Hasta La Gadget!

Last week, a federal district court in New York approved a settlement declaring that people who bought certain models of rear-projection DLP TVs from Toshiba between January 1, 2004, and September 18, 2008, are eligible for cash refunds.

The class-action lawsuit, Ersler v. Toshiba of America Inc., had a claim that Toshiba ‘knowingly misrepresented the life span of the bulbs in the lamps contained in the lamp assembly component of its 2004 and 2005 DLP television models.’ If true, this would mean the sale of the TVs had brought about a ‘breach of express and implied warranties,’ and a violation of the State’s consumer Fraud Act.

In DLP TVs, the lamp provides the light source, and is placed in between the DMD chip and the color wheel to create images.

During sales, Toshiba had estimated the life of the bulbs to last almost 8,000 hours. Instead, many people found them to burn out after only 300 hours, about 4% of the estimated life, or two months of normal use.

That had to be truly infuriating for many, since the sets at that time were seen as a fairly good deal, at a price of about $2,500 for a 50-inch set. Apparently, the replacement bulbs cost about $300 each.

By settling in court, Toshiba has agreed to provide six-month warranty extension for replacement bulbs to anyone that purchased a 2004 or 2005 model Toshiba DLP television in the U.S. If anyone that owned this TV had to go out and buy replacement bulbs in order to extend the life of the TV, they are also eligible to submit a claim for cash refunds.

If you own one of the TVs and know have the right to the claim, you can go to the site created for the settlement at www.dlplampsettlement.com, or you can call the toll-free 1-800-894-1766.

It’s easy to forget how popular DLP TVs were early in the decade, especially since they were overtaken by Plasma TVs and then LCDs in the last five or six years.

For many, DLPs TVs were the best large screen TVs available for the best price early in the decade and Toshiba, Panasonic, and Hitachi were among the leaders. By the first quarter of last year, though, they were hardly moving: only 124,000 rear-projection TVs were sold worldwide, a pittance compared to LCDs, which sold over 20 million units in that quarter alone.

By the start of this year, Toshiba was no longer selling rear-projection TVs and neither, it seemed, was anyone else. The only company currently selling rear-projectioners is Mitsubishi, with its newfangled Laser technology that is quite different and more highly developed than the old DLPs from the mid-2000s.

Check out all of the models eligible for the Toshiba refund after the jump:

Owners of the following 2004 or 2005 model Toshiba DLP televisions are eligible to receive the refund:

• 44HNHM84
• 46HM84
• 46HM94
• 46HM94P
• 52HM84
• 52HMX84
• 52HM94
• 52HMX94
• 62HM84
• 62HM94
• 62HMX84
• 62HMX94
• 62HM194
• 46HM85
• 46HM95
• 46HMX85
• 52HM85
• 52HM95
• 52HMX85
• 52HMX95
• 56HM195
• 56MX195
• 62HM85
• 62HM95
• 62HMX85
• 62HMX95
• 62HM195
• 62MX195
• 62HM15
• 62HM15A
• 62HM15B
• 72HM195
• 72MX195

Photos: FixYourDLP.com/flickr, horaceko/flickr

Philips Electronics and other companies researching future display technologies got together this week at the Big Sight lighting fair in Tokyo to unveil cool new OLED prototypes, including the latest builds of transparent displays.

Philips Research mainly used the event to show its recently announced OLED light display grid, the Lumiblade, a basic, super-bright lamp slab that had previous problems with ‘luminance variability.’ Apparently, that’s been worked out (the lamps light up evenly) and they should start being sold by the end of the year in Europe, most likely for businesses.

But Philips reps apparently had to start talking up its transparent screens (above), since The Research Institute for Organic Electronics (RIOE) stole the show with its own transparent screen window display. The screens, measured at 70-75% of transparency, provide owners with the ability to let light in during the day and then use them as image panels at night.

RIOE hasn’t officially revealed its secret sauce behind the transparency, but it should follow the process of its other OLED screens. Mainly, they place an organic EL device layer on a glass substrate and then use heat and ‘radiating functions,’ a voltage type, generating an energy reaction that lights the panels. RIOE also showed a bright OLED that consumes only 15 watts for hours at a time, perfect for saving some money and electricity.

Last year, Sony and the Max-Planck-Institute in Germany created some of the first transparent displays that rendered moving images, and they did it through the chemical process of photoexcitation. That reaction is caused when rapid-fire lasers excite photosensitive chemicals embedded in a polycarbonate transparent sheet.

As for Philips, they also haven’t revealed exactly how they’ve created their own transparent displays, though it’s obvious from the previous examples that an organic polymer layering process is likely used.

For now, none of these prototypes have a price and most (except the Lumiblade) won’t be available for another 3-5 years.

Check out the RIOE OLED layer process after the jump.

See also the following related stories:

• Open Your Windows to the Sky With Transparent Displays
• Japanese Start-up Readies Flexible, Transparent Plasma Screens

Philips’ Lumiblade OLED Panels

RIOE’s Low Powered Panels

Source:  ledinside.com

There’s no question the creators of mini projectors want them to become the popular portable alternative to expensive TVs and big projectors, just like the netbooks have cut into the market for laptops.

But looking at recent announcements of high-quality mini projectors, like that of the Syba RCG RC-VIS62002 this week, we find that the comparison is not yet apt. Mainly, they’re still too expensive.

Let’s first take a look at the Syba RCG. It’s pluggable to your notebook (or DVD player), and displays images at a 640×480 VGA pixel resolution (though it’s also mentioned it can go up to a 1024 x 768 resolution, probably with interpolating with XGA).

I like the fact that company is willing to come out and say the optimal size of the projected screen (at 25 inches) instead of giving us the largest potential size possible. That happens when the projector is pulled away the farthest from the distance of the wall, a max that always turns out to be unwatchable.

This is not a pocketable projector, despite the early claims. Just like the EyeClops Mini Projector and the similar LG, it’s a light (80 grams), mid-range, palm sized box that fits better in a large purse or backpack. And this is the key. If someone is willing to carry a projector in a bag separately, they might want to get the projector with the best image possible, and it’s not going to be the smallest Pico. It will probably be one at this size or a normal-sized projector.

But the rub is that this one is going to be almost $400, just like the LG. Put in an extra $50 or $100 at most and you can get a regular-sized, higher-quality projector. At this point, if you can carry the larger one, the mini is not cheap enough to be worth it.

Netbooks don’t face the same close price range with their competitors. The best cheap laptop comes in near the $1000 mark, twice as much as most netbooks. And they offer a similar quality version of the most popular and basic apps – word processing and internet browsing. A projector’s most basic app, the image, still can’t come close to the resolution quality of an LCD at the same price. Check out these available TVs from Amazon for comparison.

We’re going to love testing this one out when it’s available, but they’re gonna have to lower it to really take off.

You may recall Beambox as the company that brought us the very tiny Beambox Pocket Projector. Well, its newest model, the just-announced Evolution R-1 is not quite as compact (though it’s still pretty tiny), but it looks like it will pack a lot more punch than its predecessor. The R-1 will boast an LCoS chip, a brightness of 30 lumens, with a 200:1 contrast ratio and VGA (640 x 480) resolution, and will be capable of projecting an up to 100-inch image. The little guy will also have up to 4GB of onboard Flash memory, plus a microSD slot. The pico — which weighs in at 175 grams — is expected to ship around March 20th. It looks like the projector is going to run you £250 ($360), and be available in black, red, silver and white. One more shot after the break.

Continue reading Beambox launches Evolution R-1 pico projector

Filed under: Displays

Beambox launches Evolution R-1 pico projector originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 23 Feb 2009 12:50:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Designer Abhinav Dapke has come up with a green lighting concept that appears to be modeled on the easy old-school chore of taking out the laundry to be dried by the sun.

His Go Rack design centers around a combo cloth that is layered with flexible OLED displays, solar cells, and a textured, safety plastic. A person simply takes out the light ‘ironing board/clothes rack’ body outside, unspools the legs, and places the backside of the cloth (the solar cells) in an optimal angle to receive sunlight. In order to let a user know the power charge level, a small time indicator is also embedded on the side of this cloth. 

Once the panel is full, the body is once again erected, the cloth is folded in (exposing only the plastic) and the aluminum legs are used to conduct energy, once connected to a base inside a home. Presumably, you can then use the regulator switch to modulate the level of illumination. The brightness of the light, if and when this concept is ever brought to light, will depend on the materials chosen for the plastic.

I like this idea mainly because it’s a simple, probably cheap way to bring solar light into the home without re-building the whole structure of a house. But there are potential problems. The single Go Rack won’t be enough to provide enough lighting for a whole house. Also, the body of the rack needs to be engineered with enough safety features that transferring the aluminum legs after days left out in the sun can’t lead to scalding injuries, and the OLED layers need to be durable enough to withstand the constant folding.

Still, it’s a quality concept that we’d love to check in action in the next few years.