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With ever increasing steps in innovations and design, current technologies are expected to receive boosts that will not only enhance current functionalities, but totally revolutionise their sphere of operations.
Reviewed here are two cutting-edge technologies currently being designed and manufactured by Sony Corporation, one of the world’s leading manufacturer and designer outfit.
X-Technology: Projection screens
Have you ever imagined placing a projector in your sunny kitchen? Or in your well aired office, or conference room? And couldn’t because of technical short-comings in your projection unit that forced you to use pre-emptive dark rooms?
For years, projectors have been relegated to basements or dedicated home-theater equipped rooms because of their fragility in lightened rooms…they require almost perfect darkness if their picture is to be viewable. The merest sphere of direct light is all that is needed to either distort, fade or un-focus the image being displayed, and this flaw has harrowed projector units for generations.
A quick history of projectors
When Thomas Edison first invented the projector over 100 years back, the setup consisted of a reel-to-reel projector and a white screen. In the 1970's the TV projector came out consisting of large cathode-ray tubes, then small lightweight LCD projectors in the 1990's and now DLP projectors promising high brightness & high contrast-ratio pictures. However no matter how much projector technology has changed, they all suffered one major drawback - very poor contrast and color rendering in a brightly lit room. Even with the introduction of gray screen to reduce reflected ambient light, results were not the optimal views that were expected, since this technology muted the colors, resulting in either unfocused display, or else darker-shaded images due to color absorption.
Sony’s Black Screen Technology is a coating that selectively reflects just red, blue and green and absorbs the wavelengths of light that would otherwise wash out the picture, freeing front projectors to be used in any room, even in broad daylight, and still deliver a crisp, high-contrast image.
The advantages that are immediately available are noted at once. Meetings can be set up at once in any conference room, without having to either choose a pre-darkened room or a home-theater equipped room. This will improve cost-effectiveness in both expenses (practically dispensing with the many limitations a projector poses on organizations), as well as the ever important time factor, there no time is wasted in relocations to adequately furnished locations. This is very important because this also means that VIP meetings (which usually use projectors) can be set up from the go, meaning that they can be carried out at once without any special deployment.
These are amongst a few benefits expected form such technology. Higher reliability is also expected, since there will be a lesser chances of projector damages (of which a high number of faults occur when exposed to light).
Therefore, we can say with relative confidence, that in the very near future, projectors may well become a highly necessary tool in management.
X-Black technologies in TFTs
X-Black display technology has been developed to provide a much-improved viewing experience for PC-users. For the first time, performance approaches that of high quality TV – with increased brightness, improved clarity and contrast, and wider viewing angles. The technology was originally developed for VAIO laptops, but is now available on selected desktop displays too. Most PC displays are limited when subjected to strong sunlight or artificial lighting, placing restrictions on where they can be located – but not any more! X-Black technology is an innovation that lets you get the most out of your Sony.
Why is X-Black technology important?
As more and more PCs and Laptops are offering DVD playback capability, it is now important that users have a display that allows them to enjoy movies in the right quality. Since PCs have fast become multi-purpose, meaning that they are being used for a variety of work-loads. Often, such job designations require a clear picture (for example: security terminals, video editing, cinematic graphic rendering, to mention but a few). This often require clear-cut pictures, and often, rendering a CG (cinema graphic), on a monitor will show different on a TV, or Plasma LCD due that they are brighter. These are but to mention a few examples.
When comparing a Monitor and a TV, it is immediately obvious that TVs are twice as bright. However, it is not just a factor of enhancing the brightness of the screens, but also other occurrences must be taken into consideration, such as viewing angle, reflection and glare.
The biggest challenge was getting more light to the front of the display panel. In conventional designs, only around 2% to 3% of the illumination actually gets to the front. The first item that has been improved, therefore, was the actual physical layout of the panel, and this has already proved to be a step forward within the display.
Another factor was finding a new way of illuminating the LCD. This means using dual fluorescent lamps, including new components and techniques, for instead cold cathode lamps, power inverters and unique optical prism design.
The second improvements had to be targeted at image clarity and contrast. Conventional LCD panels have a “rough surface”, because they have an anti-glare filters at the front (to reduce reflected light). However, a side-effect of this method is the obscuration of the reflected light. Black portions of the image are no longer pure-black, and other colors lack their natural definitions.
For computers and displays that will be used for high quality pictures, this is simply unacceptable.
The work-around practically used a technique called reflection reduction to remove the glare without using the AR filter, which, as mentioned above, reduced the display considerately. This technique consists of several layers of coating applied, each coating perfectly calculated to one-quarter of light. The purpose is to cancel out reflections before they get to the front of the display.
Another and final central improvement that has to be made is the viewing angle. Once we accept that in our I.T. driven society, PCs will be used for high quality video, our perception of the viewing angle considerably changes. It is no longer enough for a user to adjust the display for optimum position. What happens once he wants to share with friends and family? It is simply not acceptable that, for example, three different people will view at three different contrast or brightness levels, because such angles can critically lower enjoyment of such data.
It has been statistically shown that black displays are capable of wider angles than conventional displays. Such differences were visible when the liquid molecules used by the LCD displays react differently to changes in electrical voltage. This was eliminated by the application of a special coating pasted to the front of the display.
This technology in practical usage
This technology is being used by the Sony range of notebooks, headed the VAIO range. This range give you the chance to see the world and create anther. Infused with innovative design that flows from the stylish casings to the ergonomic keypad and screen, these notebooks are certain to stand out from amongst the crowd for obvious reasons.
There is substance beneath all that stylish glamour. Capabilities vary from a great range, from composing letters to editing movies, while more advanced notebooks let you connect to the internet while on the move using Bluetooth and Wireless technologies.
Higher end models feature Centrino Mobile Technology, multi-format DVD drives, powerful graphical cards and more, making sure you are always ahead. There is also a full range of software to help you redefine your working day or play the latest high-resolution game with relative ease.
Combining their X-technology with the latest hardware breakthroughs, this laptops are amongst the top ranges that are available on the constantly competing market.
With each passing month, hopes which were generally considered as impossible are fast becoming actual reality. With pure ingenuity, intelligence and dedication, humanity is reaching new thresholds and breaching into new eras, showing that: “Everything is possible. The Impossible….just takes longer.”
For further information or any enquiries whatsoever, please do not hesitate to contact: Electronic Solutions Technical Team,
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