Sharp kept a low profile at CES 2018, meeting with media and customers in a small suite in the Wynn. The Sharp TV brand was licensed to Hisense for the US market in early 2016 for a five year term, but Foxconn has been trying to wrestle this away using legal tactics. This litigation has been dismissed, but that may not be the end of this story. (Sharp & Hisense)
In the suite, Sharp highlighted its 8K focus, showing off the 70” 8K TV that is now on sale in Japan, with expansion to Europe in the March/April time frame. There are no plans to distribute this TV in the US at this time, however. Peak luminance is around 1000 cd/m².
8K signals are delivered to the TV via eight HDMI 2.0 connectors (four can do scaling). The set can also display four UHD images in a quad configuration. These images must be preconfigured in an external processor (like the Extron one used in the suite) as the TV does not have four tuners or four separate video processing paths.
A 27” 8K monitor was shown, as it was at IFA as well, but in a slightly thinner form factor. It offers FALD with 18×16 zones, up to 2000 cd/m² of peak luminance and a pixel density of 326 ppi. Sharp was asking for feedback on the best size to suit various professional market needs in post production, photo editing and more.
The company also was showing a live 8K demo with their new 8K camera, a live model being bodypainted, and an 8K display. The $90K camera (plus more for the lens) is a single-sensor Bayer type, so the image was being de-Bayered in the camera, delivered to an Astro format converter box (from SDI to HDMI) and then sent to the 70” TV. This was to demonstrate that live 8K TV production can be done very easily now.
On the professional display side, Sharp showed an 85” 8K display targeted for the B2B market, where they are a strong player. This has a very wide color gamut in excess of P3 and can support HDR10 and HLG.
They also showed a software development project with its parent, Foxconn, that is a software-based video wall controller. This was demonstrated with four, 60″ UHD displays in a video-wall format allowing content to be displayed full screen or in a number of pre-defined configurations.
Sharp thinks such B2B configurations might start to migrate to high end homes sometime soon as well. It wants to transform the 65-year one-to-one display experience to adapt to a new world of ubiquitous screens, multi-window and multi-display engagement. Such solutions will be designed to seamlessly manage a variety of applications and content – entertainment, sports, social media, smart home functionality and new experiences – made possible through advances in form factor, display resolution, picture quality, processing and bandwidth.
While not discussed in the suite, Sharp’s press materials also revealed some information about planned models to be marketed in the US in cooperation with Hisense.
Apparently, there will be two series: Q8000U and Q7000U. Both series will be offered in 43, 50, 55, and 65” sizes, offer UHD resolution with HDR10 support and direct backlight configurations. We think the Q8000U will offer local dimming while the Q7000U will offer global dimming only. No other performance details were available, but these are likely to not be 1000 cd/m² models.
