Slimmer tube TVs to challenge flat panels

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for flat-panel sets have been made to match CRTs.

Average prices for CRTs are expected to fall as the market consolidates and survivors are forced to be profitable at low price points, according to Trinker. Many major players in the CRT business, including Sony, Toshiba, Matsushita and Sharp, have pulled back their efforts.

Trinker added that televisions are headed for prices less than $500, with average tags in the $250 range. To offset low prices, volumes will have to be high, and that might be difficult as flat panels evolve into a larger part of the overall television market.

The share of worldwide TV shipments that are LCD models will grow from 5 percent this year to 18 percent in 2008, according to iSuppli. The total TV market is expected to jump from about 168 million units to roughly 203 million units during that period.

Flat-panel televisions are becoming a larger part of the LCD market as well. This year, revenue from flat-panel desktop monitors will account for 41 percent of the overall market, and notebooks will account for 22 percent, according to DisplaySearch. LCD-based televisions will account for 11 percent. By 2008, revenue from desktop monitors will make up only 31 percent and notebooks, 16 percent. LCD televisions will provide 33 percent of the market, DisplaySearch forecasts.

Also helping the flat-panel television market will be the transition from analog to digital television. The transition is being pushed by a confluence of forces, including a long-standing federal mandate to shift over-the-air TV broadcasts from analog to digital signals; improvements and lower prices in display and digital storage technologies; heated competition between satellite and cable TV providers; and Hollywood's growing acceptance of the digital evolution.

[cschlise]

What About OLED and Field Emission Displays?

I'm glad CRT's are still hanging around because plasma and LCD are dead end technologies when you look at the amount of work that still has to go into them to make them perform similar to CRTs. Two new techologies to look out for that work as well or better than the ol' CRT are OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diodes) displays which use organic material to put a LED at each pixel making them extemely bright an efficient. Another is field emission displays which look to use the same idea as the CRT, but instead of a large electron gun shooting electrons across the screen, there will be a mircon sized electron gun using field emission (quantum mechanical effect) with electron emittersw at each pixel. These will have all the advantages of current CRTs but be thin and light.

[ConsiderateGuy]

Yes, where ARE the field emitter displays?

I'm with you, Chuck. Ever since I read about FEDs I felt they were the ideal solution: the brightness and black levels of CRT but the thinness of LCD or Plasma. Anyone that has seen a CRT HDTV can attest to the fact that they look better than RPTVs and flat panels, especially in the range of color (black levels), but they are just so big and heavy beyond about 30". If someone could bring FEDs to market, they could snatch it from CRT/LCD/Plasma/RPTV in a heartbeat, but I wouldn't hold my breath; they have been in development since the early 1990s and even with names like Samsung behind the research, I haven't seen any products in the market. From what I read, their initial plans were for small displays for gaming. By the time they can scale up to the larger displays, I think we'll find that DLP, LCD etc. have far exceeded them. So I think it is a case of a fantastic technology that is too far behind the market curve.

[Xiltheria]

No big Deal

The 30" set is still going to be 16" deep. That's really no big deal.

[chojinjia]

I think they meant 6"

"same size as the typical stand on a flat-panel elevision". Look at the picture.

[Xiltheria]

No big Deal

The 30" set is still going to be 16" deep. That's really no big deal.

[j3st3r]

comparison is a beautiful thing

Oakies..... my 17" monitor is about 16" deep and the 20" TV is about that deep again.A rule of thumb, the traditional CRT is a cube. If these new "thin" CRT's are 16" deep for a 30" screen doesn't that mean they've shaved off nearly have the depth? Competition, whether it be other companies or technologies, is the driving force and we the consumer are the better for it. However, Ive got to agree with some of the other posts in regards to the weight issue. A 30" screen requires a lot of glass regardless of its other dimensions, so in changing the depth have the manufacturers had to thicken the rest of the tube?? Leaves me with the question, "Does being thinner, mean lighter?"
Overall I'm a fence sitter though. TFT, CRT or LCD it doesnt bother me, so long as I can watch the vision I wish to and the price suits my stretched budget.

[jgemberton]

size???

The lcd projections are around 16 inches thick for a 55 inch widescreen. That's no big deal. What interests me is the maximum size of these new CRTs and the weight difference between them and the old ones. It's nice having a 55 inch television around 100 pounds that I don't need a delivery team to move.

[mizeras]

What about power consumption?

In the computer area LCD monitors consume about one half the power of an equivalent CRT based display, generating about 1/2 of the heat needed to be removed by office airconditioning. How does this new CRT compare?

[rexworld]

But what will they weigh

How much will these things weigh, compared to a plasma?

200 pound gorilla

A 300 pound gorilla could shed 100 pounds and make the claim to be "significantly thinner", but it's still a 200 pound gorilla.

I don't want to be too close when someone tries to hang one of those "superslim CRTs" on their wall.

[markdoiron]

30", What Aspect Ratio?

it seems to me that a 30" tv with the same aspect ratio as a flat panel technology tv would be deeper than a 30" tv with the typical crt aspect ratio. i never found in the article what the aspect ratio of these tv's is. that's an important detail; far too important to "assume", or to attempt to derive from a photo of a demo crt tv turned at an awkward angle.

are these tv's identical to regular crt's in aspect ratio, are they identical to flat panel tv's, or are the mfg's gaming the system by giving us some "in between" aspect ratio that is wider than a crt, but not quite as wide as a flat panel? until i hear different, i assume the latter.

mark d.

[Freddetucson]

Two gun CRTs

For wide screen(16 X 9)CRTs why not use two 3 beam "guns"? Each would cover half the screen
an 8 X 9 area. The angles should be easier to work and the depth should be thinner that way.