First Toshiba SED TVs to have 50-inch diagonals

[Gregg Lengling]

At the recently ended Internationale Funkaustellung (IFA) 2005 show in Berlin, Toshiba provided another glimpse into its surface-conduction electron-emitter display (SED) TV technology, with the company stating the SED flat panel TV will support full HDTV resolution (1,920×1,080 pixels), while adding that the first SED panels to hit the market will have a 50-inch diagonal.

Toshiba is touting SED technology as delivering picture quality similar to that of CRT monitors, with the new technology achieving response times of under a millisecond. Like traditional CRT TVs, SED technology is based on the targeted emission of electrons. When they hit the screen, these electrons cause a phosphor-based fluorescent layer in the glass surface to light up.

However, CRTs have to make do with just a single, bundled electron beam that is then scattered horizontally and vertically at the point of contact in order to build up the picture line by line, the company explained. SEDs, on the other hand, have as many electron emitters as there are pixels on the screen. Since there is no need to scatter the electron beams, it is possible to make far bigger SED displays than would have been conceivable using CRT technology.

In addition, SED TVs have no need for a separate backlighting mechanism. Light is provided by electrons colliding with the phosphor-coated screen. As a result, picture quality no longer depends on the viewing angle and lighting is spread evenly across the whole display, the company stated. SED technology cuts the average power consumption to half of that of a PDP (plasma display panel) or two-thirds that of an LCD of comparable size, Toshiba added

Earlier this year, Kazunori Fukuma, managing director of Display Devices & Components Control Center of Toshiba stated Toshiba expects its joint venture with Canon, SED, to start shipping products to the market next March.