SpongBo has written a number of posts about his search for the ultimate LCD TV. He finally bought the Sony Bravia. Good for him. He tells me that he enjoys his new TV.

I have news that will end all that.

At CES 2006, Toshiba unveiled working prototypes of their new SED (Surface-conduction Electron-emitter Display) televisions. Toshiba reckons that they will have the first SED TV’s in shops before the end of the year. Why would you want a SED? Ask IGN:

So how does it all work? SED sets use 6,220,800 electron emitters – or one for each color per pixel, to be precise – which cause red, blue and green phosphors to glow. That may not mean much to most, but the results will definitely matter. Toshiba’s CES 2006 SED sets featured the deepest black levels we have ever seen on any television, including CRT – and these televisions are as flat as any plasma! Consider this: the typical plasma set sports a contrast ratio of 3000:1, but Toshiba’s prototype SEDs offer a whopping 10,000:1 contrast ratio for truly unparallelled color and accuracy.

This sounds pretty good, the contrast is three times as good as a plasma. But these are prototypes, Toshiba promises that the final shipping SED’s will have 100,000:1 contrast! Apparently they are cheaper to mass-produce than LCD or plasma. Compelling.

For pics: http://gear.ign.com/articles/679/679235p1.html

pinkjoint, shifty, SED, TV, LCD, Plasma, ces 2006