Toshiba, Canon delay SED TV debut - again
Canon can't produce the panels in time?
Toshiba has put back the debut of SED (Surface-conduction Electron-emitter Display) TVs. Most recently earmarked for a Q4 introduction, when the TVs will now appear is anyone's guess - Toshiba certainly isn't saying.
The Japanese giant blamed the delay on Canon, which is developing the SED panels due to be used in Toshiba's TVs. "The decision is based on information provided by Canon, indicating that Canon will not be able to provide SED panels to the original schedule," Toshiba said today.
For its part, Canon said it was delaying the panels to establish the technology it needs to mass-produce them more cheaply.
The promise of SED technology is the ability to produce a TV as thin as an LCD or plasma display but deliver the colour intensity and refresh speed of an old-style CRT screen. The technique essentially used an electron emitter for every pixel and places them all very close behind a phosphor-coated display panel. For each pixel, electrons are sent speeding toward the phosphor - on impact, they produce a flash of light, just like a CRT. By targeting the individual red, green and blue colours of each pixel, however, the displays can be scaled to support HD resolutions.
Or so the theory goes. Canon has been pioneering the technology since the mid-1980s, but 20 years on it has still to come to market. Toshiba partnered with Canon in 2004, and the two have continually failed to meet launch deadlines ever since.
To be fair, Toshiba's last pronouncement, in December 2006, on the matter timelined volume production for 2008, with a small number of sets appearing in late 2007 - a schedule revised from an October 2006 plan to introduce 55in sets in July this year. Earlier this year, Toshiba said it was selling its stake in the two companies' joint-venture to Canon.
COMMENTS
SED is a bad choice of name
SED is a dreadful choice of name ..... it's understood by electronic engineers to mean "smoke emitting diode" !
As for HD CRTs, is anyone in the copy-prevention camps aware that it's possible, with a little signal conditioning, to extract unencrypted RGB signals from the grid drives and recover the timing information from the scan coils?
People can tell the difference
Many LCD TVs have poor blacks.
Also, this technology can probably be utilised in projectors which will be good news.
waste?
Joe,
LCD displays just don't cut it professionally, that is why Toshiba announced that initially SED would only be available to broadcasters. LCD's colour reproduction is poor, the response time is not great and it is based on the idea of blocking light not emitting light. Most of the 'enhanced' contrast LCD displays just dim the backlight in response to a darker picture, and this is not satisfactory. SED at the moment seems like the answer to the prayers of professional people who need true video reproduction. Considering no one is making 'Grade 1' broadcast CRTs any more the broadcast market needs SED as a replacement, because no LCD truely meets the mark.
Waste of time
2 years ago this sounded great, now with LCD prices plummetting per year, and the tech getting seriously brilliant (honestly, no-one can tell between a contrast ratio of LCD's 10000:1 and SED's theoretical million-to-one ratio) i can't see the point of bringing these to market now.
Not least because, as a totally new tech, they'll be crazy expensive for ages, by they time they become affordable we'll all be on OLED printable screens and HD mini-projectors.
CRTs can do HD, too
"By targeting the individual red, green and blue colours of each pixel, however, the displays can be scaled to support HD resolutions."
They aren't exactly slim, but there have been CRTs (both computer monitors and TVs) capable of displaying HD content for years.
