my soon to be outdated OLED Optimus Keyboard.
"With a worldwide launch date scheduled for Christmas 2007"
So we have to wait a year until we can get the "latest and greatest" in picture technology, hm? How will audiophiles looking for something to plug their PS3 or their X360 into possibly pass their time until then?
I can already get all the colors my eyes can see and almost infinite resolution, all from one device...it's called "outside." It even has games!
Insisting on "correct" English is like saying that there is only one, definitive recipe for chili.
Well if we do have all these extra colors what is it going to matter. Have you ever looked at HD stuff, it is compressed to shit. Look into the reds u can see gradienting throught out it, so seeing all these extra colors i dont see the point. Im all of it tho if it brings the prices of the TV's then its all good anyways, and well if the refessh rate on the LCD TV is shit then thats an up as well. But for colors it sounds like a bunch of marketing BS to me.
that company has a very interesting history .. and refused another 200 millions or so ... i bet a lot of people had bad dreams about that decision :)
... when ppl stopped investing in those nets, they "shortened" their product to support metro-area fiber optic netwoks.
:)
they started in pure DotComBubble 1.0 style around 2000 with an 100 million investment
their product was a better laser (cheaper and less enerygy) for long-haul fiber optic networks
looks like now they shortened that laser a bit more
at least for the stubborness and that never-give-up attitude, i wish them all the luck
"There is nothing more frightful than ignorance in action." Johann Wolfgang von Goethe
not in australia. companies are allowed to claim anything to attract shareholders - we have the glossiest and most misleading prospectuses(?) in the world, much more lurid than any US company offers. maybe thats why they chose their australian subsidary to make this, er, announcement.
"But for the very first time with a laser TV we'll be able to see 90 per cent of what the eye can see..."
For that to be so, we'd have to maintain that improved quality all the way through the production chain, from the image-sensor in the video camera on. So first you have to get image sensors that see "90 per cent of what the eye can see".
Kodak's on the line: they want to tell you that plain old slide film sees a hell of a lot more than image sensors do, and slide film only sees a small part of what the eye does.
First think dynamic range, next think about color gamut. We're no place close to capturing what the eye does - why does Bozo here think that there's content he can reproduce? What, is it all gonna be HDRI images from CGI?
I agree. The picture quality of a good CRT TV is much better than 90% of the LCD TVs on the market. They were cheaper, lasted longer, and looked better. I wouldn't have touched LCD (or plasma, which was worse) with a barge pole a while ago.
However, I then discovered the effect of CRTs on me. I knew about the radiation that pours out of these things, but I always thought I could withstand a little radiation. In truth, I found out that it was giving me chronic constipation, resulting in crippling gut pain, and chronic fatigue syndrome. Two hours of TV would leave me exhausted and sick. I had chronic fatigue for two years and I had no idea what was happening.
I've switched to LCD and avoided CRT wherever possible (those things are everywhere!). I've started to pick up my energy slowly, and I no longer get the pains in gut. I know, I hardly believe it myself.
Let me just say, thank christ for LCD.
You know, there is a difference between trolling and pointing out the flaws in your reasoning. Just saying.
Quote Dr.Evil: You know, I have one simple request. And that is to have sharks with freakin laser beams attached to their heads!
"The developing company, Arasor International, is said to be listing on the Australian stock exchange shortly."
"Buy sStocks %% for LASER TV super deeal prices will ssoar!! 6643543"
.... so I won't be able to enjoy all the pretty colors this technology offers. I'll keep my fingers crossed for a bargain on and LCD or DLP instead.
"The irony when tending a flock of sheep is the dogs you put in place to protect them are genetically mutated wolves"
I mean, our brains change the colours based on expectation and perception. That old trick about putting a coloured light on a white screen, turning it off and then seeing that screen in the complementary colour shows this and has been known for AGES.
The only time you notice is if you are reporducing something you are looking at at the same time (as your example shows).
However, I don't think I'll be seeing Natalie Portman in Hot Grits in my living room any time soon to check the colour is correct...
No, you simply quoted the article in an attempt to say how good it was.
It's hype. More the the point it's poor hype. They haven't release anything that could be described as a spec anyway.
The technology isn't new, it was first demoed in 1993 and mitsubishi produced working prototypes last year. This company has no product. Definately no patents (there's prior art) and it'd be madness to invest in them, but people like you will jump up and down excited because they managed to write something that sounded good.
Dirty Jobs + LaserTV = Gagvision?
Nuns. No sense of humor. -Kurgan
This technology has been around for a while.
, the technology was/is already quite successful in large scale public displays.
German Schneider AG attempted to bring down the price to the consumer level ten years ago, and produced some reference design, but then went bankrupt.
http://www.hcinema.de/laser.htm is in German (Babel at your own risk), but the diagram near the top shows the basic idea: three lasers are combined into one beam, which is then scanned across the screen using two rotating mirrors. Obviously, the optical technology is fragile, with many opportunities to screw up the image.
According to http://www.repairfaq.org/sam/laserlia.htm#liaschn
a pink floyd laser show dvd? dude...
Haven't we heard this promise before? I'm still waiting for LCoS and OLED to take over the world. I'm sure this revolution will look pretty sweet in HD on the plasma panel I already own.
Why couldnt someone tell me about this LAST WEEK when I could have waited another 7 years for Laser to come down to 3500 in price!
I can program myself out of a Hello World Contest!!
these laser TVs are what you could call a "True" flat CRT. Except you're using photons at an incredibly close range, instead f a massive vacuum tube. These TVs are thinner than plasma, POSSIBLY thinner than an LCD screen. Manufacturing these lasers at that size is about as difficult as semiconductor photolithography, which is to say, not at all since we're already working on 25 (was it 22?) nanometer technology. We'll have pixels so small and resolutions so high, with an incredible gamut, this sounds like a win. What's funnier is that we could pack the same resolution in a 15" Laser TV that would fit nominally on a 40" plasma. The size reduction and sharpness improvements alone will kick ass. We now just need a STANDARD for broadcasting/printing/recording in that area, because sRGB SUCKS.
Still waiting on Serviscope_minor to wake up to fucking reality and realize that Jessica Price isn't going to fuck him.
Plasma was alive?
Don't worry. By the time this becomes affordable, your plasma TV will be worn out and due to be replaced anyway.
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
I heard Duke Nukem Forever's release date has now been set back one year so that they can update it to support the new Laser TVs.
To be honest, I've always felt that Plasma and LCD TV's are overrated. I just bought a new CRT and frankly it was a quarter the price of any LCD monitor. Not to mention the intensity on CRT is nice.
LCD suffer from problems such as dead pixels. As for Plasma TVs, my office bought 2 42 inch plasma's (3500 euros each) a while back and both screens are burnt where you can see images of what burned onto the screen.
I'll stick with CRT and regular TVs for now. If laser comes out I'll wait to see what the quality is like before buying one. Hopefully it will be better than plasma or LCD since both of those are disgraful and disgrafully priced.
"Here's the address where I think I'm supposed to be -- but it doesn't look promising. Above the door, where you'd expect to see a brassy company logo, there's a blank concrete facade. Inside, ducts, cables, and pieces of furniture pock the dark, bare space. Taped to one window, a sheet of paper bears a hand-drawn arrow pointing to a modest side entrance. And there, in inch-high stick-on letters, the kind you'd buy at Staples, is the name of the ostensibly world-class technology outfit housed inside this building: "Novalux, Inc."
Manufacturing cost has nothing to do with it - things are *not* sold for what they cost to produce. They are sold for what people are prepared to pay.
Incorrect. Things are sold at a price to maximize profits. As price goes up, you'll attract less people to buy your product. These guys don't have a monopoly on televisions, so people will just buy something else if it's too expensive. I just bought a new TV and didn't even consider the HDTV sets because it was just too expensive. I could have afforded it if I _really_ wanted to, but it just wasn't worth twice the price for HDTV. I might have considered the HDTV if it was $500 vs the $400 I paid for the SDTV though.
AccountKiller
Thanks. It took me a YEAR to convince my wife to get the 50 incher.
:)
Now I can start working on her for the Laser one.
I think I need to get more than OTA HD broadcasts though
If only she would go back to work. We could buy stuff when it comes out again!
-
Marriage isnt a Word, its a Sentence.
I can program myself out of a Hello World Contest!!
I've seen experimental color monitors at SIGGRAPH have more than three color channels. Some systems add true white or black. Others add three inbetween hues. To best exploit extra colors you have add them to the camera too. These monitors do like look closer to a high quality print than regular RGB monitors. The fill more of the CIE color-volume than conventional monitors. I am not sure if the extra channels are worth the extra expense. Perhaps these could be stunning in theater environment.
Check out Sony's newest offering. They are absolutely gorgeous.
somehow, I find myself NOT wanting to shine lasers directly into my retinas.
i dunno. maybe its just me.
mount it on my shark?
I HATE digital TV. The only thing I found TV good for was sports, now half the games just degrade into a sea of blocks on any type of motion I.E. the basis of sports. Garbage. Someone told me its my Directv but I've seen it on cable too. I rmember watching the slam dunk contest, every single dunker turned into something I would expect on YouTube, just awful.
What those guys seem to make is a tuneable laser, one where the color can be changed dynamically. Last month, they announced it as a breakthrough for fibre optic data transmission. That's why they have "more colors" than old fashioned RGB systems. This will be useful in presenting pictures to species which have more than three-color vision. (Birds have at least four color vision, and see further into the UV than humans; some bird species have more than four color sensors.)
Other than that, having more than three display colors isn't that useful. It's useful for printers because of ink limitations, but that's a different problem.
It's unclear how this translates into a display, but I suspect it's something like a DLP display with field-sequential color.
One big pain with this idea is that it brings back scanning. We finally have displays that don't flicker at all, and they're so much more restful to watch. Going to a scanned technology is a step backwards.
A LASER based TV isn't new, but rather a technology finaly moving into the masses. I worked with a LASER projection display (nominally a "TV") in the mid 90's in Boston, that while expensive, worked nicely and could be scaled quite impresively. That used a gas white-light laser and a traditional color path (PCAOM, for those who know), but there's no reason it could not be recreated much more cheaply today using solid-state and diode-based lasers.
Until recently the major bottleneck has been the availability of cheap and long-lasting blue-light lasers. Once that barrier started to break, things like Blue Ray discs become doable on the consumer scale. A laser based TV is actually not a bad application.
Some side-effects: LASER prices will drop again as manufacturing picks up, the costs of the color modulation equipment will also drop. This means I could maybe put together a cheaper projector for the lasers, and that, along with a proper power output scaling, move this technology into bigger and lighter screens. Movie-house screens for the house? Doable, since lasers don't spread as much as a traditional light beam. Project that image on anything!
Oh, and take off the screen and replace the scanners with something more "X,Y", and you have a nifty vector display, IN COLOR! Pink-floyd fans rejoice!
}#q NO CARRIER
Don't forget the YouTube link baby!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Pozlp_wnkRk
How dows this differ form the laser DLP that Mitsubishi announced back in April?
http://reviews.cnet.com/4531-10921_7-6482184.html
09 F9 11 02 9D 74 E3 5B D8 41 56 C5 63 56 88 C0
"Of course, take it with a grain of salt since nothing stops a company's marketing guy from posting as Joe Internet."
Slashdot is the most wonderful site EVER! EVERYONE should get a subscription.
From The Secretary's Handbook, Taintor, Sarah and Monro, Kate, 1988, MacMillan Publishing Co., New York, p 89:
"The 's may be added to figures, signs, symbols, and letters of the alphabet to form the plural."
Although there is a growing tendency to omit the apostrophe, the original post was correct usage.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
Cool, thanks! My English is better than I thought :-)
-- Cheers!
"The unveiling of the laser TV prototype was held on the eve of Arasor's public float on the Australian Stock Exchange next week."
The best thing is that this company will also dabble in time travel and ESL classes last week.
Tell me about it. I bought a widescreen HDTV CRT set for $3500 six years ago, and every time I've seen the price of plasma screen drop or the quality of LCD screen improve, all I have is the past 72 months of actually enjoying my purchase rather than lamenting what is on the horizon. ;)
Schrödinger's cat is not amused—maybe.
Since the TFA summary features a dearth of useful tech info, here's a summary I whipped up from the comments and a little googling. (Apologies in advance for linking to my own site.)e -up-plasma-displays.html
http://www.freshdv.com/2006/10/lasertv-aims-to-on
The technology looks promising, particularly since they are building from proven projection tech just with a much better light source. I wonder what the viewing angle limitations will be?
Laser TV has existed for a long time using Argon (blue, green) and Krypton (red) lasers as a white light source (either mixed gas or two lasers) The color is chosen using an AOM or a PCAOM (see a patent for laser TV at: http://www.freepatentsonline.com/6426781.html ).
The new breakthrough is that we have solid state Diode Pumped Solid State lasers (specifically high power DPSS), you should be familiar with the 532nm green laser pointers. The green is achived through frequency doubling 1064nm infared DPSS lasers. Red lasers need not be frequency doubled because they can manufacture Diode lasers to that frequency and is available in higher power ranges. Blue DPSS lasers were developed, usign 808nm infared lasers frequency doubled, the power available is still really low, (and I can't wait to rip apart a blue ray drive to get the laser out!) and the lasers are extremely expensive. Hopefully with greater production of blue lasers the prices will go down.
The next issue to deal with in the U.S. (I don't know austrailian law) lasers are regulated by the FDA and any laser over the power of 5mw that exposes radiation to the public has to have an FDA varience to legally operate. I am wondering how this TV would be classified. I really would prefer a solid state DPSS laser projector to replace easily broken, expensive to maintain, LCD projectors. If you need more information about this technology sam's laser faq, and the guys at alt.lasers are nice and answer questions.
Peace,
Adam
Will India raise taxes on these TVs?
Have you read my journal today?
Where's the picture? I want to see for myself if it's clearer than my LCD. ;)
Won't the lasers burn holes in the TV screen and blast to smithereens anyone watching it?
I don't want plasma or LCD because they are both fixed resolution. Most content is still not in HD. All my DVDs look like shit on a fixed resolution display that has to try to upconvert the picture to fit into the fixed number of pixels on LCD and plasma displays. Until there's a display that can actually change its resolution like CRTs, I am not interested.
No, switching it on and off is irrelivant. Its the number of hours its on that matters. And all it does is cause the display to lose brightness. 60,000 hours its how many hours it will take for its brightness to be cut in half, at which point it is no longer considered usable.
The goggles, they do nothing!
Sounds like someone is trying to hype Arasor stock. Look at http://www.hometheaterfocus.com/blog/archive/2006/ 04/04/3037.aspxthis website for info on Mitsubishi's Laser TV
----------------------------
Esobofh - Currently drinking fresh mango juice.
If you post an image with the AdobeRGB profile embedded on a Web site it will look like crap in most browsers--but it will look correct in Safari.
Build a man a fire, he's warm for one night. Set him on fire, and he's warm for the rest of his life.
http://www.siliconlight.com/htmlpgs/homeset/homefr ameset.html
Will it work with my laserdisc player though?
The knack of flying is learning how to throw yourself at the ground and miss. - HGTTG
http://img.timeinc.net/popsci/images/wn/wn0805proj TV_730xslide1.jpg
The last time I got that particular kind of spam, it was for a company developing mine removal equipment. Seriously.
I did not consider it an endorsement.
I'm interested in your Craig's list posting about the TV's with the frickin' lasers. I would like millions if possible. Please contact me over secure land line at 800.234.3455. --Dr. Eve Ille
The death of plasma and LCD is here! Just like when OLED, SED, FED, ELD, NED, LCOS, and GLV displays were announced.
Does it have any fricken sharks in it?
Of course... Discovery Channel - Shark Week.
When our name is on the back of your car, we're behind you all the way!
I don't see anything in there about acronyms. This rule deosn't apply! (Letters from the alphabet clearly means individual letters, otherwise the rule would apply to all words!)
Delay is preferable to error. (Thomas Jefferson)
I was actually at the launch at the Hilton Hotel on Tuesday night.
The technology is amazing - the demo (ie, not production) version they had there was incredible, even without comparing it to any other screens or technology.
Whether they can get it out by Christmas 2007 at the price point they claim is something I will believe when I see. However, the tech is real and quite remarkable.
An example from the handbook section cited above:
"YMCA's"
I agree that the current trend is more toward leaving out the apostrophe except for single letters, but putting it in is still correct and acceptable. It is the way I was taught in public school back in the day when you would never hear a teacher say, "I seen" or, "Me and him;" both of which I have heard from teachers in the last month. Clearly, these are signs that The End Is Near.
Some mornings it's hardly worth chewing through the restraints to get out of bed.
You can't fucking read, can you?
All I did was list items that the company was quoted as saying about the TV, not my own personal opinion.
"It does not do to leave a live dragon out of your calculations, if you live near him." - Tolkien
"but they actually have a lot of competitors with actual products to show, such as Novalux, Mitsubishi etc."
:)
Did you even read the articles I posted to?
FTFA "Manufacturing company Arasor produces the unique optoelectronic chip central to the laser projection device being developed by Silicon Valley-based Novalux, which is being used by a number of television manufacturers."
And "With a worldwide launch date scheduled for Christmas 2007, under recognisable brands like Mitsubishi and Samsung, Novalux chief executive Jean-Michel Pelaprat is so bold as to predict the death of plasma."
So... erm... yeah, did you even bother to read the article before trying to debunk them.
As for the domain name:
http://www.arasor.com.au/ takes you right there, as does http://www.novalux.com/ for Novalux.
Really... that was some poor investigation.
And yes, I did post the original story, but I have no vested interest in it other than I wanted the Slashdot crew to nitpick it and show whether this had real legs or not. As if it does, I'm excited to see high def tvs get cheaper.
I hardly think that's a definitive reference. I'd take it with a grain of salt. Business language (i.e - that used by secretaries) does not have a reputation for being scholarly. Businesspeople mangle language all the time, and this sounds more like saomething that OKs the corruption of language so as not to offend the bosses.
... and then they built the supercollider.
http://proav.pubdyn.com/2006_June/June2006Parallax View.htm
Parallax View: Is There A Laser In Your Future?
Although laser imaging technology has been around for a few years, we haven't seen it in a projection TV application -- until now.
This past April, Mitsubishi Electronics showed a laser-powered rear-projection TV as part of its 2006 product line show. This demo didn't exactly come out of the blue; Mitsubishi had private meetings at CES 2006 to let selected customers inspect this technological marvel. But the event, held at the Hyatt Huntington Beach Resort in California, was the first public demonstration of a laser projection system for consumer TVs in a long time.
The idea of using lasers to illuminate images isn't new. In theory, it's been possible for a long time -- if the lasers are bright enough, and if the lasers and their power supplies can be made small enough.
Problem was, lasers required large power supplies and blue lasers didn't generate sufficient power to be practical. That changed a few years back with the development of blue diode lasers capable of 5 or more watts of power, matching the energy developed in red and green versions.
The Mitsubishi demo used a special type of laser known as a C-SEL, or Cavity Surface Emitting Laser, manufactured by Novalux Corp. Three individual laser emitters (red, green, and blue) are manufactured on a semiconductor surface in precise alignment.
The power ratings of each laser vary, but for a 50-inch microdisplay rear-projection TV the red laser would produce just less than 3 watts at 620 nanometers, the green, 3 watts at 532 nanometers, and the blue, 2.5 watts at 465 nanometers. That would be sufficient to replace a 150-watt UHP short-arc lamp, which might at best last 4,000 to 5,000 hours before reaching half-brightness.
By using laser light, which is coherent (focused) and already polarized, Novalux claims that many optical components in rear- and front-projection systems can be eliminated, such as condensers and light integrators, polarizers and polarizing films, and color wheels and dichroic filters. In theory, laser light could also be used to illuminate LCD flat-panel displays by employing a sequential color scanning system.
Two other potential advantages accrue to lasers: They're instant-on, instant-off devices, and can operate for 50,000 hours or more before reaching half-life. That has obvious appeal to rear-projection TV manufacturers, particularly those companies trying to hold off the onslaught of low-cost plasma and LCD flat-panel TVs.
So it's all positive, right? Not exactly. The price we pay for the tightly focused coherent light from a laser is speckle, a shifting, grain-like optical interference pattern that's the signature of a laser light source. If you've ever been to a laser light show at a planetarium, or seen laser text and images projected, you know what speckle is and how distracting it can be.
To successfully implement a laser light engine, we've got to eliminate as much speckle as possible. It's even more of a problem with rear-projection TVs, as their screens already have a grain-like micro lens structure that creates optical beat frequencies with the ever-shifting speckle from the laser.
Sure enough, the Mitsubishi demo projector had plenty of speckle, particularly when saturated colors such as green were being shown. Several members of the press standing near me at the demo noticed the combination of grain and speckle and commented on how soft the HD images looked, as well as the unearthly shades of red and green solid colors that were seen.
How do you get rid of speckle? By diffusing the laser's beam as much as possible. Of course, it's no longer coherent as a result, which means the light output drops off considerably. (You can't get something for nothing!)
Back in 1998, I took a trip to Portsmouth, NH, to visit the offices of the Corporation for Op
that with the color depth of TVs now they were already ahead of what the human eye can perceive? True color is 24bit and TVs advertise 32bit don't they? The eye can't distinguish past 24bit. Oh and by the way, I thought that a US media outlet had a moment of temporary insanity by actually saying the word "Christmas" (in the article summary) but then I realized that the quote was from an Australian site and that explained everything. Only the US is afraid of admitting its roots.
this nation, under God, shall have a new birth of freedom. -- Lincoln, Gettysburg Address
"A company's bigwig claiming their product, which is right now being demonstrated to the public and other industry partners at a trade exhibition, is somehow better than an existing product that's been out for years, has worse colour rendition and contrast than pre-existing technology, but that somehow, despite these extremely visible and annoying flaws, has somehow succeeded as a triumph of marketing over quality. And only a week after their IPO closed!"
Really, the typos and grammatical mutilations around here are becoming unbearable...
What part of "a well regulated militia" do you not understand?
Laser Video has been talked about for decades and was a reality in the 90s. When properly done its resolution is infinite. It also has great possibilties for large images so you can have a wall of video image or even a cyclorama in your home. It also has tremendous potential for large screen projection on building etc. If this Australian company has produced a machine that has those advantages and is reasonably priced that could be very cool. Laser crystalscan 3D would be very amazing as well.
Mr. Best Buy:
If it takes 60k hours for the screen to be unusable, that does not mean that it magically switches to "suck" after that time. It means the screen degrades from the moment you start using it. And you are wrong. Switching is always harder on a device than leaving it on.
It's not your fault. Your managers don't tell you the truth because it's easy to lie when you believe it.
---
ECHELON is a government program to find words like bomb, jihad, plutonium, assassinate, and anarchy.
So, if it uses DLP (lots of micro-mirrors tech) I think it makes sense to use it as a video projector, at least it is portable, and have an adjustable screen size (easily removed when not needed)...