The writing’s been on the wall for some time now, but Quixel made it official with their most recent study, the MicroDisplay Rear Projection Market Review for Q2 2008 that relegates RPTV technology to the very high (+60 inch) display size. Tamaryn Pratt, Quixel Research’s high-profile principal and top analyst said, "The market has changed and there is no value for 42-, 46- and 50-inch MD RPTVs, but there is great value in the screen sizes above 60-inch or 65-inch for $2,000 or less, even 73-inch models are available for under $3,000 day in and day out, and there is really not a comparable flat TV offering to compete with those price points."

Steve Sechrist
Senior Analyst and Editor

Well, almost Ms. Pratt! As luck would have it, on the very day the Quixel report came out, we found an Olivia 65-inch Full-HD (yes 1920 x 1080) flat panel LCD on sale on Woot (www.woot.com) for a paltry $2299. Not a stripped down model mind you, this unit came with a list of specs as long as your arm. (Like HQV video processor from Silicon Optics, 6ms response time, ATSC, NTSC, QAM tuners, PIP and a Japanese Sharp panel, none the less.) And did we mention, just $5.00, count ‘em $1, $2, $3, $4, $5, door-to-door shipping for the 231.5 pound beast? Now that’s a deal that comes to less than $35/screen inch for a Sharp LCD panel. Even the 73-inch RPTV at sub $3K can’t beat that (at $41/screen inch).

What’s the catch you may ask? Well it is from a company (Syntax-Brillian) currently in bankruptcy and there is an interesting policy disclaimer regarding the Olivia "Dead Pixel Policy" at the end of the entertaining write-up on the Woot web page.

But given this is a Sharp panel, and it only takes 7 dead pixels out of the plus 2M total to scrap the thing, that should not be too severe a problem. On the other hand the 2-year warranty (that is in effect) may be a bit difficult to collect should something go wrong, as there’s still no guarantee the company will be around that long.)

For those not familiar with the Woot on-line cult following, the company made history by offering a single product for sale each day (starting at midnight Central Standard Time). Once the inventory is gone, that’s it until the next night. Shipping is always $5, no matter what. A 10 oz. 2GB micro SD card I recently purchased for $6 (OK, I bought three to leverage the shipping charge and used them for "nerd gifts") or this plus 200-pound behemoth both ship for the same $5. The group is also famous for their tongue-in-cheek, oft irreverent descriptions that elicit ROTFL (rolling on the floor laughing) and/or many other non-printable side effects.

The $5 shipping, plus the witty comments, keeps folks coming back night after night. (You don’t want to wait until morning, or you may miss out on a good deal.) The best comment on this deal so far: "I hope my neighbor buys one, I’m getting tired of watching his 52-inch from across the street."

But I digress, we started out with the serious Quixel RPTV report and this is good hard number crunching that just happened to coincide with the Woot / Olivia 65-inch Full-HDTV $2300 anomaly.

We agree with Quixel, who sees the big screen space as the niche for RPTVs 60-inch and above, but can’t help but wonder just how long that 60 to 65-inch category will hold. Particularly in the face of current flat panel fab line expansion plans, that lead to continued efficiency in flat panel production and translate into successive ASP declines in flat panel TV prices.

Quixel also told us, "The total value of the Advanced TV market in the USA was worth almost $7B in revenue in Q2 2008 and the MD RPTV segment represented close to 4% of that market in revenues and 2% in volume." Microdisplay RPTVs US revenue was down by 2% over Q1 numbers and unit volume was flat at 136K units here in the US.

This occurred just as global TV shipments are booming. According to the latest figures from DisplaySearch’s Quarterly Global TV Shipment and Forecast Report, Y/Y shipments for all TVs improved 11% to 47.5M units in Q2 "with better than expected shipments in North America."

So as Quixel puts it: "Neither LCD TVs or Plasma TVs offer the best value for a super large-screen HDTV, and MicroDisplay RPTV providers have stepped up to fill that void." The operative question is: for how long, especially in the short-term, in the 60 to 65-inch category? While the RPTV displays are undeniably beautiful and getting better all the time, with remarkable illumination technology breakthroughs in both LED and Lasers, the "call of flat" may simply be too formidable a feature overcome