Last month, Samsung dropped a bombshell at this year’s FPD International, the premier trade fair for flat-panel displays. On the Samsung stand at the Yokohama fair was a prototype 40-inch (101cm) LCD TV featuring full HD – only 10mm thick, enough to make the average picture frame look chubby. The hyper-slim design is quoted as having low power consumption, at 90 watts, but potential future buyers will probably be far too taken with the astounding looks to pay much heed.
The new technology will (predictably) hit the US market first, but no firm time-frames have been announced.
Whilst Samsung was dropping jaws at FPD, Hitachi also announced its latest series of LCD TVs. The UT series models, ranging from 37 to 42 inches, have been slimmed down by special non-fan cooling methods - and also by moving the TV’s tuner and other hardware into a separate ‘media station’, allowing buyers to connect the TV’s ‘brains’ to their current home media system whilst placing the monitor itself anywhere they want. At 3.5cm thick at their thinnest point, these TVs won’t outgun the Samsung prototype for slimness honours – but they are confirmed for the Japanese market in mid-December 2007, so launches in other markets are probably not far off.