Sony demos 19-inch FED display running Gran Turismo 5 at 240 fps

FED (or Field Emission Display) hasn't quite caught on as quickly as some other display technologies, but Sony's still out there doing its best to move things forward, and it certainly looks to have turned more than a few heads with its latest demo. Apparently not content with simply showing off a new 19-inch display from its spin-off, Field Emission Technologies, Sony went so far as to demo it with a customized version of Gran Turismo 5 Prologue that's playable at 240 fps. To do that, Sony used four PS3s to increase the frame rate, something it had previously done to run the game at quadruple the resolution of 1080p on a Sony SXHD projector. While that setup is out of the reach of most folks, Field Emission Technologies says that FED displays are now finally heading to market, and that some high-end professional FED video monitors up to 32-inches in size will be available sometime next year.

[Via OLED-Display.info]

[decapitor @ Nov 20th 2008 6:51PM]

Should I feel techie shame for never having heard of FED?

[ubn2 @ Nov 20th 2008 6:54PM]

go home your too stupid!
/sarcasm

[KAIKAI @ Nov 20th 2008 7:28PM]

well chances are you probably wont be able to afford it just yet........
so FEEL NO SHAME :)

[ubn2 @ Nov 20th 2008 8:22PM]

were you highest ranked because of my lowest raked making you look better?

[maveric101 @ Nov 20th 2008 9:05PM]

yes, if you consider yourself a real "techie."

[Jeff @ Nov 20th 2008 6:51PM]

What's the point? The eye can't really see more than 60 fps.

[Vegetable @ Nov 20th 2008 6:57PM]

Not this again.

[meist3r @ Nov 20th 2008 6:56PM]

A couple of years ago people kept saying "the human eye can't see more than 24 frames per second" now 60fps is basically standard for really advanced graphics performance. I wouldn't be surprised what this much more framerate could do for some people. Think about it, the more you see (even if subconsciously) the better you can react. Some people can do quite amazing stuff in real life (e.g. catching a flying arrow/fastball, align sights in miliseconds).

[Invisiblemoose @ Nov 20th 2008 6:57PM]

-_-

[Metkis @ Nov 20th 2008 7:00PM]

There is a visible difference between 60 FPS and 200 FPS. The refresh rate of a monitor (typically 60Hz-75Hz) limits what we can see and going beyond the refresh rate:FPS ratio is seen as unnecessary. The 60FPS myth is just that... a myth.

[FLaSHBaCK @ Nov 20th 2008 7:01PM]

@meist3r
actually they did that on mythbusters u cant catch an arrow shot at you.
but other than that i agree.

[gonintendo @ Nov 20th 2008 7:07PM]

Yes, you can catch the arrow (they brought in a ninja) but the ninja couldn't predict who was going to shoot first. Mythbusters FTW!

[thatrotierkid @ Nov 20th 2008 7:33PM]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=uLj8eK814o0

[maveric101 @ Nov 20th 2008 9:08PM]

3d applications could use this. and its like pixels: theres no such thing ad too much.

[MED @ Nov 21st 2008 3:07AM]

this section of replies made me forget what the original article was about. :P

[eatbuckshot @ Nov 21st 2008 2:44PM]

Finally, I've been waiting since LCD's became mainstream for all the companies to realize the effect of refresh rate... I don't know how that myth of "the human eye can only see 60fps" propagated... I really want to help dispel this misconception. This is what i posted in that viewsonic 120hz lcd monitor article(refuting a post that posited why gamers use crts, and that the human eye can only see 60fps):

Gamers use crt's because of their high refresh rate as well as perfect resolution scaling. Especially for Fast paced first person shooters, such as quake 3 arena cpma, or even counter-strike 1.6 the high refresh rates coupled with the high frame rates (over 100fps for quake ,100 constant for cs1.6) provide the best Scene Production(fluidity of frames), not just image quality. With vsync off, high refresh rates guarantee that you get a chance to process every frame of the 100 in that second and ensures there are minimal frame cuts. Enabling Vsync with high refresh rate will not only eliminate the problem of frame cutting, but also minimize the delay of waiting for the screen to refresh (60hz with vsync on will introduce a laggy feel, input lag some would say, but since more refresh would mean more updates of the screen per second, the delay is reduced until almost nothing once the refresh rate is very high)


No, that is not true the human eye can tell the difference. There is no such thing as "fps" to our eyes.
"The Human Eye perceives information continuously, we do not perceive the world through frames. You could say we perceive the external visual world through streams, and only lose it when our eyes blink." http://amo.net/NT/02-21-01FPS.html
It depends on a individuals conscious ability to "perceive", which requires manual processing from the brain, the world is still streaming into our eyes. There are a few special people in the world who have the ability to accurately reproduce an image from very quick motions. Normal people can still perceive high refresh rates but may not have the cognitive ability to extract single images from a motion, but they certainly can see fluidity of motion, which is what refresh rate affects.
You can in fact distinguish 60hz and 120hz or almost any refresh rate for that matter. However, it depends on what "distinguishing means" If it means to perceive every frame individually like in a slide show then around 30hz-60hz would be quick enough to allow perceived motion. (It still depends on what source the image is from, CRT's phosphor glow creates a persistence effect in the eye so that part of an image will stay long enough for the entire frame to be drawn) Distinguishing fluidity of motion, on the other hand, is much different:
The real world around us provides "infinite" fps (really though, no such thing as fps )
All our display technologies are FAR from what real life can provide.
Rendering, Recording, and Display technologies all work upon the same principle of sampling at specific intervals of time.
http://www.microsoft.com/whdc/archive/TempRate.mspx (scroll to "Flat-panel displays have a sample-and-hold characteristic")

"All of the newer display technologies such as LCD, plasma, DLP, and so on, have essentially a sample-and-hold characteristic. When a pixel is addressed, it is loaded with a value and stays at that light output value until it is next addressed. From an image portrayal point of view, this is the wrong thing to do. The sample of the original scene is ONLY VALID FOR AN INSTANT IN TIME. After that instant, the objects in the scene will have moved to DIFFERENT places. It is not valid to try to hold the images of the objects at a fixed position until the next sample comes along that portrays the object as having instantly jumped to a completely different place.

Your eye tracking will be trying to smoothly follow the movement of the object of interest and the display will be holding it in a fixed position for the whole frame. The result will inevitably be a blurred image of the moving object."

"Leaving aside the temporal rate conversion difficulties, displays with a sample-and-hold characteristic, such as LCD and plasma, would PRODUCE BETTER MOTION PORTRAYAL if operated at rates ABOVE 60Hz. Flat panels are normally run at 60Hz, because it is PERCEIVED that this is all you need to do since there is no flicker problem. The REALITY is that a faster update rate would be beneficial in order to reduce the blurring effect associated with the sample-and-hold characteristic. Pixels with a sample-and-hold characteristic effectively extend what should have been an instantaneous sample into a constant value that lasts for a whole frame. The result of this is motion smearing. This smearing is reduced if you can update the sample and hold circuits more often with new sample values."

The problem is that real life gives us infinite fps so only by approaching infinite fps or a very very high fps can realistic perceived motion be achieved. Sure at 60 fps we can see that it's motion but compared to 120 fps, it's much less smooth.

Oh and while i'm at it, response time:
Most of the manufacture quoted response times are false, I don't feel like getting into that but the only review website that reviews monitors scientifically by measuring response times is xbitlabs.
They also measure real contrast ratios,brightness, color gamuts and backlight uniformity.
As for response time I am amazed that it can vary so differently depending on what grays are changing to what other grays.. namely somewhere around 256 different response times.. check it out..
http://www.xbitlabs.com/articles/monitors/display/19inch-12_2.html

Just to note:
I also am very glad that my laptops can be set way over 60hz. Thank you LVDS Signaling! I enjoy the smoothest video from my games.
the way laptops interface with the monitor allows manual configuration of timings unlike Desktop monitors which are already using a lcd controller that interfaces with DVI to your graphics card. Subsequently, it will not allow as much flexibility (>75hz refresh rate)
It seems that it works with most modern laptops with nvidia graphics cards, some ati if you use powerstrip
Toshiba satellite 1805-s254 xga 13.3" Trident Cyberblade xp Ai1: 94.8hz @ 1024x768
Toshiba Tecra m3 xga 14.1" geforce go 6200-6600: 100hz @ 1024x768 (more introduces occasional sync loss that causes "flickering")
Asus V6J sxga+ 15.1" geforce go 7400: 100hz @ 1400x1050 (can handle up to ~150hz but with major color distortion)
IBM thinkpad T61p nvidia quadro 570m sxga+ 14.1": 150 @ 1400x1050 (At this refresh rate, there are very very feint yellow lines on very dark colors, black etc)
google for "100 hz refresh rate v6j" first link.

this 120hz from these tv manufacturers are getting on my nerves.. i want my real refresh rate..

[KIFF @ Nov 20th 2008 6:54PM]

Wow, just wow.

[Matthew Hilario @ Nov 20th 2008 7:36PM]

Not just WoW! but gran turismo too!

[ED @ Nov 20th 2008 8:02PM]

Not just Gran Turismo two, but Gran Turismo 5!

[narutogrey @ Nov 20th 2008 9:19PM]

Not the butts of Gran Turismo 5, but the Prologue.

[sinai @ Nov 20th 2008 6:56PM]

what the hell is the point of this? i can play solitaire at 3000000000000 fps, big deal.

[DWells55 @ Nov 20th 2008 7:18PM]

But you don't have any device capable of refreshing that fast, so have fun with your horizontal tearing.

[Alex @ Nov 20th 2008 7:50PM]

Well the great thing about FED (or SED) is it should be a real successor to the CRT, unlike LCD and Plasma. I'm glad to see I may be able to get a real replacement for my GDM-F520 in the next few years.

[Fusion Fuzo 05 - Proffessional @ Nov 20th 2008 6:57PM]

NICE

[Chris @ Nov 20th 2008 6:59PM]

Where's a video, I'd like to see 4 ps3's playing 4x 1080p

[patriotsn1 @ Nov 20th 2008 7:38PM]

Wouldn't your computer have to be able to display 240 fps for a video to help you realize what is going on?

[Paul Fehr @ Nov 20th 2008 9:56PM]

patriotsn1:
I'd think the camera filming would have to be able to film at 240FPS as well.

[AJR @ Nov 20th 2008 7:01PM]

and how much will products cost with this technology?

[iEye @ Nov 20th 2008 7:37PM]

its Free...

just tell them iEye sent you.

[ubn2 @ Nov 20th 2008 8:26PM]

holy shit iEye works at sony!

[who_the @ Nov 20th 2008 7:03PM]

This is all well and good, until your TV "springs a leak" and goes bye-bye. Unfortunately, attaining the kind of long-lasting vacuum seal required by these FEDs is difficult to do in consumer applications subject to vibration and potentially large variations in operating temperature.

[spiffmds @ Nov 20th 2008 9:44PM]

CRTs rely on basically the same principle (shooting electrons at a phosphor coated screen). Think of FED as CRT, only with an electron gun (or many redundant electron guns) for each pixel. So, since that 10 year old CRT sitting in my living room has been holding a vacuum just fine, I don't think the vacuum issue is a problem for FEDs.

[who_the @ Nov 22nd 2008 12:01AM]

Actually, FED's require a much higher vacuum seal than your CRT display, and also use much higher voltage, which means that spare oxygen (and other) molecules are ionized by the beam and degrade the phosphor. Though the technology is similar, it's not valid to compare things like manufacturing tolerances and operating constraints. They are two completely different worlds.

[)law( @ Nov 20th 2008 7:05PM]

Wow thats smooth, its almost mind blowing.

[rento @ Nov 20th 2008 7:11PM]

In other news the FEDs bailout Sony.

[The Dude @ Nov 20th 2008 8:05PM]

I see what you did there.

[Game_playa @ Nov 20th 2008 9:04PM]

I also see what you did there

[ubn2 @ Nov 21st 2008 1:33AM]

ewww I cant stand your avatar...even if it is photoshoped.

[Labrador @ Nov 20th 2008 7:13PM]

One good use for 240Hz would be head ache less 3D. In combination with a cheap pair of shutterglasses this beauty would give each eye 120 HD frames per second.

[Nihility @ Nov 21st 2008 9:52AM]

You would still need shutter glasses capable of doing 120 blinks per second.

[Jeff @ Nov 20th 2008 7:13PM]

http://letmegooglethatforyou.com/?q=4+ps3%27s+playing+4x+1080p

http://www.gran-turismo.com/en/sp/d2788.html

[Duncan Beevers @ Nov 20th 2008 7:30PM]

Now I just need 4 ps3s.

[iEye @ Nov 20th 2008 7:40PM]

Buy them, conduct your little experiments then return them to be sold as open boxed items at 5% discount, examined by skilled techs at Best Buy...

[ubn2 @ Nov 20th 2008 8:28PM]

@ iEye
lol skilled techincians at best buy.

[anthony @ Nov 20th 2008 7:27PM]

are those WIRED PS3 controllers? a rare and beautiful sight of two wild beasts chained by 90's technology. a shame.....

[Game_playa @ Nov 20th 2008 8:05PM]

Retard, those are Metal chains, so pricks like you wont steal it.

[anthony @ Nov 20th 2008 8:15PM]

uh, i don't see anything metal or chainy about those cables. most definitely wired. you think they just have the controller feeding controls to all four systems? that just isnt practical, especially at a tech demo.

[phanbouy fan fan @ Nov 20th 2008 8:17PM]

game playa's just bitter that his grandma still feeds him through a food chute connecting the kitchen with the basement

[anantha92 @ Nov 21st 2008 3:28AM]

Its the USB cable used for charging geniuses.

[bluesky_v2.01 @ Nov 20th 2008 7:26PM]

Can someone explain this to me please? As far as I know, human eye can only see 24 frames per second, so what is the point of having a game run at 240 fps, or even 60 fps for that matter? I'm not saying these people are wrong, just the opposite . . I wanna find out why this works.