Yesterday, I attended Mitsubishi Electric’s TV Line Show in New York. Mitsubishi marches to a different drummer when it comes to TV. It has a nontraditional line-up, focuses on premium products, and sells relatively few units compared to the likes of Samsung, LG, Sony, and Vizio.

Ken Werner
Senior Analyst and Editor

There has been a significant amount of pundit speculation over the last few years about whether Mitsubishi can survive, but the Mitsubishi-ites (Mitsubushies?) I talked to yesterday seemed genuinely happy with the state of their business, and had some interesting contrarian comments.

All of the LCD-TVs Mitsubishi sells have LED edge-lighting and immersive sound. What that means is that each set has a built-in sound bar. The top-of-the-line 55-inch model, which has an MSRP of $3,199, has an18-speaker sound bar that simulates Dolby Digital 5.1 audio. For an additional $399 (with transmitter) you can buy a Polk-built, wireless external sub-woofer. For another $399 there is another wireless unit that is placed in the back of the room and reproduces both back channels with increased volume and presence.

The two more economical series of products still incorporate immersive sound, only with 16 and 12 speakers in the sound bar, instead of 18. The speakers in the sound bar can be bridged so it can serve as center-channel speaker in receiver-based 5.1 set-up. Professional installers like that, said Mitsubishi reps. The company recommends the sound bar be used this way in 5.1 or 7.1 configurations, and recommends that the internal amplifier be use to power the sound bar when it’s used in this way.

The panels for the two more economical series are 120Hz; for the premium "Diamond" 265 Series they are a true 240Hz. Although Mitsubishi isn’t saying so, we have reason to believe the LCD panels are sourced from Samsung.

The 265 Series sets support Deep Color and x.v.Color.

Mitsubishi decided not to incorporate 3D this year in its LCD line-up, saying that, 1) LCD-TV technology is not yet ready for 3D, and 2) the 3D experience is better on DLP rear-projection TV. DLP switching is much faster, Mitsubishi representative said, which minimizes cross-talk. Indeed, the 3D demonstrated on Mitsubishi’s DLP sets was impressively free of cross-talk.

Later in the day, I sat with my colleague Pete Putman, watching the World Cup game between Germany and Ghana on a Sony Bravia 3D LCD-TV in the Sony booth at the CEA Line Shows. The 3D cross-talk on the Sony was so bad as to make the game nearly unwatchable. (For more details see Pete’s comments at http://www.hdtvexpert.com/?p=592.) This is a complicated situation, because a similar Sony set viewed with prototype Monster/Bit Cauldron switching 3D glasses looked much better, although the content was different. But other 3D LCD-TV sets I saw yesterday also exhibited objectionable cross-talk. Mitsubishi may have something.

The third part of Mitsubishi’s line-up is its LaserVue 3D rear-projection TV. I have not been impressed with previous iterations of the LaserVue, but this year it finally seems to be fulfilling its promise. The colors can be very saturated and the color gamut can be huge, up to 208% of NTSC, Mitsubishi said. But there are several options for reducing the gamut. One of them, the "Natural" mode, reduces the gamut down to that specified in BT.709. The normal luminance of 400 nits is not really adequate when reduced significantly by 3D glasses. "Brilliant" and "Super-brilliant" setting are available that increase the luminance to as much as 500 nits, although this reduces the set’s time to half-luminance.

Mitsubishi is marching to a different drummer, but its marching is crisp. There’s more to say about Mitsubishi’s approach, and we will — in the next issue of Large Display Report.