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by William Van Winkle |
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Elo TouchSystems Elo TouchSystems is essentially to touchscreen monitors what HP is to printers. If you haven't heard of Elo before, that's likely because the market for touchscreens is a slim fraction of the overall display sector. You won't find touchscreens in mass merchant aisles or on special feature at the big e-tailers. This is because touch-based displays all but require specialized software from vertical market ISVs. Nobody would dream of buying a touchscreen just for Web browsing and MS Word; the input method simply isn't suited to the applications. But pick any vertical from hospitality to manufacturing and K-12 education to gaming (think casinos) and you're likely to find huge areas in which touch-optimized solutions are either needed or are in use but could benefit from upgrading. "Touch is sort of where LCDs were back in 1998," says Elo's Bill Nulf, director of channel sales. "They're just coming into their own. It's a very hot market, not because of the LCD but because of the touch. Now, you don't have to be an engineer to spec one in and hook one up. And the rise in touch technology popularity is a result of our society. If you have to stand in line for more that two seconds, you lose your patience. So in kiosks, point of sale, or wherever, touch helps dissipate lines and waiting."
Being able to demonstrate productivity is key in a field where 15" LCD monitors with otherwise low-end specs sport similar price tags to conventional high-end 19" flat screens. This is fairly easy in an environment where mouse fumbling can cost many wasted seconds per transaction and cumulatively add up to significant customer frustration or even walk-outs. Nulf notes that retail/hospitality is now the biggest touch market and therefor the easiest for resellers to crack. Less obvious environments might be ones in which users are required to wear thick gloves or, as on charter boats, have data applications in settings where motion makes mouse operation difficult at best. (Note that many touchmonitors are water resistant to significant pressures.) The application range for touchscreens is simply too vast to match one model to a particular niche. However, an excellent general purpose panel from Elo is the 1925L, a 19" design with a street price in the $1,200 or lower range. On paper, the 1925L specs out much like other popular 19" units: 1280 x 1024 resolution, 25 ms response time, 170-degree viewing angle, 300 cd/m2 brightness, and 700:1 contrast. The unit builds in a pair of speakers as well as a couple of USB ports. The 1925L doesn't start to show its worth until you see that the base is designed to both hide all cabling as well as bolt to the desktop. The base is also reversible for wall mounting, or there is a VESA mounting option. The screen is sealed to the bezel, and the OSD controls can be locked to prevent public tampering. And, of course, the screen is touch sensitive with either Elo's AccuTouch Five-Wire Resistive Technology or the company's IntelliTouch Surface Wave Technology. Five-Wire is the dominant approach and one of the most cost-efficient to implement. It is basically a uniformly resistive coating stretched taut over a glass substrate, which is then mounted to the LCD display screen. A touch from any object compresses the membrane between the coating and the glass, establishing a point of contact that is then converted into X, Y coordinates. The approach is tough, washable, and well-suited to harsh environments, but it is prone to scratching or pressure damage, and it is not the most accurate of touch technologies. Surface wave technology also uses a glass overlay but instead uses a 5 MHz electrical signal that is then converted into ultrasonic waves. These waves are beamed across the glass and read by transducers at the corners of the overlay. Touch coordinates are calculated by analyzing the part of the wave blocked by an interfering object, such as a fingertip. Surface wave designs offer superior image clarity to Fire-Wire as well as the most sensitive resolution, accurate to 4,096 x 4,096 density. Elo also has touchmonitors based on capacitive and infrared technologies, plus the company has another sensing method in the works. One is not intrinsically better than any of the others; each has its own merits based on the customer's environmental and cost requirements.
Elo has additionally found rising success with all-in-one LCD "touchcomputers," such as the 1529L. This is essentially a 15" LCD touchscreen with a built-in computer. The CPU is typically a fanless 1 GHz VIA Eden chip backed by 512MB of RAM, a Type 2.1 PCMCIA slot, a CF slot, four USB 1.1 ports, 10/100 LAN, and a minimum 30GB hard drive for XP/2000 configurations. Windows CE-based touchcomputers load straight from a 64MB CF card and can dispense with the hard drive. Naturally, going with a touchcomputer doesn't leave much hardware for the system builder to configure, but the footprint benefits of not needing a separate PC and the simplicity of being able to focus on integration rather than screwdriver work has plenty of appeal for all parties involved. The obvious question is where on earth you're going to find touch-ready applications to bring to your customers. Elo may not offer the same sort of ornate channel program found with the likes of BenQ, LG, or Samsung, but the company doesn't exactly have to lure in business with back-end incentives. Instead, Elo's TouchReady Program is a central gathering point for touch application ISVs to showcase their wares and partner with solution resellers. This is probably your best bet for finding an application or two most compatible with your existing clientele. "Leverage your current suppliers and customer base," advises Nuff. "If you're in verticals, start working on touch. Lots of VARs who never gave touch a second thought are now doing it because it's no longer an engineer sale like three or four years ago. Even a non-technical idiot like me can set it up and have it running out of the box in less than five minutes. RAM readers first need to get familiar with touchscreens but then add in the printers, scanners, bar code readers, cash drawers, and develop relationships with the ISVs in that space. Like there are dry cleaner verticals, restaurants, retail, fast food—all types that need to be looked at." LG Electronics LG bears many similarities to BenQ. Both manufacture their own panels (in this case, LG sources from LG.Philips). Both are huge companies that lean heavily on low pricing to build market share for their relatively new display brands. LG matches BenQ with its selective three-year, 48-hour hot swap, pre-paid shipping warranty. And LG, like BenQ, is still grappling with trying to overcome public misconceptions. After all, when I see LG on TV advertisements, it's for refrigerators, not computer peripherals.
"Last year, we heard, ‘Oh, yeah, we know LG. They're a lower-end manufacturer,'" says LG director of marketing Chris Neff. "This year, we're getting compared to the name brands everybody recognizes. Resellers are now seeing that we're not going to go away or dump our product all over the place for the lowest bidder." In poking around LG's LCD collection and speaking with company reps, I sensed a growing unease that LG is feeling itself becoming more a member of the display herd rather than a breakaway leader. But again, this may have more to do with public perception than true fact. For instance, in September of 2004, LG debuted its f-Engine chip. While LG marketing materials are more shy about noting that the f-Engine is a YUV converter and channel enhancer, that's exactly what it is. Just like BenQ, yes?
Well, no. BenQ's Senseye allows the user to select from any of five color/contrast preset modes, such as modes for productivity applications or movie playback. LG's f-Engine provides four modes for color (Flesh-tone, Nature, Sports, and Color Enhancement) plus manual adjustment options. f-Engine then provides another three presets for contrast enhancement plus manual controls. So while the two image enhancer technologies may look identical on the surface, LG actually provides more functionality and control for those willing to delve into its options. Truthfully, I fell in love with LG's large LCDs when the L2320A first arrived. It was the first widescreen LCD I'd ever sampled, and while the image quality knocked me back, the brilliance of its multi-input Media Station box, which handled all cables ranging from RCA to DVI, blew me away. I still have yet to find a more impressive design for letting one monitor tackle every possible video application.
Today, given that widescreens, never mind costly 23" displays, are not in the market's sweet spots, LG is giving higher priority to newer models, such as the L1980Q. This 19" unit integrates the f-Engine chip for superior image quality on top of its default 250 cd/m2 brightness and 500:1 contrast. Typical response time is a sweet 8 ms, and the viewing angle is 160 degrees. What makes the L1980Q so delicious is its mirror and pivot capabilities, allowing users 360 degrees of freedom to adjust the panel without moving the base. As you can see in LG's advertisements in this magazine, the base's hinge design allows the monitor to fold down to incredibly slim (2.8 inches!) dimensions, which can come in handy with the included wall mounting kit. Interestingly, the control buttons are heat- rather than pressure-sensitive, so you can "press" buttons without actually touching them. I'm stumped for a practical application for this, but it definitely has geek appeal. The L1980Q sports LG's trademark teardrop bezel around the power button. Specifically for channel resellers, the company released an L1981Q version without the teardrop so that screens could be tiled flush with one another for wall displays. Taking one more step up, LG recently added the 20" L2012P to its portfolio. The L2012P also uses the f-Engine chip, offers both VGA and DVI ports, and supports pivoting. This is a less stylish, more corporate-looking unit, though, in which LG has concentrated on core specs: 178-degree viewing angle, 300 cd/m2 brightness, 800:1 contrast, and 16 ms response, which not so long ago was considered the threshold for artifact-free video. (And then vendors realized they needed new SKUs to sell. Go figure.) While the L2012P still had yet to reach store shelves as of this writing, it has all the hallmarks of being a strong performer for graphics professionals looking to put their dollars into image quality rather than more experimental value-adds. Yet for all its apparent merits, I have to wonder if the L2012P can thrive on image quality and strong pricing alone. Even if the monitor were best in its class, on paper it still looks like a me-too product. A strong channel program might be the push resellers need to get excited about the product. We've discussed LG's SuperSeller program in RAM before, and it's got all the bells and whistles you could request: 30% off demo units, 30-day free eval units, dedicated reseller support, accrued points that trade for prizes, and even a grand prize, which last year was a Lexus hybrid SUV. Compared to what is offered by the overwhelming majority of component manufacturers out there, SuperSeller is a phenomenally motivating and generous program. The trouble may be that it also sounds a lot like the programs offered by BenQ and Samsung these days. Chris Neff indicated that the LG program is currently in a state of review and that new programs will be arriving in Q4 designed to help resellers increase margins and assist partners who have been telling LG that "the LCD price wars are getting on their nerves." Until then, I asked Neff what was the number-one benefit and value-add that LG displays bring to the channel. "I think the main thing resellers want to know is what happens if something goes wrong. Who can they turn to? Is there going to be consistency in the entire product line? Is the panel going to suddenly change in mid-production because the manufacturer's source ran out? That's not going to happen with us. We build our entire product line from start to finish, and this gives us the ability to give our channel partners around the world exactly what they need." NEC NEC Display Solutions, despite its changing name, is one of the oldest and most respected groups in the LCD world. NEC has never been flashy. Rather, NEC designs are almost always professional, simple, and clean-cut, saving their best attributes for the display image and corporate TCO calculators.
"We're sort of like comparing a BMW or Mercedes to a Yugo," says Andrés Maldonado, NEC director of product marketing. "Yeah, each has four wheels and will get you around, but how long will they do their job, and how much does each really cost you at the end?" These days, NEC divides its channel efforts into six programs: System Builder Select (designed for white box resellers), ProPartner Select (high-end graphics), Display Solutions Select (SKUs involving privacy, touchscreens, etc.), Consumer Select (consumer-focused), GovClub (government and education), and MD Select (medical). NEC maintains its basic ChanneLink program for all resellers, but the best incentives, such as rebates, MDF, and training, are reserved for resellers who get certified into at least one of these six program categories. Accordingly, NEC segments its displays into four groups: business, consumer, medical, and information. For the purposes of our value-add discussion, we were most drawn to the large LCDs in NEC's lineup. One example is the MultiSync LCD3210-BK, a 32" LCD aimed at signage markets with a retail price of $2,700. With some 30" LCD TVs now starting under $1,000, what could NEC offer to compensate for such a massive price delta? For starters, the LCD3210 integrates a new backlight system for more uniform brightness, because, when viewed from across a room, poor backlighting sticks out like a sore thumb. True HD resolution of 1366 x 768 isn't exactly novel in large panels, but the integration of a real-time clock for content scheduling and sleep/wake management (no small consideration given the power draw for large displays) is. The 600:1 contrast is strong, but this model's 500 cd/m2 brightness is what signage calls for in distance viewing under daylight conditions. Perhaps the LCD3210's biggest draw is its inclusion of TileMatrix, which enables quick and relatively painless setup of video walls in up to 5 x 5 grids. "Normally, if you want to bring in three, five, fifteen displays into a tile matrix, you have to buy something like a Jupiter server for $10,000 or $15,000," says NEC's Anne Tuisl, director of channel and marketing communications. "So you might save $500 per monitor with a cheaper brand, but now divide in the cost of that server or other mechanism to make that tiling work. With us, it's built in."
At the other end of the spectrum, the LCD1770VX is NEC's answer to the commodity 17" market. Once again, you don't see much that's special just by running down the specs: 250 cd/m2 brightness, 500:1 contrast, dual video inputs, and a 160-degree viewing angle. There is a "No Touch Auto Adjust" function but nary an image enhancing chip to be seen. About the most innovative part of this unit is its NaViSet OSM software, which lets users control screen attributes with a mouse rather than bezel buttons. NEC pegs the SKU's estimated street price at $345, almost twice that of a tier-three display with similar specs. Still, the company is undaunted in maintaining its value. "We judge value by looking at total cost of ownership, things like operating expenses," says NEC's Richard Atanus, vice president of product development and customer service and support. "What's the energy consumption on a monitor, and will I save on operating expenses with NEC over another monitor? Some LCDs can show 1280, but they're fuzzy because the display uses low-end scalers, so they can't handle that amount of information. Scalers are also going to make a difference in edges and the jaggies you see in some applications. There's recycling and disposal. Is this monitor made with recyclable materials? Does it not have hazardous metals incorporated into it so it's easier to dispose of? Also, NEC tends to garner a higher resale value than other brands. Will you get more out of your monitor if you decide to sell it in three or four years?" Company reps also caution resellers to look under the hood at component quality within the display. As we've seen on motherboards, cheap capacitors can be subject to evaporation and fail prematurely, causing a monitor that should have lasted five to seven years to fail in only two or three. On the topic of recycling, NEC's Total Trade program is exemplary throughout the industry. Working with a recycling partner, NEC has gathered over five million pounds of monitor materials for re-usage or recycling. If a monitor goes back to NEC still in working condition, the company will issue some credit to the donator that can be applied to future NEC display purchases. Note, too, that NEC's Total Trade will accept any technology equipment for recycling, even cell phones. Environmentalism isn't a sales pitch that everyone is ready to hear yet, but as pressure from Europe continues to sway the tech community, NEC's activity on this front may turn out to be a bigger channel asset than you'd think. If nothing else, NEC's green attributes make its models more salable to international clients as well as those who don't want to risk running afoul of future U.S. regulations. NEC also helps channel partners by offering upsell options for its displays, including extended warranties, resellable on-site service, and two-way freight coverage for RMAs. Philips Philips may not be widely known as a strong monitor brand in the channel, but that may soon change. In reality, the company's presence in distribution is relatively ancient. I used to help sell Philips CGA and VGA monitors under the Magnavox brand 15 years ago. All of that time and experience has built up to some very impressive things for Philips, and now the company offers an alternative for high-end buyers every bit as persuasive as NEC. Take the 20" 200W6CB. This dual-input widescreen panel spans 1680 x 1050 resolution, sufficient for two side-by-side letter-spaced pages, yet still maintains an impressive 16 ms response time along with a 176-degree viewing angle. Typical contrast is 600:1 and brightness is 300 nits. The lead-free design and RoHS Directive compliance are laudable, but this pales as a channel value-add besides Philips' SmartManage functionality for corporations. "SmartManage is an asset management application co-developed with Altiris using the DDC/CI protocol built into the monitor, allowing you to do a whole host of functions," explains Chris Pollitt, product marketing manager for Philips. "Of course, you can track model number, serial number, date of acquisition, and the like, but it goes way beyond that, and some of our features are pretty surprising. For example, you can track the number of hours on the backlight. So if you have 1,000 units deployed, after 15,000 to 20,000 hours, when you better be looking to upgrade some of those monitors, you can run a query to see how many monitors are greater than or equal to 15,000 hours. We're looking to wrap our warranty around that, just like auto manufacturers. Because if you've had a monitor for five years that only has 10,000 hours on it, that unit still has a lot of life left in it." Given these benefits, I was mildly shocked to discover that, at $699 MSRP, the 200W6CB is one of the least expensive 20" widescreen monitors on the market.
But there's more good news with Philips' SXGA 19" flagship, the 190P6. This is one of the Philips models alluded to earlier that meets ISO 13406-2 Class I compliance, the foundation of Philips' Perfect Panel warranty. The monitor uses Philips' own image enhancement DSP, which it calls LightFrame Digital Reality. SmartManage comes bundled as does a very slick color calibration feature. Like Photoshop and many color printers, the 190P6 supports sRBG, so users can accurately match screen colors to final print output. Philips here matches BenQ's ambient light sensing for dynamic brightness control, and the 190P6 delivers 8 ms white-black-white response time. Street price runs below $450. All Philips P-series monitors include LightFrame, and all P- and B-series units offer the Perfect Panel warranty. Another excellent value-add for Philips is the smart security function found in many SKUs. If you remove a secured monitor from its host PC, two things happen. First, a warning message goes out to the designated admin. Second, just as with car stereos today, if the device is removed from it's host, it ceases to work. A managed Philips monitor taken from the office and planted on someone's home PC would work for about 10 minutes and then shut down. And don't bother looking for Philips monitors in your mass merchant competitors' ads. Philips only sells through the channel. Samsung By far the most prominent of the third-party monitor brands, Samsung's quality, style, and innovation almost need no discussion. We've dedicated a lot of ink in RAM both to Samsung's incredible monitors as well as its equally impressive channel program, the Power Partner Program (P3), which has been so successful that Samsung has left it virtually unchanged for over two years. In fact, the only major update to the P3 this year is the inclusion of Pro A/V products into the program, which should be welcome news to resellers involved in high-end multimedia deployments in corporations and home theaters. The new SyncMaster 193p+, still on its way to store shelves as of press time, specs a standard 250 cd/m2 brightness but a remarkable 1,000:1 contrast ratio—an extreme yet feasible number given Samsung's history of excellent contrast performance. The SXGA, dual input 19" screen also delivers a remarkable 178-degree viewing angle. But the monitor is perhaps a better showcase for some of Samsung's latest value-add terminology.
"The 193p+ integrates our new set of proprietary ‘Magic' features," explains Helman Lukito, senior marketing manager for Samsung. "With our MagicTune software, users can actually tune their monitors from the operating system. Before, you had to figure out the on-screen menus and front face buttons. MagicPivot is software we bundle that lets you seamlessly switch between portrait and landscape viewing. MagicBright gives users optimal modes for displaying text, multimedia, or Web content, although you can also fine-tune these brightness settings manually. And out MagicSpeed delivers the fastest response times in the industry. In this case, we're talking 4 ms gray-to-gray." Looking at Samsung last among our monitor brands, Samsung's collection of value-adds may not seem uniquely magical. However, the company has a long, proven track record of blending such innovations together seamlessly and effectively in an attractive form factor and at price points the market finds too good to pass up. Lest you think that Samsung's features are ordinary, look no further than the SyncMaster 460pn, a 46" behemoth from the Pro A/V group that is one of the first two monitors (the other being Samsung's 40" 400pn) to ever feature integrated LAN functionality. This is a huge development that will help transform how digital signage and presentation hardware get deployed.
With Samsung's MagicNet technology, digital video becomes packetized and dished out across the LAN, administered by a "server" running the MagicNet software. The use of Ethernet erases the distance limitations imposed by conventional video cabling, letting one PC schedule and manage screens across multiple floors throughout a building...or possibly even from across the world. Conceivably, a company could instantly and simultaneously change the ad messaging in its lobbies for 50 branch offices with a few keystrokes. On top of everything else, one of Samsung's best value-adds is peace of mind. The company offers a three-year warranty with lifetime toll-free tech support and even pays for shipping both ways during the first year. Just because others have copied this policy doesn't mean it still isn't the best in the business. Looking Forward "Monitors are often considered a commodity in the market now, and that can make it hard for resellers to choose and differentiate," notes Philips product marketing manager Chris Pollitt. "A lot of the marketing these days just encourages customers to look at the lowest price. Well, we've created value in the monitor so it's not just a commodity. It's now a solution. It saves time, it's insurance against future regulations. It now offers things that Dell can't." Value-adds in LCD monitors are vital. If a customer stops to think about it, the monitor may well be the single most important component in his configuration. A poor monitor can increase ergonomic strain and damage productivity, and money tossed at inferior panels will often get spent again and again while quality monitors from manufacturers that stake their livelihood on brand perception make sure that end-users and channel partners alike stay happy. Still, it's harder to sell intangibles like quality. The best thing about value-adds is that most of them can be immediately seen and put to use. In implementing those value-adds, you might be surprised at some of the new applications and environments that open up for your business. "This is an exciting area for resellers," says Andrés Maldonado, director of product marketing for NEC, "because it's where technology can really transform. It's something that has been done a certain way for many years, and now new opportunities are popping up not just for how content is displayed but also the way it is delivered. And that's where the reseller can play a role: helping the end-user understand how that's done, then helping them do it." Value-add displays can transform a home's entertainment just as it can reshape how churches are able to communicate with congregations. I wouldn't even be surprised to see small LCDs resurge in places such as security and in-car PCs. All it takes are the right applications and the right resellers driving display-based solutions to a public that largely doesn't know what it's been missing. ...more |
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