Choosing between LCD, LCOS, Plasma or DLP HDTV display technology |
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Each television technology has its benefits and draw
backs depending on what you want to watch the most:
- Traditional CRT (cathode ray tube) based TVs have
been in homes across America for more than 50 years. It
is the cheapest television technology, but it can
be bulky and the image being reproduced is high quality
although commonly shrunk to fit the square screen. The
range of screen sizes for CRT TVs spans from just
a few inches to large-size rear projection televisions.
- LCD TVs are slim monitors that are available in
screen sizes up to 36 inches. Because LCDs
were originally designed for computer monitors rather
than televisions, they are better suited for viewing
data than video. The response time of an LCD
television is slower than other technologies, which
means you may get a blurring effect when images move
quickly across the screen. Because
LCD televisions tend to be smaller, they are easy
to fit in most home kitchens, workshops and the like. However,
it’s important to remember that the biggest
benefit of high definition television is enhancing
an image so it seems that you are immersed in the
picture. This quality is much more effective
on larger screen sizes. The bigger the television,
the more dramatic the improvement in picture quality
from standard to high definition. If you’re
looking at a 13-inch screen, you might not notice
much difference at all.
- Plasma is one of the newest television technologies,
but has been on the market just long enough to become
the latest craze. Newer model plasma televisions
offer picture quality and color reproduction as good
as any projection television, while being thin enough
to fit almost anywhere. Plasma also has a wider
viewing angle than many other televisions, which
means you don’t have to sit in the “sweet
spot” in the living room to get a good view
of the TV. The larger-size plasma televisions
provide the most dramatic difference when viewing
HDTV.
- Digital Light Processing (DLP) Although DLP is
much slimmer than a typical rear projection television,
they don’t have the viewing angle, size or
brightness to be hung on a wall or perched on a stand
easily. DLP technology uses micro mirrors and a color
wheel to create an image. Viewing angles, life span,
depth and brightness have plagued the technology.
The upside is that these large screen displays are
relatively inexpensive compared to other technologies.
- Liquid Crystal on Silicon (LCoS) technology is
similar to how DLP works, however it uses liquid
crystals (LCDs) on silicon wafers (rather then small
mirrors) to reproduce images. enabling the
display to show high quality image reproduction when
watching movies and playing video games. Price
and size of the displays are slowing the growth of
the technology.
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