Comments on: What does 600Hz Sub Field Drive mean?

By: Kaldaien

Kaldaien — Sat, 16 Apr 2011 21:00:08 +0000

For many years, the issue has been pixel dot pitch. LCDs are capable of packing pixels extremely densely. Even the venerable CRT technology which I miss dearly could produce significantly smaller pixels at affordable manufacturing prices. Plasma seems to be bridging the gap in recent years, but you still have to buy a screen at least 40 inches to get a panel with all the flagship bells and whistles.

For this reason, I still have a nice 32″ SONY VVEGA 1080i Super Fine Pitch CRT in my bedroom. Sure, I would love a 1080p display, but I do not want to have to turn my head in bed while watching TV to see the entire screen

It is a real shame you cannot find quality CRTs anymore. Samsung still manufactures some shallow CRTs, but they are not even 1080i native, and have poor focus due to the shallowness of the tube :-\

I have to say though, if all you care about is picture quality, Plasma’s the way to go these days. Great pixel response time vs. LCD, better NATIVE contrast ratio (even vs. LCDs with LED local dimming) and less expensive. The image quality will fade over time, but you can afford to buy two or three high quality plasmas for the price of a good local dimming LCD.

By: Best3DTV

Best3DTV — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 11:28:57 +0000

They don’t make 32 or 37 inch Plasma TVs because they are not economical to make. At those sizes, LCD technology has a much bigger benefit when it comes to cost of production. However, Plasma technology allows much easier size scaling. Hence you will notice a lot more 40-50+ inch Plasma TVs that are very competitive, if not cheaper than LCD TVs in those size ranges.

In any case, I wouldn’t buy a 3D TV smaller than 42 inches if I were you. 3D content does need a larger screen size to provide an immersive experience.

By: Sathya

Sathya — Fri, 01 Apr 2011 11:24:50 +0000

Whay ther cannot be a plasma Tv of display size 32 inches or 37 inches ??

By: Alfred

Alfred — Thu, 31 Mar 2011 10:50:09 +0000

Your all too technical for me all I want to know which 3d tv I should buy from your experience to use as a gamer,action movie freak,slow and sport fan. Plasma, Lcd ,Led,Dlp.I know I will check it myself at point of purchase.
I need a dark knight to shield me from the Jokers and Riddlers of this world.

By: Best3DTV

Best3DTV — Sat, 05 Feb 2011 03:49:35 +0000

Mike, that isn’t true. This article was referencing 2D Plasmas in 2009 (when it was originally written), that used to display at 60Hz with 10 pulses per frame.

However, the new VIERA GT25 and VT25 series provide 60fps to each eye for a total 120fps (or 120Hz). It should be noted that even though some LED 3D TVs provide 120fps to each eye (240Hz total), this isn’t necessarily a good thing or imply better 3D performance.

They typically suffer from more cross-talk issues because the LCD pixels are fundamentally limited by slower refresh times.

By: Mike

Mike — Fri, 04 Feb 2011 20:08:17 +0000

Could a “600Hz” plasma display show higher than 60Hz signal? New 3D games can output 60fps per eye, 120 distinct images per second requiring 120Hz. If a plasma display can’t handle a 120Hz signal, and doesn’t do any interpolation effect like LCDs, then the 600Hz label is meaningless, right?

I’m not saying that 120Hz LCD TVs can necessarily handle a 120Hz signal, but they are displaying 120 separate images through interpolation to justify the label (though the effect looks a bit odd). I don’t see how showing the same frame 10 times is anything to wank over, especially when most of these TVs can’t handle 24p blu-ray signals properly.

By: Jay Bell

Jay Bell — Wed, 17 Nov 2010 07:44:35 +0000

Thanks for demystifying this feature for me. I’m looking forward to getting one of these TVs in my home.

By: Pravin Bell

Pravin Bell — Thu, 02 Sep 2010 06:17:27 +0000

Absolutely fantastic article.
After searching so much on Google, this was the only article that made it perfectly clear what the 600Hz Sub Drive means.
Thanks a ton !!!!!

By: zing

zing — Fri, 11 Jun 2010 06:42:34 +0000

The OP is very informed, but I disagree. I think LCD can accomplish 17ms and maybe slightly better. The article is mostly pointing out that LCD won’t be as fast as plasma which is true. In fact it may be several times slower. However I think it can achieve 60hz, 120, 240, 480. I start to wonder beyond that though. And regardless of interpolated frames, it really doesn’t matter as the brain can’t distinguish between these anyway. The point isn’t to provide real frames, but interpolated ones to for two reasons. One to make transitions more smooth. (and it’s not like some object will suddenly vastly change direction on screen in less than 1/60th of a second anyway). And two to reduce eye strain with shutter glasses for 3d. The slower a shutter glass is, the more you can see the flicker, which creates eye strain. If you have a pseudo refresh of 480, and glasses that switch eyes 480/2 times per second, it will appear much smoother on a larger screen. This is one reason companies like Vizio and HTC are upping their refresh. It’s not all about motion blur, but eye fatique as well.

Another point is that once “motion blur” is reduced to the point that people don’t really notice, it becomes less of an issue. Meaning if you have an LCD that is smooth enough to be considered great, a faster plasma won’t look better in that regard, but will instead look EXACTLY the same to the viewer. So it depends on the quality of the LCD. Another downside of plasma is that after about 5 to 8 years of 3-4 hours a day viewing, it will have notably diminished brightness even though plasma has been improved vastly. However, out of the box, some plasma’s may look better. . So you must decide between those factors. If it’s up to me, I’d rather have one of the best LCD’s. If I don’t see motion blur and it looks great, I’ll also know that in 10 years it has the highest chance of still looking roughly the same as when I got it, rather than having something that degrades as you watch it. And again, I read about the new plasmas, so I know they are are improved, but still…

By: omar

omar — Tue, 25 May 2010 11:15:00 +0000

so i have a samsung plasma,it has a 600hz Sub Field Drive and i was wondering if it can handle 3d?? it is not full hd,its only hd ready.

By: Best3DTV

Best3DTV — Mon, 10 May 2010 16:00:28 +0000

Hey Berto, Thanks a lot for pointing that out! Looks like I accidentally overlooked that. Of-course, I meant milisecond and not nanosecond response times. The 3D TV manufacturers would kill to have those kind of response times!

By: Berto

Berto — Mon, 10 May 2010 07:37:29 +0000

In the paragraph, “Sub Field Drive – Plasma Panel Basics”, the article mentions a plasma’s response time as 0.002 milliseconds. It continues by saying that a frame @ 60 Hz is 1/60 seconds or 0.017ms. Given that the unit for 1/60s is 0.017 seconds, or 17ms, I think the article means a plasma response is 0.002 _seconds_ or 2ms. Still fast, but not nanosecond fast.

Thanks.

By: Best3DTV

Best3DTV — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 19:31:06 +0000

Hi Michael,

That’s an excellent question. While the TVs themselves should be able to display the content, the main issue is with the actual DVD player which will need to read this content and transmit it to the TV in a format that it can display correctly. At the moment, it doesn’t seem like this is supported by the 3D blu-ray players.

Having said that, there are softwares for HTPCs that can be used to hook up your computer/laptop to the TV via HDMI and output the video correctly for 3D pictures.

By: Michael Ramey

Michael Ramey — Tue, 30 Mar 2010 12:06:20 +0000

Will the new 3-D TV’s that are just now hitting the market be capable of playing the field-sequential 3-D DVD’s that were sold for use only with CRT TV’s?