According to Digitimes Research, micro-projectors have been introduced into mass production since the second half of 2008, and liquid crystal-based liquid crystal (LiquidCrystalonSilicon; LCoS) and Texas Instruments (TI) independently developed digital light source processing (DigitalLightProcess; DLP) and other two technologies, and called micro The mainstream of projection technology. At present, two types of micro-projection technologies use LEDs as light sources. Due to the high mass production of LEDs, more and more manufacturers have the ability to mass-produce, and the cost continues to decline. Among them, LCoS micro-projection technology can also use white LED with color filter, which can effectively reduce the cost of micro projector and increase the penetration rate.
In 2010, with the gradual recovery of the consumer electronics market, terminal manufacturers and consumers will also tighten the technical requirements for micro projectors. Therefore, the development of micro projector quality will have three major trends, including the improvement of brightness, the improvement of resolution, and the improvement of color performance.
In order to improve the brightness, LED manufacturers are increasing the luminous efficiency of LEDs year by year; although white LEDs with color filters have the advantage of reducing costs, but inevitably affect the color performance, LCoS micro projector terminal manufacturers have adopted RGBLED light sources. As for the resolution, theoretically, it is determined by the panel end. However, if the luminance does not reach a certain standard and the panel resolution is high, it is difficult to have a corresponding display effect.
In addition to LEDs, lasers have the potential to evolve into light sources for pico projectors. At present, although a variety of emerging micro-projection technologies have adopted laser light sources, only the 2-dimensional scanning MEMS micro-projection technology independently developed by Microvision has been introduced into mass production in early 2010. Although the laser light source has the advantages of good collimation and no manual focus, it will cause the laser spot (Speckle) phenomenon to affect the image quality. Although it cannot be solved, it still takes a lot of trouble. In addition, at present, due to the short-time production of green lasers, and only Corning can be mass-produced and expensive, it is necessary to use micro-projectors with laser as a light source for more than two years.
