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Philips LED LUX LCD television launches

IFA 2008: LED backlighting to deliver outstanding blacks

28 August 2008 14:02 GMT / By Chris Hall

Philips today announced the launch of their 9800 series of LCD TV, dubbed LED LEX, using LED technology to deliver their best performing television to date, with a distinct focus on "pure performance".

The new technology replaces the CCFL backlighting common in LCD panels with LEDs. The advantage the of an array of LEDs over traditional bulbs is that they can be individually switched off, delivering superior black levels: where a similar sized CCFL LCD might have 16 bulbs, the Philips LED LUX will have 128 segments, all of which can be dimmed independently. The result, Philips claim, is a dynamic contrast ratio of 2,000,000:1 and in the example shown to Pocket-lint, it certainly did look very impressive competing with a similar sized leading plasma screen.

For those interested in the tech specs, the panel will feature 128 segments, arranged in 8 rows of 16 segments, each segment containing 9 LEDs – that’s a total of 1152 LEDs maths fans.

The LED LUX 42PFL9803 will come with a brushed aluminium bezel and has been recognised by EISA as "European LCD-TV 2008-2009". The TV will also feature the normal array of Philips technology such as the Perfect Pixel HD engine, which in 2008 has been doubled in power to process 500 million pixels per second. But whilst you’ll be getting more out of your TV, you can also pat yourself on the back for taking less out of the environment, as Philips claim the LED delivers a power saving of up 45% over conventional bulbs.

The LED LUX will also feature Philips’ Ambilight feature, so whilst enjoying those near-perfect blacks on screen, you can enjoy the pretty lights cast across your walls.

The 42PFL9803 will feature four HDMI ports for your Blu-ray player and next-gen consoles. It will also feature an Ethernet port to access your networked content.

Prices are still to be confirmed, but expect to pay around 2999 euros.

We will keep you posted.