Sony Corporation has announced it has developed a high frame-rate 0.61-inch full HD SXRD display device for video projectors. According to the company’s Japanese corporate website, this device improves liquid crystal drive speed to 240Hz, 2 times the former 0.61 type full HD SXRD announced in 2005 September, resulting in 120Hz frame rate support. With a liquid crystal response time of 2.5 milliseconds (ms), the device is said to minimize "afterimage impression," resulting in "clear picture quality which does not have blurring" in "fast sport and action scenes."

Aldo Cugnini
Analyst

The response time of 2.5ms is achieved using a super narrow, thick structure cell and a new liquid crystal of less than 2µm cell gap. The high frame rate is the result of a new silicon drive baseplate that enables a bulk data transfer rate of 2 times that of the previous device. A noise level in the range of millivolts, together with improved voltage stability of the input signal, results in low noise in the picture. In addition, increasing the device circuit density has allowed optimizing the internal wiring layout, so that the size of the package is standardized by comparison with the previous 60Hz frame rate panel. This also means the panel can be used in the former optical engine, so efficient commodity development is possible.

In order minimize reflected light, the device structure was optimized, with result that there is good compatibility with to various illumination sources, such as LED, laser, extra high pressure mercury lamps, and xenon lamps. The operating stability of the device - and manufacturing repeatability in the mass production of projectors - is assured by means of a new thermal design that incorporates a temperature detector inside the silicon drive baseplate.

In addition to the reduction of motion-induced blurring, 120Hz is a good refresh rate for film sources, as it is evenly divisible by 24, so that every film frame is displayed for an equal amount of time. This eliminates the 3:2 pulldown artifacts that have existed since 60Hz video came into being. Of course, we’ll need 24fps-output DVD players in order to enjoy this improvement, and these are currently scarce. And while many processors can do some form of interpolation to minimize these and other upconversion artifacts, purists always prefer to have material presented in its native (or equivalent) format.

No further information is available at this time on pricing or plans to incorporate the device in products planned for the North American market. Expect some increase in projector cost, both for the increased device cost as well as upgraded drive and processing electronics. Internet scuttlebutt predicts products using this device will appear in Japan before the end of the year, and won’t that make for a nice, new Christmas display.