Mitsubishi is to show of a new Laser TV at the 2008 Consumer Electronics Show (CES). The company's vice president for marketing revealed the news in an interview with the New York Times .
"It will spawn a new category for the premium end of the market," Frank DeMartin said.
Laser TVs use lasers instead of UHP lamps which are traditionally used in rear projection displays. The laser produces precise, undiluted colours meaning that the televisions can produce very high quality pictures.
They are also said to be much cheaper to manufacture than current plasma and LCD televisions. They weigh half as much too, use 25 per cent less power and have a longer lifespan.
Will Laser TVs take off?
Chris Chinnock, president of market research firm Insight Media , said that lasers can produce an even wider range of colours than LEDs. "The lasers produce extremely saturated colours - the red is very red.
"In contrast, the red in many displays has a lot of orange in it. Because of that limitation, it is harder to show the range of shades that the eye can see, for example, between red and orange.
"You can create some different architectures in how the light is folded and managed inside the TV. So you could potentially get a rear-projection laser TV that's 6 to 8 inches deep."
It was widely expected that laser TV would appear at CES 2007 and hit the shelves sometime before Christmas. Sadly that didn't happen, so it looks like 4-8 January 2008 could be when the flatscreen market TV takes another turn.
