The Wonderful World of LEDs

Planar has published a new eBook on LED Technology for AMLCD Backlights. The latest eBook is now available to download.

LCD, LED, backlights... All the same terms which are familiar to industrial display projects and display professionals are becoming familiar to the home TV users as well. Have a look at Sony's "TV lecture", I'd say the content is more interesting to display professionals rather than someone looking to get the best possible viewing experience at home... Well, judge for yourself from this 10-minute clip posted by sonylearntv.

To be fair to the different brands, here's also Samsung's input to the LED TV discussion. It's a TV ad for the Samsung's new LED TV, so more marketing orientated than the Sony clip. You've been warned!

When talking about LEDs, I cannot resist adding the clip by BaaaStuds as the grande finale to this short end-of-the-year blog post. Especially, if you are spending this week on holiday and STILL reading this blog, you've deserved a bit of entertainment.

On behalf of our entire team: thank you for reading Planar blogs in 2009 and all the best wishes for the New Year 2010!!!

Electroluminescent Displays at the Smithsonian Air and Space Museum

The electroluminescent (EL) display that was used in the GRID Compass 1101 laptop on the space shuttle in 1985 has made history again. The GRID laptop, one of the first laptops on the market, is on display in the Smithsonian Air & Space Museum.

In a previous blog post, you can see an image of the laptop with the EL display on board the space shuttle. EL technology has made continual and dramatic improvements, but you'd have to say that a display that can withstand g-force environments is an ideal solution for the most challenging and demanding applications.

Planar's EL displays have significantly improved over the past 25 years. Besides improved display brightness and contrast, improvements have been made to reduce power consumption and improve enhanced shock and vibration resistence.

What project do you have that would benefit from an EL display?

LCD Displays and the Future of Touch

The researchers at MIT's Media Lab have been working on a thin LCD display design that is touch and gesture friendly, much like your iPhone. Despite the fact they've already developed a large -scale gestural interface like the system that Tom Cruise's character uses in the movie Minority Report, the goal is to be able to incorporate the gestural display into a thin LCD device without wearing gloves or any type of tracking tags.


LCDs with built-in optical sensors are new to the market and Media Lab hasn't been able to procure any yet, so they are experimenting with a mocked up display in their lab to test their approach. The LCD display includes an array of optical sensors right behind it and serves as lens to display a black-and-white pattern that lets light through to the sensors. On Dec 19 at Siggraph Asia, the MIT team is presenting the first application of its work, a display that lets users manipulate on-screen images using hand gestures.


Customized LCD displays can be used in a multitude of other applications, too. Planar's use of an ultra-thin digital signage display provides premium performance by using LED backlighting. If your display specifications require more brightness and less wattage, Planar's in-house design and manufacturing capability enables performance advances in TFT display technology. Or, if you have some questions about selecting a custom LCD display, Planar offers some answers in its ebook and provides a guide to help navigate your display project requirements.


How would you use gesturing or touch for your display project?

Oudoor Kiosks...A Sign of the Times

Outdoor kiosks are seen everywhere from Times Square to sporting event venues to airport terminals across the country, not to mention the increase in products offered for purchase from these point of purchase kiosks. Displays that are rugged enough to be used in high traffic environments like this offer a perfect solution to present an assortment of information and services including purchasing products, providing directions, displaying advertisements and offering news.

Just take a run through any airport in the U.S. and you'll see kiosks that allow you to buy and print your ticket and/or boarding pass, plus buy an assortment of products ranging from electronic devices to video and music rentals. The point of purchase option provided by kiosks is well on its way to becoming a mainstay for buyers.

Recently, an article written from a New Yorkers' viewpoint addressed this phenomonon of purchasing trends. Can we be nearing the day when all or the majority of our purchases can be made at a kiosk?

What did you recently purchase from a kiosk?

Ultra-Thin Bezel LCD Video Wall System

Have you seen the latest series of giant video walls popping up in retail environments across the country? Some are better than others, for sure. One recently launched product standing out though is the Clarity Matrix LCD Video Wall.

The cool feature with this video wall has to be the ultra-thin bezel that provides awesome tiled visual performance. Just think what it's like to view a bunch of video wall panels with thick bezels breaking the visual flow. Now, think of viewing a wall of panels that look seemless. You get the picture!

Clarity Matrix utilizes commercial-grade 46" LCD panels with breakthrough narrow-bezel characteristics resulting in just a 7.3mm pixel-to-pixel gap between images. Now that's thin! And, it's easy to mount, too.

Let us know where you've seen a video wall recently.