Mitsubishi Laser TV Unveiled at CES

• January 8th, 2008 | HDTV

In case you missed yesterday’s post, CES 2008 is here and Mitsubishi has joined Westinghouse and a stack of other companies unveiling their newest TVs at this huge electronics event.   The catch here is that Mitsubishi hasn’t announced their new line of LCD TVs.  Nor have they announced any new HD TVs.  No plasma TVs or flat panel TVs or even old school CRT TVs are they talking about.  Nope, they’ve unveiled a whole new kind of Television–it’s called Laser TV.  The funny thing about it is that it’s not actually all new.  In fact, some of the technology that goes into Mitsubishi Laser TV might sound pretty old fashioned to most of you TV Ninjas out there.

For starters, it’s technically a rear projection screen TV.  Another oldie-but-goody in the Laser TV’s tech department is the Texas Instruments DLP chip that has held the standard for quality video projection for years.  However (and it’s a big however), both of these technologies used to use very old-fashioned light bulbs as their light sources (and later bright white mercury lamps).  Sure, bright lamps could provide a great picture, but these new Laser TVs replace those old bulbs with semiconductor lasers.  These red, green and blue lasers are said to be able to create much more vivid colors, higher contrasts and better pictures inHD resolutions.

Yep, that’s right–the Laser TV is an HDTV, too.  So, it’ll be able to pump out 1080p.  The truly weird thing about these Laser TVs is that despite these babies being “rear projection” TVs, because the light source is three lasers, the thickness of the TV is surprisingly minimal–in other words, it’s not a thick TV.  While it won’t be as thin as your average LCD TV, it will be a great deal lighter because the LCD screen is so heavy on it’s own.  The LaserTV’s screen isn’t a giant glass-and-LCD panel.  Along with the weight improvements, you’ll also see Laser TVs that have almost no bezel–just the tiniest of frames for the screens on these TVs.   This maximizes screen size without minimizing your shelf space.

Laser TVs are reportedly to be available later on in 2008.