Samsung Demos 82" 2160p HDTV

Los Angeles (CA) - Samsung draws attention at this year’s Society for Information Display (SID) International Symposium with a 82" Quad HDTV that offers four times the resolution of today’s 1080p high definition TVs.

The prototype display has a massive 82" size and features a resolution of 3820x2160 pixels, which results in a total screen resolution of 8.3 megapixels. Current 1080p TVs run at 1920x1080 pixels or 2.1 megapixels. According to the manufacturer, the TV integrates a red/green/blue LED backlight, which raises the color saturation to 150%. The image refresh rate is 120 Hz.

What makes this screen especially interesting is the fact that Sang Soo Kim, executive vice president of the LCD Technology Center at Samsung Electronics, called it the "optimal display for future TVs." Quad HDTVs have been available before, but were exclusively marketed to markets that have a need for high resolution image display - such as the oil and gas industries. For example, Westinghouse has been offering 2160p TVs with sizes up to 52".

The Westinghouse Quad HDTV is not sold on the open market, but our sources say that you won’t be able to buy one for less than $40,000 at this time. So we don’t even ask how much that 82" 2160p TV could cost and wait until we win the lottery first.

Samsung said that it will have a few other products to show at its SID show booth, including an 82" e-board with a "multi-touchscreen" that could replace whiteboards and beam projectors, the company believes, as well as its previously announced 15" blue-phase LCD and a foldable 2.3" e-paper display.

SID 2008 runs from May 18 to 23 in Los Angeles.