Since DLP came out about 5 years ago it never offered better picture quality than CRT driven rear-projection TVs. Despite this, most manufacturers over the last three years have all but dumped CRT rear-projection TVs from their lineup in favor of DLP technology which offers a much brighter image and thinner form factor, but suffered from color issues and the nausea inducing “rainbow effect” from the spinning color wheel employed to produce color. 

That’s all about to change by a technological change in the way DLP displays its image. With this change DLP driven TVs will be able to produce more colors than the HDTV spectrum even allows, and the light bulb life will number 20,000+ hours instead of the usual 2,000-6,000 hours.

This will most definitely be the year of DLP.

DLPs Current Shortcomings
The main problem with DLP TV is the color wheel used to display color. The color wheel spins different colors timed with the micro-mirror chip in an attempt to display smooth color. The problem is that some people are susceptible to the “rainbow effect” wherein people they can actually see color shifting as the color wheel spins instead of seeing smooth color.  It affects everyone differently with many people not knowing until after living with the TV a few weeks. You’ll know you have issues with the color wheel if you get headaches and get nauseous while watching a DLP TV, or can see the color shifting/flickering.

High-end DLP displays use three micro-mirror chips for the red, blue, and green spectrum. The three-chip configuration eschews the color wheel altogether and produces perhaps the best picture quality, color, and brightness of any device ever made.  The problem is that they’re expensive with the cheapest three-chip DLP projectors starting at $15,000. A few years ago it was more like $40,000.

Single-chip DLPs also suffer from color banding wherein if only one color is prevalent, such as with black and white movies, there’s simply not enough color to go around and bands of color are displayed instead of smooth color gradients.

Add a $300-$500 light bulb replacement every 2,000-6,000 hours and the shortcomings of DLP seem daunting. Despite all the shortcomings, over the last few years, manufacturers have made great strides in minimizing the issues with current DLP TVs producing a very good high-quality picture.

Throw all those shortcomings out the door because nothing’s going to come close to what single chip DLP displays are going to be able to do in June when the latest DLP technology hits the stores.

Technological Change
DLP manufacturers realized that three-chip DLP devices offered the best quality, but the price wasn’t coming down anytime soon. What was developed was not only ingenious, but will change the capabilities of DLP driven TVs so much that they’ll even exceed the picture quality of CRT driven TV, long the gold standard for videophiles.

The change is relatively simple, but its impact great. Instead of using three micro-mirror chips to produce smooth color and to get rid of the color wheel, the latest DLP technology uses three lights to display the red, green, and blue color spectrum. Now they’re not just using three normal light bulbs that would cost about $1000 to replace every 2,000 – 6,000 hours. The new DLP display technology uses three high-power LED lights. If you’re not familiar with LED lights, the thing you need to know is that they’re highly efficient and last a really long time. For DLP were talking 20,000+ hours, essentially making light bulb replacement a thing of the past.

With the advent of this new DLP technology, DLP TVs are going to be the best of the best with great picture quality, brightness, sharpness, and screen size. Not only will the rear-projection TV market be dramatically changed, but the projector market as well.

The pricing of this technology will start in the higher-end of the consumer range with TVs starting at $4,000+, but that’s what DLP started at a few years ago and prices will fall as time goes by.

Wait, Wait Wait
If you’re in the market for a rear-projection TV simply wait. Today’s DLPs won’t even come close to competing with DLP TVs that are coming just three months from now. If you’re not looking to spend that much, you’ll be able to get a great deal on the old DLP models as the new technology comes in. So either way, if you wait, you’ll either get the best picture quality the market has ever seen, or the best deal on some very good DLP TVs.

This is awesome stuff!