Finally, the newcomer to the digital display world is LCoS technology. LCoS is considered reflective technology, though it uses liquid crystals like an LCD. With an LCoS unit, however, the liquid crystals are reflective. The biggest plus with an LCoS display is its high pixel count. It is the first digital display technology that has a 1920-by-1080-pixel count, meaning that most if not all high-definition signals can be displayed without any loss of resolution. It also means that the display is compatible with higher-resolution computers, so from a resolution standpoint, the LCoS technology has the greatest flexibility. But, like its LCD relative, it also has a higher black level than competing technologies, so its picture looks somewhat washed out in comparison.

What hasn’t been discussed here is the look of the images from any of the display technologies. Though each digital display’s image is made up of pixels, and the number of pixels in a display affects the detail of the image, the appearance of the image is quite different between a DLP, LCD and LCoS display. How the image looks is the result of one or more of a variety of factors, and most models of the same type of video technology tend to have a similar look. For example, LCD televisions have higher black levels and their pixels are farther apart than those of DLP or LCoS televisions, which can produce an effect akin to watching TV through a screen door. DLP televisions do not have these issues, but they do have the aforementioned rainbow effect as a result of the use of the color wheel. I’ve always said that the most important specification of any type of display is the one that cannot be described in print. You can research native resolution, inputs and a variety of other hard specifications on a spec sheet, but in order to tell how well a display will reproduce its image, you have to physically see it.