This is a very complex issue, that couldn't possibly be covered to any depth in a single post. There are many trade offs between cost, performance, reliability, energy efficiency AND features. The big trade off is how and where the set will be used; either daylight football parties with people milling about, or one person in the sweet spot in a dark room. This last trade-off, "use", is the biggest factor with every display technology, because (today anyway) they all have some sort of major limitation that restricts their use to one of the above watching scenarios.
Todays plasma display technology has many issues and some virtues. Plasma sets are displaying serious color and luminosity issues within three years of purchase, yup THREE. They run very hot due to all the elctricity they consume. They are sensitive to power feed. Yet, they are slim, and provide very wide viewing angles. Depending on the mfg, scaling, molting, color temp and contrast ratio will vary in relation to price. Long term, plasma will not play out, just because it is too expensive, eats too much juice, short service life, and will always be catastrophically susceptible to pixel loss. Other fixed pixel display devices that employ "light engines" will eventually reach a point where the "light engine" itself can be replaced. Not so with a plasma screen. Plasma will also not make it, because the size of the panels can not be scaled. The panel is the display device, so large panels will be impossible to build. With RPTV tecnology, the light engine is independent from the display surface, so display size becomes a factor of contrast ratio, refresh rate, and the resolution of the display chips. Plasma will probably always occupy some niche, but that's it biggest possible role.
Todays LCD RPTV have a ways to go, but they are improving. Sony's line up for 2005 is head and shoulders above its 2004 lineup. LCD RPTV's suffer primarily from poor contrast ratio. This limits their ability to be used in dark rooms, aka movie watching. They typically use three chips, which allows for excellent color temp, good brightness, and good geometry. At this moment they are limited to a native display rate of 720p, but this should change in 2006 to 1080p. Not bad for daylight viewing, but as all RPTV's they suffer from vertical viewing arpeture limitations.
LCOS, which is really reflective LCD technology will eventually (within a year or three, see Intels forthcoming products) displace transmissive LCD completely. LCOS (basically same as DILA) has many technical advantages over LCD and DLP. LCOS is one of the few (only?)technologies which can scale the substrate and pixel size down much further (LCD and DLP can not do this for many technical reasons). This will allow for much smaller and cheaper LCOS chips within 2-4 years.
DLP will be the undisputed king of the hill in two months when the first xHD3 based products begin to roll out. It is close to that reign now with the HD2+ chips. That leadership will quickly be challenged within 12 months by the first generation of high tech LCOS displays. In the mean time, DLP xHD3 sporting contrast rations of 3000:1, 7 segment color wheels, and 1080p native resolution will be tough to beat. Ultimately DLP will face stiff competition from LCOS, but that is really 5 years out atleast, as both technologies will continue to improve in the near term. Next thing up for DLP are the coming improvements in the design of the color wheel, expected mid 2005. The newest 7 segment color wheels already bring any rainbow effect to vanishing low levels, while at the same time improving contrast ratio (thanks to the new dark green 7th segment).
CRT RPTV still has the best pure picture quality in a dark room, bar none. There is limited vertical dispersion and limited horizantal dispersion. Not to mention weight, setup hassles, size, ambient light issues, and CRT performance fade over time. But the picture, oh my. Oh yeah, and it happens to be the cheapest to boot. But that huge bottom cabinet and the ambient light issues keep in the yesterdays technology arena.
Sony SXRD is still a myth from what I can tell. Even if this can be brought to market, its limitations and costs are unknown. And it appears that contrast ratio might be an issue right out the chute. The Qualia three chip front projector is not a price/performance leader at $25K, but it does showcase where SXRD could go.
Front projection is another ball game.
If all this wasn't enough, there are the issues with STILL evolving HDMI, DVI, HDCP, and CardAccess technologies.
All that said, I am very much looking forward to viewing the Samsung xHD3 61" display in January. Part of their upcoming "90" series. It might be worthy, maybe.
Today, you still can't beat a direct view CRT monitor. But, and big BUT's here, they are heavy, very deep, and not energy efficent. Color temp, veiwing dispersion and flexibilty are unbeaten. But the biggest 16:9 set is 34". Yes, there is the 38" Aconda from Lowe, and a 40" XBR from Sony (300lbs), but those are specialty sets due to their depth, weight, and power requirements. The 38" RCA offering looks, well, not great.
Happy viewing.
