Plasma TV's

Plasma Screen or Plasma TV is not a new name today. Almost everyone
from a small child to his grandfather knows about it. It has entirely changed
the television industry. All the big names in this industry now offer different
kinds of Plasma TVs in different sizes and at different rates. So what actually
is this Plasma TV? How does it work? How is it different than the normal television set?

Plasma TV:

The name comes from the kind of technology it uses to produce the picture on the television screen. In plasma televisions the phosphor present on the rear part of the television screen is excited by a plasma discharge and thus due to their illumination we see a picture on the screen.

The earlier television sets used Cathode Ray Tubes (CRTs) to excite the phosphor and produce a picture. Though they were popular there was a big disadvantage associated with these CRT operated sets, they were bulky. Their size was also small, the reason being that if a big screen is made it will need a big CRT and a long tube, this will further increase their weight and the overall size.

The main advantage of plasma display technology lies in the fact that by using extremely thin materials, a much wider screen can be formed. Plasma screens can be produced as large as upto 262 cm's or 103 inches diagonally. The display panel of these plasma TVs is just about 2½ inches (6 cm's) thick. Also the total thickness of a plasma panel including its electronics is not more than 4 inches (10 cm's). Thus plasma televisions are also called as flat panel displays.

Some of the features of Plasma flat panel display are,

It has a slim design and is thus mountable on a wall
It has a better contrast ratio
Larger in size
It has a fast response time
It has a wide viewing angle
It is cheaper than a LCD screen

Owing to all these futuristic features almost all big brands in televisions produce Plasma screens. Some of the popular Plasma screen manufacturers are:
Akai
Akira
Albatron
BenQ
Cornea
Electrograph
Fujitsu
Hitachi
JVC
LG
Luce
Marantz
Mitsubishi
MoniVision
NEC
Panasonic
Philips
Planar
Pioneer
RCA
Sampo
Sanyo
Samsung
Sony
Toshiba
ViewSonic
Zenith

All these brands offer Plasma Televisions in various sizes ranging from 42 inches to 60 inches and more. The usual cost of these models range from $4,000 to $10,000.