Field emission displays
Some three years ago, I developed an interest in Field Emission Display (FED) technology. At that moment, not much news was heard about it, and analysts were saying that FED technology was either abandoned, or (more likely) going trough a quiet period while the scientists worked hard on improvements.
Today, we can see the first announcements about this new generation of FED technology. All players are now focusing on carbon nanotubes as electron emitters, whereas before etched silicon tips were also considered. The big news is, the most optimistic companies even think they can have competitive products out before the end of the year.
- Sony said it would be ‘technically possible’ to produce FEDs before 2007, but did not announce concrete plans to do so.
- Motorola says its NED (Nano Emissive) technology is ready, but does not want to enter the display business itself.
- Samsung seems to be very confident about going to production in 2006.
- SED, a joint venture of Toshiba and Canon, said late last year that it’s SED (Surface-conduction Electron-emitter) technology would yield real TVs this year.
However, the fate of these efforts is still unsure. The competition from both plasma and LCD displays has increased, and at the same time OLED technology is steadily growing to larger display sizes. It would be very surprising if the first generation of commercially available FED screens where free from technology drawbacks (remember the awful burn-in effect of the early plasma devices).
One of the main concerns of the previous generation was the lifetime of the phosfors, which receive a lot more current (while at a lower voltage) than in CRT screens. Another difficulty is how to maintain a vacuum between two large flat surfaces, that are so close to each other.
This will be an interesting evolution to watch, and, as in the Sony statement above, ‘there will be many, many different developments and they will coexist with each other.’ As always, ‘(…) in the end the consumer will decide’.
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