LG yesterday began shipping their LH90 series 1080p Full LED Backlit HDTV’s which the company claims are the first sets to both pass the THX Display Certification and feature full LED backlighting. The LH90 series, which includes the 42LH90 (42″), 47LH90 (47″) and the 55LH90 (55″), all use a full array of LED backlights as opposed to mere “edge” lighting.

The LH90 series HDTV’s feature a contrast ratio of up to 2,000,000:1 while LG’s TruMotion tech keeps things moving smoothly with a 240Hz refresh rate. A built-in lighting sensor optimizes the TV picture automatically to a room’s lighting conditions, while their Picture Wizard self-calibration tool makes it easy to fine-tune picture settings. The LH90 series also meets the Energy Star 3.0 spec.

The three models have a recommended price of $1900 for the 42-inch, $2400 for the 47-inch and $3200 for the 55-inch – but the 47 and 55 inchers are available now from Amazon.com for a heavily reduced $1898 and $2599 respectively.

Sources:
LGE and Amazon.com
Via: Electronista

Jumping on the “green” bandwagon, LG have announced a solar-powered cell phone that features an array of solar panels built into the cover. The phone is on show at Mobile World Congress 2009 and promises to squeeze a 3 minute call out of just 10 minutes of sun exposure.

The photovoltaic addition will power the phone all by itself whilst in standby mode, giving unlimited standby minutes without you ever having to reach for a charger. Making calls or playing games etc. will require more power however, so we’ve not quite reached a charger-less solution just yet. What’s surprising about this handset is that despite the solar cells, LG managed to make it rather attractive, without resorting to hiding the cells behind the display and lessening their performance.

The solar cells are built into the back cover of the cell phone, which makes retrofitting the panels to older model handsets a very real possibility. The packaging is apparently more environmentally friendly too – despite its resemblance to a take-out container (below) – and will be introduced for all of LG’s 2009 handsets.

While this souped-up solar phone is certainly headed for market, we’ll unfortunately have to wait until the end of the year for its European release.

Sources:
LG (Press Release) via MobileBurn

LG Electronics recently announced that they will debut a 3G wristwatch phone at January’s Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas, which will be a fully-functional handset wristset? complete with touchscreen and video calling capabilities.

The LG-GD910 will support 3G and HSDPA for high-speed internet access and incorporate an MP3 player, putting two of the most common take-everywhere gadgets – the phone and personal media player – right on your wrist. Video calls can be made via a small camera located above the top right corner of the display.

It would seem LG have made a real effort to make this device usable, from the touchscreen that obviates the need for tiny buttons to the built-in text-to-speech that provides an intuitive alternative to typing.

Despite everything they have packed into this watch-phone, the thickness has been kept to a minimum – coming in at only 0.56-inches (13.9mm). It will feature a 1.43-inch (3.63cm) display, Bluetooth connectivity and is expected to launch in Europe later next year.

There’s no word on pricing, but you can count on it being many times more than a relatively basic view-screen spy watch.

Sources:
The Telegraph and The Sun and PC World

LG Display yesterday announced the completed development of a 14.1-inch LCD display for laptops that is not only brighter and easier to see when used outdoors, but uses the sun as a light source to reduce power consumption and improve battery life.

The display incorporates reflective display technology we’ve seen before on Casio’s energy-efficient LCD for mobile devices and when used outside, is expected to draw a quarter of the energy required indoors.

The new LCD detects sunlight and switches to its reflective mode, which essentially absorbs light and reflects it back through the display. When indoors, it reverts back to the standard transmissive mode relying on traditional backlighting.

This latest innovation will be presented at the upcoming CES 2009 and offers us a little hope that someday we may be able to (productively) work with our lappies outdoors.

Sources:
LG Display (Press Release) via DigiTimes

LG today demonstrated their latest development in cellphone chip technology, based on the 3GPP Long Term Evolution (LTE) standard. They managed to achieve a whopping 60Mbps download / 20Mbps upload speed in the demo, around half of the technology’s theoretical limits of 100Mbps down and 50Mbps up.

The demonstration was held at the Mobile Communication Technology Research Lab in Anyang, Korea and marks a giant step forward in the development of a market-ready 4G handset (whatever that may be).

Their Modem Chip is just 13mm x 13mm (0.51″) in size and is the result of three years work by 250 R&D employees. The test terminal ran Windows Mobile which apparently played back high quality, on demand video.

The first LTE handsets are expected in 2010 and LG are currently in the process of developing the technology for use in computers, to improve upon the current WiFi standards.

Sources:
LG Press Release via Engadget

LG has unveiled its latest LCD panel, the Flatron W2252TE, which it claims is the world’s most energy efficient monitor.

It is a 22-inch widescreen display that offers a 45 per cent (~40W) power reduction compared to other models but without compromising on spec.

The display has a 1680 x 1050 resolution, a 2 ms response time, a 10,000:1 contrast ratio, a 250cd/m2 brightness rating and a 170 degree viewing angle.

Price has not yet been announced but it should be available August in the UK.

Source:
SmartPlanet

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LG Creates Round LCD Displays

We’re used to thinking of squares and rectangles when it comes to LCD displays. That’s not really surprising since that is what we’re used to seeing in nearly every HDTV or monitor.

LG is set to change all that with their new round LCD displays. Round LCDs make a lot more sense aesthetically in some applications than their cornered cousins – think about clocks, watches or instrument dials in your car for example. They could also be used in mobile phones or gaming devices, which the company says there is already a market for.

At the moment they are only very small, 6in for elliptical and 1.4in for circular-shaped LCDs, but the size will surely increase as the technology evolves.

Both types are capable of displaying 262,000 colours with a viewing angle of nearly 160 degrees.

You can see these displays at the upcoming 2008 Society for Information Display (SID) exhibition in Los Angeles (May 18 – 23) where LG will be showing this latest achievement.

Image credit: ubergizmo.com