Panasonic IPS-Alpha LCD Panel Technology

A quick overview of the panel technologies

Viewing angles on TN are substantially worse, particularly vertical viewing angles, and all TN LCD panels are natively 6-bit panels that use dithering to approximate 8-bit color. Most people won’t notice the difference in color accuracy, but imaging professionals would definitely prefer something better. The advantage of TN panels is that input lag is not a problem. Response times are usually lower on paper, but again it’s difficult to actually see the difference between a 2ms panel and a 6ms panel, especially when the display refreshes every 17ms (60 Hz refresh rate).

PVA and IPS are basically the exact opposite of TN: great viewing angles, very good color reproduction, and true 8-bit colors. However, pixel response times are a little lower (it’s not something that has ever bothered us). The big problem on the S-PVA panels are input lag, ranging from as low as 20ms up to nearly 50ms. However, S-IPS panels (example of S-IPS brand LCD TV is Panasonic Viera) don’t seem to have a problem with input lag.

Viewing Angle Comparison Chart Released By Sharp

A less common panel type is MVA, which in practice is similar to PVA but seems to perform better in regards to input lag. Color quality and other aspects are also good, but pricing and availability is a concern.

Frequently, the choice will come down to getting something larger with a cheaper TN panel versus getting a smaller LCD with a PVA/IPS panel. Even among the same panel technology, however, there are wide variations in quality. Most LCD panels are manufactured by one of only a few companies (Taiwan Chung Hwa Picture Tubes, Chi Mei Optoelectronics), but similar to processors these panels are “binned” based on quality. Bottom line, you get what you pay for! If you’re wondering why LCD A seems to have the same specifications as LCD B but costs significantly less, it’s very likely that the panel doesn’t meet the same quality standards. Color uniformity is one of the big differences between various LCD panels, with the best panels often ending up in displays that cost twice as much as LCDs that are otherwise equal in terms of specs.

Funai
Funai might not be a household name because it’s the brand behind other brands, mainly lower-priced labels such as Emerson, Sylvania, and Symphonic, that tend to be sold at mass-market stores, such as Wal-Mart. Funai recently acquired the rights to two longtime TV brands, Philips and Magnavox, in the U.S. and Canada (Philips will no longer be making and selling its own sets here). It’s possible that Funai will use those brands, particularly Philips, to gain entry into retailers that don’t carry its other brands.

Haier
Established in America in year 1999. Today, it a tier one brand that competitive with Panasonic, LG and Samsung for electrical appliances. Their LCD TV products range from low-end to high-end for all sizes.

Hewlett-Packard
After forays into rear-projection and plasma, Hewlett-Packard—often known as HP—now sells LCD TVs exclusively. Leveraging its PC heritage, the company is in the forefront of TV interactivity, offering models with MediaPC capability and Internet connectivity.

Hitachi
Hitachi, at one time a leading rear-projection TV manufacturer, now focuses exclusively on flat-panel HDTVs. The company has been strong in plasmas, sometimes offering unusual sizes (such as a 55-inch screen) and resolutions (1024×1080). It previously had a limited LCD line, but it is making a strong push into LCDs with a line of ultra-thin 1.5-inch-deep LCD TVs.

Insignia
Insignia, Best Buy’s electronics house brand for LCD TV and Plasma TV, is exclusively sold by the retailer. Insignia TVs, which are made overseas by contract manufacturers, are positioned as a “value” line offering more features for the price than better-known makes.

JVC
The company’s LCD sets are typically positioned in the mid-to-upper price range. JVC recently signed a deal with Funai to jointly develop and produce LCD TVs. It recently exited the LCoS rear-projector microdisplay business, but continues to make LCoS-based front projectors for the consumer and professional markets. JVC is in the process of merging with Kenwood, a consumer electronics company known largely for car audio products.

LG Electronics
LG is a growing force in the plasma and LCD categories, remember the Scarlet line? Often, the company offers the largest screen sizes available for each type. The company’s newer TVs have had a strong design focus. LG sets typically sell in the mid- and upper price brackets.

Mitsubishi
In LCD TV, Mitsubishi is positioning its sets as a premium line with step-up features (all models are 120Hz, 1080p sets, for example) and ultra-slim bezels for select dealers. The company’s flagship line is the Diamond series. Mitsubishi is one of two major brands (the other is Samsung) still actively selling rear-projection micro-display (DLP) TVs. It is promoting models with 3D technology, and this year will introduce the first set (dubbed Laser Vue) using a laser as a backlight. In the front projector market, it has competitively priced 3LCD-based high-definition (720p and 1080p) models.

Olevia
Olevia, previously named Syntax-Brillian, recently sold its LCoS rear-projection TV business to focus on LCD TV market. It has three distinct lines of LCD TVs: very basic sets value-priced compared with the competition, a step-up series line, and a flagship series that includes additional features.

Panasonic
Panasonic is the market leader in plasma TVs (Panasonic is major plasma TV manufacturer), with an extensive line of sets ranging from 37 inches to 58 inches. Plasma sets are usually competitively priced and are widely available, including at CostCo. The company is also expanding its assortment of LCD TVs this year. Its apparent strategy is to offer LCDs in smaller (37 inches or less) screen sizes that won’t compete with its plasma TV lines. Panasonic is getting out of the rear-projection market, selling off its existing inventory, to focus primarily on flat-panel TVs, which carry the Viera brand. It also sells 3LCD front projectors.

Philips
Philips, which exited the plasma business to focus on LCD models, recently announced that it will be licensing its Philips and Magnavox brands to Funai for use in the U.S. and Canadian markets. As a result, Philips- and Magnavox-brand LCD TVs will be made and sold by Funai, which also controls the Emerson, Sylvania, and Symphonic brands. Philips had used the Magnavox brand for its entry-level products aimed at mass-market retailers.

Pioneer
Plasma stalwart Pioneer has consistently targeted consumers willing to pay more for a “prestige” label, particularly with its higher-priced Elite-brand series. The company offers a line of performance-oriented Kuro plasmas, which are typically priced much higher than its competition. The company recently announced that it would no longer make its own plasma panels but would instead source them from Panasonic (though it will continue to apply its other proprietary technologies to the TVs). In addition, a recent investment in the company by Sharp could result in the first Pioneer-branded LCDs.

Polaroid
Polaroid is a value brand that is often among the lowest-priced sets of its type and size. Polaroid’s TV presence in the U.S. has expanded thanks to increased shelf space at Circuit City and Wal-Mart. Polaroid TVs are made overseas, primarily in China and Taiwan, by contract manufacturers. The Polaroid brand was acquired in 2005 by a former U.S. licensee, Petters Group, which had previously used the brand for TVs and DVD players.

Samsung
Samsung is a top-tier manufacturer in every category in which it participates, and is one of two major brands—the other is Mitsubishi—still making rear-projection microdisplay (DLP) HDTVs. Samsung is often an innovator, as with its use of LED backlighting in rear-projection and LCD TVs, and 3D capability in rear-projection and plasma TVs. Samsung has value-priced and premium lines.

Sanyo
Sanyo’s focus is largely on LCDs TVs and front projectors, though it still has one plasma model. Its flat-panel TVs are sold primarily through Wal-Mart, typically at lower prices than sets from first-tier manufacturers. In front projectors, the company’s 3LCD models compete with entry-level HD models from companies such as Epson, Panasonic, and Optoma.

Sharp
Sharp is a force in LCDs and has been at it longer than almost any other manufacturer. The company sells its TVs under the Aquos brand. It has one of the most advanced LCD panel manufacturing plants in the world and is often an innovator. Like many other major brands, its lines are segmented into several different series. Some of Sharp’s biggest, most innovative sets are pricey; others are competitively priced. The company recently took a stake in Pioneer; the benefits to Sharp are likely to be audio related.

Sony
Sony is a powerhouse LCD TV manufacturer with one of the most extensive product lines of LCD sets, which are sold under the Bravia name. There are several distinct Bravia lines with varying levels of features and quality; most are mid- to high-priced, and its flagship XBR-series models are generally the most expensive of their type. Sony recently started offering a low-priced line for mass merchants such as Target and Wal-Mart. Sony has exited the rear-projection microdisplay business (LCoS), but continues to make front projectors for the consumer and professional markets.

Toshiba
Toshiba, which sells LCDs under the Regza label, has some sets that emphasize value, with features comparable to those of other major brands, but generally at lower prices. Its Cinema Series models are higher priced and loaded with features. The company, which makes LCD TVs in a large range of sizes, has a new line with very thin bezels, allowing a larger screen size to be used in a smaller physical space.

Vizio
From its humble start just a few years ago as a warehouse-only brand, Vizio has emerged to become a top-tier TV brand whose sets are now also available in Wal-Mart and in some Circuit City and Sears stores. Vizio TVs, which are made overseas by contract manufacturers, are generally sold at very low prices compared with more established names, but the company has announced some new models that will carry higher prices and some step-up features.

Westinghouse
Westinghouse Digital, which licensed the venerable brand from Westinghouse Electric, has emerged as a lower-priced alternative to more established LCD brands. It has typically been among the first to offer step-up features such as 1080p resolution at lower prices than its competitors.

Hiroshi Take, one of the managers of Sharp Corp.’s latest and most advanced television factory, beams like a proud father. The gleaming white $1.4 billion Kameyama factory, 260 miles southwest of Tokyo, came online in year 2004 and is cranking out thousands of Sharp’s hot-selling large-screen flat-panel Aquos TVs per month.

Sharp got its flat-screen focus from Katsuhiko Machida, the company’s president, who for years fretted that his outfit was doomed to be a second-tier player. When he ran Sharp’s television business in the 1980s, Machida says, the firm had trouble competing because it didn’t manufacture the most important TV component, the cathode-ray tube. Forced to cobble together parts bought from competitors, Sharp was little more than an assembler, cranking out sets that were always a little too expensive and a little too poorly engineered to attract many customers. It was a dispiriting struggle, says Machida, but it taught him an ironclad belief that is now axiomatic throughout the company: “If you are in electronics and you are not strong in TVs, your business and your brand will suffer.”

When Machida became president in 1998, he wasted no time acting on his theory. Sharp, he knew, had long excelled at developing products featuring liquid-crystal displays (LCDs). It released the first mass-market LCD calculator in 1973, developed its first flat-panel LCD TV in 1987 and dabbled in LCD televisions throughout the 1990s. Building on that foundation, Machida moved LCD TVs to the forefront of Sharp’s strategy. He spent heavily over three years on the design, manufacture and marketing of a new flagship TV brand dubbed Aquos, and his bet paid off. Launched in January 2001–a moment referred to inside the company as the Big Bang–Aquos quickly became the coolest name in TVs since the Sony Trinitron. Sharp is now the world’s biggest seller of LCD televisions, accounting for 1 in 4 of all LCD sets sold.

Sharp AQUOS LCD Televisions

Wow, from the bold statement above, I can say that Sharp captured more than 25% of LCD televisions market share worldwide. Anyway, right now, Sharp is the only company that produce own LCD panel, LCD TV and has it own intellectual property on LCD technology that remain solo in LCD televisions fierce war.

Even in his core business of manufacturing LCDs, Machida is playing to Sharp’s strengths and avoiding margin-killing commodity products. Taking on Goliaths like LG Electronics and Samsung Electronics across every LCD product line would be foolish, he says. They’re dominant, for example, in mass-market LCD panels used in smaller, cheaper TVs and in laptops. Rather than engage them in a murderous price war, Sharp concentrates almost exclusively on ever larger TVs or on small, high-quality panels found in cell phones, car navigation systems and handheld game players like Sony’s PSP and Nintendo’s DS. That tactic has enabled Sharp to withstand the margin pressure that’s ravaging its rivals.

Right next door to the Kameyama plant that opened last year, Sharp is building a larger, more advanced plant, costing another $1.4 billion, that is scheduled to open in 2006. But Sharp’s competitors are also building furiously. In a joint venture, LG Electronics and Royal Philips Electronics are spending $5.1 billion to create the world’s largest plant for LCDs. Sony, whose lack of flat-screen capacity has been a huge disadvantage, is teaming with Samsung in a $2 billion LCD venture. Hitachi, Toshiba and Matsushita have similarly joined forces. In the U.S., computer maker Dell is getting into the flat-panel game. However, Sharp is happy to go it alone, hoping that it’s strong enough technologically to maintain a leadership position without a partner.

Sharp Kameyama LCD Televisions Plant

Source of article above from Time’s Sharp’s New Focus (www.time.com/time/magazine/article/0,9171,1106322-1,00.html)