LCD Display with 200,000:1 Contrast Ratio

When someone claims contrast ratio of 200000:1 that means when pixels are off they turn into black holes and when on - they are something like a sun. Here is how said contrast ratio is commented by Brightside in their DR37-P LCD model:

The DR37-P is capable of putting out a completely black image by not illuminating the individually modulated LEDs in the backlight when presented with a black signal. There is no residual light produced by the display, therefore the lowest amount of light it can display is zero which gives a meaningless contrast ratio of infinity. In practice, the measured contrast ratio in a dark room is determined by the second addressable step of the display (i.e. step 2 out of 65025) which is the first non-zero luminance level. In the absence of ambient light and nearby bright image areas this second addressable step produces a luminance of approximately 0.015 which yields a contrast ratio of 200000:1 using this metric. 25,000:1 using ANSI 9 point checkerboard pattern (VESA contrast ratio standard) In normal usage, the display will be in a room with some ambient light which will introduce front surface reflection and raise the effective black level of the display somewhat. The DR37 uses high end anti-reflective coatings to suppress this effect as much as possible.

And all this is achieved because this startup had enough brains to use what is called Individually Modulated Array of LED backlights ( IMLED). Basically, this technology is having a tiny lights sources behind each pixel as if there is another panel besides the main panel. IMLED enables addition of extra 8 bits to existing 8-bit color scale or LCD thus making a virtual 16-bit LCD panel. Very innovative and applausible. Now, hold on tight because the price is shocking - $49000 for the 37-incher. Is it worth it? Not yet. Let's give the company some more time to work on making it cheaper (and please redesign the look - it looks only $300 worth). By the way, this is a native 1080p display and sports SD-SDI, HD-SDI, single and dual link DVI-D inputs.


Source: Engadget, Tom's Hardware and BrightSide