Sharp unveils mammoth 108-inch TV

Sharp Corp. on Monday unveiled the world’s largest liquid-crystal display television set, featuring a gigantic 108-inch screen.

The television set, which was presented at the International Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas, is set to go on sale this summer, but the electronics firm hasn’t yet decided on a price.

Last year, Samsung and Sony brought out an 82-inch model at the show, which was then the world’s biggest LCD TV. Sharp’s previous biggest version had a 65-inch screen.

The TV unveiled on Monday is also bigger than the 103 inch plasma set put out by Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. It uses a panel produced at Sharp’s No. 2 Kameyama plant in Mie Prefecture. Measuring 2.38 meters by 1.34 meters, it is about the size of a double bed. Since it is produced to high-definition standards, it can reproduce high-definition signals in their original format.

On Monday, Matsushita Electric Industrial Co. also unveiled the world’s smallest high-definition plasma television set, which has a 42-inch screen. The firm has not decided when it will start marketing the set.

Plasma televisions are best in large sizes, and it is reportedly difficult to incorporate high definition technology in screen sizes under 40 inches. Matsushita said it was able to make the set high-definition with the production of a new type of luminescent material.

The International Consumer Electronics Show will run until Thursday, with the technology battle between liquid-crystal display and plasma sets looking likely to continue.

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By Sun Tzu on 09-01-2007