Darkchip4 Technology
The DLP booth showed off some incredible new technology from Texas
Instruments today including a new DarkChip4 DLP projector from SIM2.
This was a 3 chip, 1080p DLP projector
featuring the new chipset producing trillions of colors combined with a
native
contrast ratio of 15,000:1. Additionally, there was a static
demonstration of a DLP
HDTV with DarkChip 4 and LED illumination with a stated contrast
performance of 100,000 to 1. DarkChip 4 makes modest improvement to
Darkchip3 such as a darker wafer that is reported to deliver a 30%
higher contrast ratio "depending upon the application" (is that vague
enough for everybody?) All DLP product lines,
including DLP HDTVs, DLP 1-chip projectors and DLP 3-chip projectors
currently feature
products with various chipset iterations of DarkChip technology. The
new
DarkChip4 will be available in a number of products in 2008. Among the
companies taking advantage of the new technology are SIM2 and Samsung,
though more are certain to come.
The DarkChip 4 process was originally developed for the high brightness
and contrast picture quality requirements of the digital cinema industry. The contrast improvements
from DarkChip 4 are achieved by advances
in mirror design lithography and other proprietary process changes. The mirror tilt ratios are the same as DarkChip3.
For more information, please visit www.dlp.com.