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Re-activateIt wasn't too long ago that LCD TVs were tiny sets with 4- or 5-inch screens, so-so picture quality, and hefty price tags. Watch our "vintage" video review of portable LCD TVs from 1993 and it's easy to why we said LCD display technology had "a lot farther to go." (Click on the embedded player at right to watch the video.**)
In the 15 years since then, LCD displays have gone even farther than anyone expected, transforming the TV industry as well as smart phones, laptop computers, portable digital media players, and much more.
LCD TVs, of course, have grown exponentially in size and image quality. We now have models up to 52 inches in our latest LCD TV Ratings, all of them with far better picture quality than their miniature ancestors.
And smaller LCD displays have carved out several new niches:
It will be interesting to see whether OLED displays, still in their small and pricey infancy, make similar strides over the next decade or so.
—Nick K. Mandle
** That's Evon Beckford, Senior Director of Electronics Testing at Consumer Reports, in the video. He's been testing televisions for Consumers "for almost 30 years," as he says in our much more recent "Comprehensive video guide to buying a big-screen TV."
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