OTHER TECH

New Tech vs. No Tech

I'm not just spouting science fiction when I say that flat-screen TVs can and will get even flatter in the future. OLED (organic light-emitting diode), one of the key new technologies nosing its way up into the TV world, made a very decent showing at this year's CES, with an array of prototypes on display in the Sony booth whose screen sizes ranged from a few inches across to 27 inches diagonal. The cardboard-thin profile and rich color of these sets make me hungry to see more examples of OLED in the near future.

I'm probably not the only one who traveled to Vegas hoping to see a preproduction bigscreen SED TV in the Toshiba or Canon booth. Unfortunately, the technology was a no-show - the result, I was told, of some kind of patent dispute that's preventing either company from displaying SED sets in the U.S. Not surprisingly, Toshiba made an announcement immediately after CES that the company would sell its stake in a joint SED manufacturing venture with Canon. So much for SED shaking up the flat-panel TV world!

Sharp showed off a 4,000 x 2,000-pixel LCD (that's four times the resolution of current 1080p TVs) playing full-motion video and a Network Aquos TV that used PLC (Power Line Communication) to send dual high-def video feeds, via a home's electrical wires, to TVs equipped with adapters. The 4K-rez TV was just a display of technological muscle, but the PLC adapters are actual products Sharp plans to introduce sometime this year.

Meanwhile, Pioneer's demo in a nearby booth of its new-gen plasma panel looked utterly fantastic, with the prototype 60-inch TV (shown above) displaying a dynamic contrast ratio that rivaled my now fading memory of the SED sets Toshiba displayed at past shows. The company wasn't giving any model numbers, specs, or prices for its new plasma line - we'll have to wait until late spring/early summer for that information. - Al Griffin