Hitachi's 8m:1 contrast ratio hybrid LCD on display at CEATEC

So Hitachi is showing off their super high contrast ratio (8,000,000:1) "hybrid" LCD at CEATEC today, and we'll be completely honest, we were totally underwhelmed. As we learned before, the panel uses two LCDs -- one panel, and one LCD projector firing into the panel -- to achieve those higher-end contrast ratio numbers, but to these eyes everything just looked grainy and mushy, and the viewing angle and 700cd/m2 brightness were nothing to write home about. For our money, when it comes to uncommercialized / prototype display systems, SED, OLED, and even a really good LCD or plasma produce far better pictures. Perhaps we'll have to revisit this one in a year or two when Hitachi irons out the kinks.

Gallery: Hitachi's 8m:1 contrast ratio hybrid LCD on display at CEATEC

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[Crayola @ Oct 2nd 2007 3:20AM]

Doesn't look very contrasty to me... OLEDed!

[I LOVE THE CAPS LOCK KEY @ Oct 2nd 2007 11:41AM]

Blame that on the digital camera and/or the source player/content (disc) may not even be able or outputting that much detail. Seeing in person is believing.

[MyFirstMoniker @ Oct 2nd 2007 5:55AM]

Oh boy.. Does this mean that the contrast ratio is now the TV equivalent of the camera megapixels, i.e. a somewhat relevant attribute has now been taken over by marketing as the ONLY relevant measurement of picture quality.