World Gone Mad
“I’m of the age where we didn’t have television as kids. So when I saw my nieces and nephews watching Howdy Doody (1947), Kukla Fran and Ollie (1948), and so forth, I thought the world had gone mad” – Jack Nicholson.
Buffalo Bob & Howdy Doody (1947)
Kukla, Fran & Ollie (1948)
It seems that Mr. Nicholson was right, and with the announcement that LG Electronics (066570.KS) made yesterday, it seems we have delved even further into that madness. LG announced that it was releasing its first DVLED (Direct View LED) ‘Extreme Home Cinema’ designed for high-end residential installations ‘based on the company’s years of building premium consumer electronics, keen understanding of affluent consumers, and deep expertise as an innovator of DVLED technologies.’ While ‘DVLED’ is LGE’s wording, it seems that this line is really an expansion of LGE’s Micro-LED products, which have been available to commercial rather than residential customers and would compete with a similar product from Samsung Electronics.
The difference between the LG system and the Samsung system is primarily size, and while both systems are modular and therefore can be custom designed, Samsung’s “The Wall” Micro-LED system taps out at a mere 292 inches (diagonal) while the LG system can be configured to a mind-boggling 325”. Using a 9:16 aspect ratio, the Samsung system would come to a display size of 9.9’ x 17.6’, or 25,027 in2, while the LG system comes to 13.25’ x 23.6’ or 45,136 in2 or 80.3% larger. Even the smallest LG DVLED system which is a tiny 81”, can be configured as 2K, 4K, or 8K and even at 8K the LEDs are above 100um in size, which means both systems are not true Micro-LED products, especially as the LEDs can increase in size as the display gets larger, but they are still very expensive to produce, with the 81” 2K model costing ~$70,000 while the top of the line 325” 8K model clocks in at $1.7m, quite a bit for a home TV.
Aside from the promises of ‘exceptional brightness, years of residential lifespan, incredible viewing angles, and very high color gamut’, the organization in LG that is responsible for such systems (you cannot buy them at any store) not only includes installation from an LG field engineer and twice yearly ‘health check’ visits for three years along with a 3 year limited warranty, which LG estimates is worth ~$30,000 all told, but only applies to those not buying one of the 30 pre-configured packages. LG goes as far as to explain that the high-end nature of the product is such that they do not ship the components in boxes or wood crates but only in LG branded flight cases, and while the Samsung system allows for multi-window viewing, meaning the display can break the display image into 8 segments, each with a different source, the LG system can window up to 20 sources, allowing the owner to watch multiple games at once while still keeping an eye on the baby and the front door. If the baby wakes up from all the noise, just bring him/her in a put him/her next to a corner of the screen and put that screen segment on “Pete the Cat”!
Of course, the realities of these systems are such that only a rarefied few can afford the luxury of having such an entertainment devices but if even a few such systems are sold, it will continue to incentivize TV set producers to continue the development of Micro-LED technology and the costs will begin to decline. We have covered many of the issues surrounding the ‘real’ commercialization of Micro-LED technology, and we would sure like to try the new systems, even for just a few days (weeks?), but in the long run we are still happy with the 55” TVs we have that seemed so large a year ago and now seem, well, a bit small….
The difference between the LG system and the Samsung system is primarily size, and while both systems are modular and therefore can be custom designed, Samsung’s “The Wall” Micro-LED system taps out at a mere 292 inches (diagonal) while the LG system can be configured to a mind-boggling 325”. Using a 9:16 aspect ratio, the Samsung system would come to a display size of 9.9’ x 17.6’, or 25,027 in2, while the LG system comes to 13.25’ x 23.6’ or 45,136 in2 or 80.3% larger. Even the smallest LG DVLED system which is a tiny 81”, can be configured as 2K, 4K, or 8K and even at 8K the LEDs are above 100um in size, which means both systems are not true Micro-LED products, especially as the LEDs can increase in size as the display gets larger, but they are still very expensive to produce, with the 81” 2K model costing ~$70,000 while the top of the line 325” 8K model clocks in at $1.7m, quite a bit for a home TV.
Aside from the promises of ‘exceptional brightness, years of residential lifespan, incredible viewing angles, and very high color gamut’, the organization in LG that is responsible for such systems (you cannot buy them at any store) not only includes installation from an LG field engineer and twice yearly ‘health check’ visits for three years along with a 3 year limited warranty, which LG estimates is worth ~$30,000 all told, but only applies to those not buying one of the 30 pre-configured packages. LG goes as far as to explain that the high-end nature of the product is such that they do not ship the components in boxes or wood crates but only in LG branded flight cases, and while the Samsung system allows for multi-window viewing, meaning the display can break the display image into 8 segments, each with a different source, the LG system can window up to 20 sources, allowing the owner to watch multiple games at once while still keeping an eye on the baby and the front door. If the baby wakes up from all the noise, just bring him/her in a put him/her next to a corner of the screen and put that screen segment on “Pete the Cat”!
Of course, the realities of these systems are such that only a rarefied few can afford the luxury of having such an entertainment devices but if even a few such systems are sold, it will continue to incentivize TV set producers to continue the development of Micro-LED technology and the costs will begin to decline. We have covered many of the issues surrounding the ‘real’ commercialization of Micro-LED technology, and we would sure like to try the new systems, even for just a few days (weeks?), but in the long run we are still happy with the 55” TVs we have that seemed so large a year ago and now seem, well, a bit small….
LG Electronics DVLED Extreme Home Cinema - Source: LG Electronics
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