The Plasma TV Revolution!
What is Plasma?
Before we learn about the advantages and technology behind Plasma Tv let us understand what Plasma is. Plasma is often called the "Fourth State of Matter", the other three being solid, liquid and gas. A plasma is a distinct state of matter containing a significant number of electrically charged particles, a number sufficient to affect its electrical properties and behavior. In addition to being important in many aspects of our daily lives, plasmas are estimated to constitute more than 99 percent of the visible universe.
How is Plasma formed?
In an ordinary gas, each atom contains an equal number of positive and negative charges; the positive charges in the nucleus are surrounded by an equal number of negatively charged electrons, and each atom is electrically "neutral". A gas becomes a plasma when the addition of heat or other energy causes a significant number of atoms to release some or all of their electrons. The remaining parts of those atoms are left with a positive charge, and the detached negative electrons are free to move about. Those atoms and the resulting electrically charged gas are said to be "ionized". When enough atoms are ionized to significantly affect the electrical characteristics of the gas, it is then a plasma.
How does a conventional TV function?
For the past 75 years, the vast majority of televisions have been built around the same technology: the cathode ray tube (CRT). In a CRT television, a ‘gun’ fires a beam of electrons (negatively-charged particles) inside a large glass tube. The electrons excite phosphor atoms along the wide end of the tube (the screen), which causes the phosphor atoms to light up. The television image is produced by lighting up different areas of the phosphor coating with different colors at different intensities.
What is the drawback of Cathode ray tubes?
Cathode ray tubes produce crisp, vibrant images, but they do have a serious drawback: They are bulky. In order to increase the screen width in a CRT set, you also have to increase the length of the tube (to give the scanning electron gun room to reach all parts of the screen). Consequently, any big-screen CRT television is going to weigh a ton and take up a sizable chunk of a room.
The new invention PLASMA and how it functions:
Recently, a new alternative has popped up on store shelves: the plasma flat panel display. These televisions have wide screens, comparable to the largest CRT sets, but they are only about 6 inches (15 cm) thick. Based on the information in a video signal, the television lights up thousands of tiny dots (called pixels) with a high-energy beam of electrons. In most systems, there are three pixel colors -- red, green and blue -- which are evenly distributed on the screen. By combining these colors in different proportions, the television can produce the entire color spectrum.
The basic idea of a plasma display is to illuminate tiny colored fluorescent lights to form an image. Each pixel is made up of three fluorescent lights -- a red light, a green light and a blue light. Just like a CRT television, the plasma display varies the intensities of the different lights to produce a full range of colors
What are the advantages of Plasma?
The main advantage of plasma display technology is that you can produce a very wide screen using extremely thin materials. And because each pixel is lit individually, the image is very bright and looks good from almost every angle. The image quality isn't quite up to the standards of the best cathode ray tube sets, but it certainly meets most people's expectations. The biggest selling point of a plasma TV is its size and shape, big and slender. Plasma TV catches your attention with its screen size of 40 to 70 inches they are slim and light enough to hang on the wall.
What is the advantage of flat screen?
A plasma TV will perform exceedingly well under most ambient light conditions. A very bright light does not "wash out" its picture, nor does backlighting cause a glare on your TV screen. The beauty of these flat screens is that, unlike front view projections screens, you don't have to turn out the lights to see the image clearly and easily. Moreover, you can watch TV from almost anywhere in a room, since flat screens have a 160° viewing angle.
What quality of picture and color is displayed?
Plasma TVs have none of those annoying scan lines that conventional sets do. This owes to the fact that each pixel cell has its own transistor electrode, which creates smooth, evenly lit images across the entire surface of the display. Many of the newer plasma displays also have built-in line doubling to improve the image quality of even low-resolution video signals. And they are saturated with color; some high-end plasma TVs are capable of displaying 16.77 million colors!
Hats off to the plasma revolution:
A plasma display is a television monitor, capable of displaying HDTV, regular TV, and home video. It's also a computer monitor. In fact, it can accept any video format. With prices starting at $4,000 and going all the way up past $20,000, these sets may be a bit pricey for the average consumer, but as prices fall and technology advances, they may soon begin to edge out the old CRT sets. With the Plasma TV revolution, setting up a new TV might be as easy as hanging a picture!
About the Author
Mitchell Medford is a popular reviewer of consumer electronics and technology and has served as a product development consultant for several consumer electronics manufacturers. Visit his site or more information on Plasma TV, HDTVs, and DVRs: http://www.gnpstv.com
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