Liquid crystal lasers will light up next-gen HDTVs, your life

If you thought Mitsubishi's LaserVue HDTVs were the beginning and the end of laser-tech in boob tubes, think again. Mitsu's line is carrying on, but the brightness and depth of color offered by that telly are apparently just the beginning of what's possible according to researchers at the Centre of Molecular Materials for Photonics and Electronics at the University of Cambridge. They indicate that the use of liquid crystals in concert with a single, laser-based light source would result in the same color depth but at a lower cost and higher reliability than the LaserVue, which requires separate lasers for RGB. What cost, exactly? That, dear reader, remains to be seen, but given the source we're thinking you have plenty of time to save up -- and to practice those Dr. Evil impressions.

[Via OLED-Display]

[superhobo Posted Apr 21st 2009 7:04AM]

Good good, but it's OLED's time to shine.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 21st 2009 12:32PM]

Agreed.

As for cost - they mean it will be cheaper to PRODUCE. These savings will not be passed on to customers (it's called profit, markup, and to some price-gouging)

[chaos215bar2 Posted Apr 21st 2009 8:43AM]

What am I missing? Lasers are monochromatic. How do you get RGB from a single laser?

[SiXiam Posted Apr 21st 2009 9:30AM]

My best guess is that these crystals somehow alter the wavelength of light.

You would start out with a laser of the highest energy out of RGB: blue, which would then be used directly for blue, then the crystal would change it to green, then red, the least energetic of the three spectra.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 21st 2009 11:19AM]

Well, since green and blue laser diodes are created from lower frequency light using DPSSFD, it's more probable that the LCDs act as the frequency doubler crystals for lower frequency light. Since the green and blue lasers in a TV would each require a source and a frequency doubler crystal, they are (probably) using one low frequency source.

So there are 2 fewer sources, but you still need the frequency doubler crystals for blue and green, and they still need to be focused just right to avoid convergence issues.

[mattcoz Posted Apr 21st 2009 11:43AM]

The same way liquid crystals create color from a monochromatic backlight.

[(Unverified) Posted Apr 21st 2009 9:11PM]

LCD back lights are not monochromatic, they are made up of a wide spectrum that when mixed we perceive as white light.

[RupanIII Posted Apr 21st 2009 9:53AM]

Hmmm.... a single scanning excitable emitter addressing successive lines of pixels in a single pass...
Sounds like CRT.

[golfnz34me Posted Apr 21st 2009 9:48AM]

But have they solved the problem yet of how to attach these to the tops of the shark's head, yet?

[kobioshi Posted Apr 21st 2009 10:09AM]

Beat me to it! History and tech repeats itself I guess... I mean come on we are reverting back to BNC networking infrastructure for heavens sake! http://www.engadget.com/2009/04/20/d-link-finally-ships-the-dxn-221-coax-ethernet-adapter/