panel

Some salespeople still think flat-panel LCDs beat plasmas?

In a time when CNET's two top-rated HDTVs of the year are Panasonic's TH-50PZ800U and Pioneer's PDP-5020FD, we have to wonder why a salesperson would recommend flat-panel LCD HDTVs at the rate that J.D. Power and Associates claims in a recent report.

The report, which surveyed more than 2,000 shoppers on their experience in big-box electronic retailers, a specialty television retailer, a mass merchant, and a warehouse store, found that retail salespeople recommended LCDs over plasmas at a three-to-one rate.

Sure, plasmas have a long list of supposed failings: they're allegedly bulky and power hungry, and have image burn-in issues and leaks, and a short lifespan. However, most of these problems--image burn-in being the most common with early plasma sets--have been resolved on modern plasma displays.

According to the report, however, "37 percent of salespersons warned their customers that images may be permanently burned onto the screen of plasma TVs." The lifespan argument doesn't hold up either, as both LCD and plasma lifespan claims are basically the same now at 60,000 hours each. And, with LCDs still costing more at equivalent screen sizes, it's certainly convenient for retailers to promote the LCD technology over its less expensive rival.… Read more

China to pass U.S. as second-biggest flat-panel monitor market in 2011

As desktop PCs fall further out of favor in the U.S., peripheral manufacturers are having no problem picking up the slack elsewhere.

China is poised to pass the United States in just three years to become the second-largest market for flat-panel monitors, according to a report released Tuesday by DisplaySearch. DisplaySearch is a market research company that tracks the display business.

The EMEA region (which refers to Europe, the Middle East, and Africa) will continue to provide LCD monitor makers the most lucrative market, with just over 30 percent of all shipments heading there by 2011. Greater China will … Read more

Toyota plans Prius with solar panels

Toyota plans to install solar panels on the roof of the next generation of Prius hybrid cars, according to a report in Monday's edition of the Nikkei newspaper.

The panels, which are expected to begin appearing on the high-end version of the gasoline-electric hybrid car as early as next spring, will supply part of the 2 to 5 kilowatts needed to power the air conditioning, MarketWatch cited the Japanese business daily as reporting. Kyocera will reportedly supply the panels.

The move would make Toyota the first major automaker to incorporate a solar-power generation system into a mass-produced car.

Prius was introduced in 1997 … Read more

Power your Air with the sun

A new solar panel kit for the MacBook Air will both charge and power the laptop at the same time.

QuickerTek, a Wichita, Kansas-based company that sells accessories for Apple devices, calls its new portable solar power gadget the Apple Juicz MacBook Air Solar Charger.

The Juicz comes in three size and power options and has a one-year warranty, QuickerTek said Tuesday. As usual with solar energy, all that "free" power is going to cost you.

The smallest 19-watt Apple Juicz, which takes 14 hours to recharge the laptop, will sell for $500; the 8-hour, 29-watt model is $… Read more

Gadgettes 94: The Solar Episode

Lindsey's going green, pigeons! Molly and Jason never knew she was such a hippie. But she'll have a chance to explain herself on this week's solar powered episode of Gadgettes. Listen now: Download today's podcast EPISODE 94

Microinverters track solar panels via the Web http://news.cnet.com/8301-11128_3-9964732-54.html

The solar powered golf cart at Hammacher Schlemmer http://www.hammacher.com/publish/11164.asp

Floating solar farm juices up winery http://crave.cnet.com/8301-1_105-9954667-1.html

Profolio solar bag, take solar with you anywhere you need it! http://www.rewarestore.com/product/profolio.html

Artificial … Read more

Report: Tube TVs weather slowdown better than LCDs, plasmas

Tube TVs did best weathering an overall decline in television sales during the first quarter, largely due to a softening economy and a lower price point than their plasma display panel and liquid crystal display TV competitors.

Total North America TV shipments declined 34 percent in the first quarter over the previous quarter, according to recently released results from DisplaySearch, an NPD Group company. Plasmas fell by 38 percent, while LCD televisions dropped by 35 percent.

But in comparison, shipments of the old CRT (cathode ray tube) TVs slipped only 14 percent in the quarter, the study found.

"We … Read more

Top-tier TV vendors to go small as budgets tighten

The flat-panel TV industry is coming of age in the U.S. at a less-than-desirable time.

As energy costs, food prices, and mortgage defaults are on the rise, the first things to go for many consumers are luxury buys. Tightening one's budget can mean ruling out the purchase of a larger TV.

So what's an industry to do?

Give consumers more lower-priced options, according to Paul Gagnon, who monitors the television industry for DisplaySearch. He expects the top-tier TV brands (Samsung, Sony, Sharp, Panasonic, et al) to move in this direction, since TVs in smaller sizes and ones … Read more

Hitachi's 1.5-inch LCDs now available in the U.S.

If you've been eagerly awaiting the opportunity to own the thinnest flat-panel LCD TV, now's your chance.

Though already available in Asia, the 1.5-inch-thick TVs from Hitachi are now available in the U.S. The sets come in three different screen sizes, 32 inches, 37 inches, and 42 inches.

One of the secrets, by the way, of how Hitachi managed to slim down the TVs so much is that they took out the ATSC tuner. And although it is definitely the thinnest LCD TV, it's downright bloated when compared to Sony's impossibly thin OLED TV, … Read more

Pioneer picks Panasonic to make plasmas

Panasonic has been tapped to pinch-hit for Pioneer.

The two television makers said Wednesday they had come to an agreement in which Panasonic will produce the panels for Pioneer's plasma televisions.

The news comes a month after reports surfaced that Pioneer was pulling out of the plasma business. When Pioneer confirmed it would be finding someone who could make the panels more inexpensively than it could, there was a sense of dismay and disappointment among fans of its Kuro technology. Pioneer plasma TVs are generally regarded by experts--including CNET Reviews' David Katzmaier--as having the blackest black levels … Read more

Cryptographers speak of threats, voting, and Blu-Ray rumors

On Tuesday, the creators of the Diffie-Hellman key exchange, a cryptographic protocol, and two of the creators of EMC security division RSA gathered onstage for the annual cryptographers' panel at RSA 2008 in San Francisco.

First, panel members offered their perspectives on the state of security since last year, then they answered questions posed by a moderator. The panel included: Whitfield Diffie, chief security officer at Sun Microsystems; Martin Hellman, professor emeritus of electrical engineering at Stanford University; Ronald Rivest, professor of electrical engineering and computer science at MIT; and Adi Shamir, professor of computer science at the Weizmann Institute … Read more