The quest for TV technology leadership took a new turn at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES) in Las Vegas this week, as major brands moved away from acronym wars and incremental improvements, towards dramatic shifts in formats and built-in technology.
Samsung and LG Electronics led the charge, respectively unveiling a modular "shape-shifting" TV and a roll-up TV. Hisense and Skyworth unveiled ultra-thin TVs with speakers built into the display panel itself, and Sony produced standard TVs in 85-inch and 98-inch formats, in pursuit of a goal to push for super-large screens to become the norm in living rooms. Samsung also debuted an 85-inch TV, as it vied with Sony for dominance of the emerging 8K standard, which represents a 16-fold increase in picture resolution over high-definition displays.
As the largest tech expo in the world by floor space - this year it covered more than 750,000m - CES sets the technology agenda for the year, and the evolution of TV in turn tends to define CES.
In recent years, the emphasis has been on the display technology, and in particular on finding new acronyms that the big brands hoped would set their devices apart from the competition. LG is the leader in production of organic light-emitting diode (OLED) display panels, as well as a pioneer in quantum dot (QD) technology, which produces more accurate colours. Samsung also produces QD TVs, and delivered, at successive CES events, SUHD and QLED, for super ultra high definition and QD LED. Hisense responded with ULED, for ultra LED.
As in the smartphone sector, where the public has become weary of new flagship devices that look the same as every other new flagship device - one of the factors behind a slump in Apple and Samsung phone sales - TV makers have woken up to the need for a revolution in format rather than evolution of display.
The new units unveiled by Samsung and LG were already available as concepts at CES a year ago, but only for display at a distance or private viewing. The South Korean appliance giants both appeared to be seeking market feedback before taking the technology public, and the vote seems to have been a big yes.
Meanwhile, Chinese rivals Hisense and Skyworth, who have clawed market share away from the Koreans with lower-cost high-end TVs, have each introduced a new approach to TV sound. Hisense unveiled the Sonic One TV, which measures only 1.1 inches at its thickest point. Marvellously, it has built the speakers into the display panel.
"The slim profile is achievable because a piezoelectric speaker form factor pumps sound from the panel, maintaining a super-thin profile," the company said at CES, referring to a technique for producing sound from electrical charges.
Skyworth, which is well-known in SA through its Sinotec brand as well as the first Android TVs to be launched in SA under the parent company's brand, has taken a more complex approach. It announced a new version of a sound technology for display panels launched by LG last year, called Crystal Sound OLED (CSO).
Skyworth's new TVs launched at CES use a version called CSO pro screen sound field technology, which means the sound is no longer emitted from a single point, but from the entire screen sound field, with sound and picture in the same place.
"The disappearance of traditional front-end or downward speakers has made it possible for a purely pedestal-free full screen to be presented in an artistic and extremely concise form," said Chunhui Han, MD of Skyworth in SA.
The result is a large-screen TV that does not need a base - where speakers are usually housed - and can more easily hang from a wall. This is also the thinking behind Skyworth's new Waterfall OLED TV, claimed to be the first big-screen TV with the speakers at the top of the display panel.
The unit also uses a technique first demonstrated by Samsung at CES in 2016, which Skyworth calls No Gap TV wall hanging.
"It seamlessly fits the wall like an art picture frame, breaking the cold feeling of conventional TV and perfectly merging with the living room," said Han.
That is also the concept behind the second generation of two Samsung TV units intended to perform the dual role of decoration and entertainment, the Frame and the Serif OLED TVs.
The Frame provides an Art Mode, which displays digital pieces drawn from a built-in Art Store containing more than 1,000 artworks. Luminance sensors in the TV adapt the display to fit the ambient brightness of the room, giving the art a more natural look.
The Serif, originally only available in furniture shops, is designed to blend into a living space when it is switched off. Ambient Mode can provide live text information like news and weather, as well as displaying appropriate images when the TV is turned off.
Of course, that is a mere sideshow to the new modular TV showcased by Samsung this week. In effect, it is a 75" TV made of a collection of 12x12" microLED panels, that clip into each other seamlessly - and in any configuration.
One can create a vertical TV to watch videos shot on smartphones in standard vertical mode, a square TV to watch Instagram videos, and a long, shallow screen to watch movies shot in wider-widescreen, as the 18:9 format is known.
"MicroLED will soon become a fixture of your everyday life," said Andrew Sivori, vice-president of Samsung Electronics America. "MicroLED will give you the power to create whatever you want, and to place it wherever you want it."
The device that will be remembered most vividly after the 4,500 CES exhibitors have pulled down their stands and the 180,000-odd visitors have gone home is undoubtedly the LG Signature OLED TV R. Technically known as model 65R9, it is the world's first rollable TV screen. A sequel to the LG Signature OLED TV W, or Wallpaper TV, launched at CES 2017, LG says the "R" in the new name is not for rollable, but rather "about creating a revolution in home entertainment".
It uses the flexibility of an OLED panel made of organic materials to transform itself into three viewing options: the standard Full View, a narrow Line View for displaying live text information, and a Zero View for rolling up and stowing it out of sight.
It is nonetheless unlikely that customers for the R will want to hide away this stand-out product of CES 2019...