Hitachi's 1.5-inch LCDs now available in the U.S.

If you've been eagerly awaiting the opportunity to own the thinnest flat-panel LCD TV, now's your chance.

Hitachi's 1.5 LCDs are just that thick.

(Credit: Hitachi)

Though already available in Asia, the 1.5-inch-thick TVs from Hitachi are now available in the U.S. The sets come in three different screen sizes, 32 inches, 37 inches, and 42 inches.

One of the secrets, by the way, of how Hitachi managed to slim down the TVs so much is that they took out the ATSC tuner. And although it is definitely the thinnest LCD TV, it's downright bloated when compared to Sony's impossibly thin OLED TV, which measures a mere 3 millimeters thick.

See my colleague David Katzmaier's take on the latest TV from Hitachi here.

[Wes#1]

Amazing how all the R&D is now going into making screens thinner, instead of larger. When you sit down to watch a movie, do you really care how THIN the screen is?? Yes, it's amazing how they can squeeze these things, but it would be more dazzling to see them in 60" or 70" sizes at affordable prices.

[ericaatnews]

Totally agreed, Wes#1. The difference between a 1.5-inch thick screen and a 3-inch screen is fairly negligible for most consumers, I would think.