Video:What Is a Plasma TV?
with Bob MurphyThe Plasma television was the first flat panel introduced to the consumer market and is still quite popular today. Learn more about plasma tv and how it has improved in this About.com video.See Transcript
Transcript:What Is a Plasma TV?
Hi, I'm Bob Murphy, I am Branch Manager here at Listen Up in Boulder, Colorado. I am here for About.com, and I am going to be talking about what is a plasma tv.
The Plasma TV Design
Plasma was the first flat panel TV that was developed for consumer electronics use. A plasma TV is a flat panel TV for home viewing. They range form about 40 inches to about 100 inches. They came out in the late 90's, early 2000's, and it was a revolution really because up until then, 30 or 40 years, all we had to watch for TV was the big box, the CRT, that sat in top of a stand, or, built into a cabinet, or the rear-projection, if you wanted to get more than 30 inches or so, you had to build it into a big box. So when plasma came along it was just a wonderful freeing of the living room from the big box style, we were able to put a TV on the wall.
How Plasma TV Works
Plasma TV is composed of two pieces of glass with a gas in between it. It is excited by electronic circuitry, and it plays very much like a CRT in the sense that there are phosphors in it that light up. The phosphors are the things that light color is created. One of the reasons we like plasmas so much cause it looks like the old-fashioned CRT. It had very good picture, very good color rendition.
Improvements in Plasma TV Resolution
In the beginning, there was lower resolution. If you got to close, you could see the lines of resolution separated by little black lines, or you could see the scanning. Now we have enough pixel density, we have faster processors, and we have better panels, so we don't see that as an issue anymore.
Thanks so much for watching. For more information about home theater, please visit us at About.com.