Pacific Media Associates (PMA) adds the American Top Selling Projectors report to their enhanced website.

Each month, Pacific Media Associates will post the Top 5 Lists for the following categories:

New Era / Pico and Personal (sub-500 lumens) Projectors. This “Top 5 list is compiled from data collected from PMA’s monthly Retail Projector Tracking Service sample, which is made up of North American retailers and web resellers. The September results showed the top 5 selling projectors, by unit volume, were the Optoma PK-301, Vivitek Qumi Q2, Optoma PK-201, OptomaPT100, and Acer K11.

Mainstream (500 to 4999 lumens) Projectors. This “Top 5 list is compiled from data collected from PMA’s monthly Distributor Projector Tracking Service sample, which is made up of North American distributors. The September results show that the top 5 selling projectors, by unit volume, were the Viewsonic PJD5123, InFocus IN104, NEC NP-V260X, NEC NP-M260X, and Epson PowerLite 93.

High-End (5000+ lumens) Projectors. This “Top 5 list is compiled from data collected from PMA’s monthly Pro A/V Projector Tracking Service sample, which is made up of North American dealers and integrators. The September results show that the top 5 selling projectors, by unit volume, were the Panasonic PT-DZ6700, NEC NP-PA550W-13ZL, Sanyo PLC-WTC500AL, Hitachi CP-X809, and NEC NP-PA500U-13ZL.

Go The 5 Top Selling Projectors

Panasonic Europe’s launches four LCD series for the digital signage market, available in November.

The LFP30 models can withstand harsh weather conditions and comply with the IP66 standard for weather resistance (protected against water and dust penetration). The aluminium cabinet and tempered glass front make the panels rugged while the winter-mode ensures the screens can withstand temperatures as low as -20 C. The High Brightness (1.000 cd/m2) of the LFP30 is ideally suited to outdoor applications, including advertising and Point of Sale. Available in 42” & 47,” these units will suit installation in factories, public spaces, and transport facilities.

The 47” LFT30 display has an integrated touch panel, a combination of LCD trans-reflective technology, brightness level of 1.500 cd/m2 and a forced-air cooling system that allows the display to be used even in direct sunlight. This series is standard equipped with protection against water and dust at a level equivalent to IP53, allowing interactive applications in public spaces and facilities such as information kiosks in shopping centres.

For ambient light conditions such as shop windows, the brighter LF30 series, available in 42” and 47”, has an ambient light sensor to control the backlight and comes with Panasonic’s original function slots, "SLOT2.0", allowing users to change interfaces or internal computers easily depending on the signal source.

The LF25 series, available in 42” & 47”, is more for indoor signage applications as it features a slim frame suitable for standard POS and POI screens and menu boards. They offer a wide-viewing angle IPS panel with vertical or horizontal use and a wide option of standard terminals.

Watch Panasonic LCDs for Digital Signage

Christie launched its new Christie YK50 dual-arm projector yoke at LDI 2011. The newest addition to the Christie Nitro Solutions family of yokes and projectors, the Christie YK50 is smaller than the Christie YK100 (single-arm yoke) and Christie YK200 (dual-arm yoke), and is suitable for live events, theatre productions, and staging applications in small- to mid-sized venues where moving video and lighting enhance the audience experience, but space is at a premium.

The Christie YK50, designed for the Christie LX700 or Christie LHD700 projectors, can be used as a moving light or moving video projector. The Christie YK50, when combined with the Christie LX700 or Christie LHD700, provides 7000 ANSI lumens – making this a solution for houses of worship, museums, trade shows, and nightclubs.

Go Christie YK50

Display and TV makers looking for The Next Big Thing may have found it. Palo Alto-based Nanosys says today’s displays only offer 30% of the colors the human eye can see in reality.

Nanosys, as you can tell by the name, works in the world of nano-materials, materials up to 100,000X thinner than a human hair. From this nanotechnology background, the company has come up with process of mass producing nanocrystals of particular sizes, embedding them in a solution and then coating a thin sheet of film with it.

This thin nanoparticle film goes inside a display to effectively double the color range the display can show. QDEF and QuantumRail are composed of Nanosys’ proprietary, high efficiency quantum dot phosphors. Larger than a water molecule, but smaller than a virus, these tiny phosphors convert blue light from a standard GaN LED into different wavelengths based upon their size.

Samsung and LG are believers-- both are Nanosys investors. The first devices containing its quantum dot technology -- probably tablets or notebook computers – should reach US stores in the first half of next year and TVs by the end of 2012. Can pro displays be far behind?

Go Nanosys promises better color…

projectiondesign got our vote for the best stand at the new xSolutions show in UK.

They demonstrated their projection solutions including the F35 wqxga high-resolution projector, the FR12 Remote Light Source projector for command and control and the F82 series featuring 3-chip DLP technology.

In addition, projectiondesign previewed the world’s highest resolution 3D single-chip DLP projector, the F35 AS3D.

What clinched their “pole position” at XSolutions was their real-life motion platform Formula 1 simulator on the stand. Courtesy of PureTech Racing, this simulation drew pro AV integrators who stood in line to get their shot at the fast lane.

Go projectiondesign

In USA, Sharp launches the largest LED LCD TV to date, the 80” AQUOS (80-inch diagonal) LC-80LE632U. This is a 1080p (1920x1080) display using Sharp's Smart TV technology and equipped with built-in Wi-Fi and 120Hz capability.

Using a full array LED backlighting system (not edge-lit) to get better uniformity in both color and brightness, Sharp says the display’s contrast ratio is 6,000,000:1.

And, although this being market as a home HDTV, it can easily be used in both pro and digital signage applications because of the LED backlight system. It's also made on a commercial production line -- although Sharp doesn't necessarily want your customers to know that.

The LC-80LE632U will list at $5499 in USA.

Go Sharp’s 80” AQUOS

New television station Bulgaria On Air commissions a major Christie MicroTiles installation at its renovated facility near Sofia Airport.

This first use of MicroTiles in Bulgaria will help deliver business and financial information to local audiences and international investors. Advising on business opportunities in Bulgaria, their own business development strategy depends upon generating leads from their TV audience.

Five separate stages will host the different shows.The feature backdrop is a curved display, measuring 5.71 x 2.45 meters and containing 112 MicroTiles. In addition there are two displays with 30 MicroTiles each (2.45 x 1.53 meters), one display with 18 Micro Tiles (measuring 2.45 x 0.92 meters) and an angled display formed by 2 x 30 MicroTiles each (2.45 x 1.53 meters). All are built into the TV design set and all screens are connected to HDSDI video switcher via HDSDI/HDMI converters.

The integration was carried out by UVT SC Computer, broadcast and professional system integrators and distributor, after they presented MicroTiles to the customer along with configuration suggestions and a technical proposal.

UTV Director of Sales, Alexander Kitanov says, “The original intention of the customer was to use plasma screens on all sets, but after a detailed presentation and explanation of the technical and operational benefits of MicroTiles he was convinced by the benefits of this technology. Thanks to the close cooperation with Christie we were able to match their target price and to win the project.”

He says the client was particularly impressed with the narrow gaps between the screens. “This was very important for their big curved screen. The uniformity of the colour reproduction and automatic operation were also very highly regarded but in all respects, against the other competing technologies, MicroTiles gave a stronger performance: colour reproduction and consistency across screen, image stability, maintenance, ease of set up and infinite resolution.”

Part of the evaluation process during the installation and set-up also included camera tests, performed in different light conditions to assess colour temperatures of the screens.

These MicroTiles sets can look forward to daily usage since all live shows and station news will use the displays, which feature both live and recorded content generated by the graphics department of Bulgaria On Air.

Go Christie MicroTiles

Samsung announces a breakthrough in LED technology-- one allowing the development and eventual production of ultra-large display panels on ordinary sheets of glass in the future, the Korea Times reports.

Researchers say “in ten years, window panes will double as lighting and display screens, giving personality to buildings.”

The breakthrough is the production of “nearly single crystalline Gallium Nitride (GaN) on amorphous glass substrates”—that leads towards the creating larger products (400x larger than the current GaN LED size of 2-inches) while lowering production costs.

The technology will first go into large commercial screens (sports displays, advertising boards) but Samsung may also leverage it into consumer devices and residential installations.

The only drawback? Samsung says it still needs up to 10 years to develop the technology into commercial production.

Go Samsung Advanced Institute of Technology

Go Samsung Reports LED Breakthrough