Whatever happened to "Extreme Devices"?

[Nelson J. Navarro]

Hello,

I'm wondering, does anyone know if Extreme Devices' cold cathode technology
ever went anywhere? Do any CRTs make use of it?

http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20020104S0027

Regards,
Nelson Navarro

 

[Joerg]

Hi Nelson,

There was a later story in EET, not so enthusing:

http://www.eetimes.com/semi/c/as/showArticle.jhtml?articleId=18310562&kc=2634

Seems like they ran into a frequent snag: Cost. You can have the greatest idea
but if the solution is going to cost a lot more than what's already out there
it has to have some very convincing upside for the user. Maybe "instant on" and
some other features aren't quite enough. Then there are the LCD panels, plasma
and all that, which are all competing here.

Regards, Joerg
http://www.analogconsultants.com

 

[Mike Harrison]

On Thu, 6 May 2004 18:47:50 -0400, "Nelson J. Navarro" <nnavarro@_removethis_adelphia.net> wrote:

Hello,

I'm wondering, does anyone know if Extreme Devices' cold cathode technology
ever went anywhere? Do any CRTs make use of it?

http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20020104S0027

Regards,
Nelson Navarro



On a similar subject, I wonder what happened to a really neat idea to improve colour LCDs I read

about a couple of years ago - instead of having a white backlight, then wasting two-thirds of it in
each of the RGB colour stripe filters, and having to compromise the LCD fluid to cope with the full
colour range, they used a UV backlight, which then passed through the LCD, and got converted to
visible light by RGB phosphors instead of a stripe filter - seemed like a really neat idea...

 

[Nelson J. Navarro]

Hello Joerg,

Thanks for the update.

I wonder what trouble the company had "getting its technology to work
completely"?

This makes me think that in addition to high cost, maybe their emitter
technology has some fundamental flaw that would preclude its use in other
devices, e.g., microwave tubes. Otherwise, I think they could have gotten
some grant money or a partner or even went public and issued stock.

Regards,
Nelson

"Joerg" <notthisjoergsch@removethispacbell.net> wrote in message
news:409AC56A.9FAD2A0@removethispacbell.net...

Hi Nelson,

There was a later story in EET, not so enthusing:


http://www.eetimes.com/semi/c/as/showArticle.jhtml?articleId=18310562&kc=2634

Seems like they ran into a frequent snag: Cost. You can have the greatest
idea
but if the solution is going to cost a lot more than what's already out
there
it has to have some very convincing upside for the user. Maybe "instant
on" and
some other features aren't quite enough. Then there are the LCD panels,
plasma
and all that, which are all competing here.

Regards, Joerg
http://www.analogconsultants.com

 

[Joerg]

Hi Nelson,

As far as I remember they did raise $30M in the fall of 2000. Sometimes it isn't
a technical roadblock that ends projects. Could very well be that the drying up
of the VC market after the tech slump did it.

One tough cookie for this type of company is that their equipment is extremely
expensive and often the risks with that are aggravated by the fact that there
isn't much of a market for it should they decide to unload some of it later.

Regards, Joerg
http://www.analogconsultants.com

 

[John Larkin]

On Thu, 6 May 2004 18:47:50 -0400, "Nelson J. Navarro"
<nnavarro@_removethis_adelphia.net> wrote:

Hello,

I'm wondering, does anyone know if Extreme Devices' cold cathode technology
ever went anywhere? Do any CRTs make use of it?

http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20020104S0027

Regards,
Nelson Navarro

Sounds like they've joined the couple-of-dozen other companies that
have washed out on microtips/amorphous diamond/carbon
nanotube/schottky cold emitters. The field strengths and current
densities necessary to get cold emission wind up destroying the tips
or emitting very erratically. Cold emitters tend to need outrageous
vacuums, too.

Everybody's going LCD anyhow.

John

 

[John Larkin]

On Fri, 07 May 2004 00:08:10 +0100, Mike Harrison
<mike@whitewing.co.uk> wrote:

On Thu, 6 May 2004 18:47:50 -0400, "Nelson J. Navarro" <nnavarro@_removethis_adelphia.net> wrote:

Hello,

I'm wondering, does anyone know if Extreme Devices' cold cathode technology
ever went anywhere? Do any CRTs make use of it?

http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20020104S0027

Regards,
Nelson Navarro



On a similar subject, I wonder what happened to a really neat idea to improve colour LCDs I read
about a couple of years ago - instead of having a white backlight, then wasting two-thirds of it in
each of the RGB colour stripe filters, and having to compromise the LCD fluid to cope with the full
colour range, they used a UV backlight, which then passed through the LCD, and got converted to
visible light by RGB phosphors instead of a stripe filter - seemed like a really neat idea...

Frame sequential RGB illumination with LEDs would be wonderful, giving
three times the resolution of colored pixels and less light wasted. I
guess most LCDs are too slow for this.

John

 

[Nelson J. Navarro]

In case anyone's interested, here's a paper that describes some of the
various approaches: http://www.pfe-ltd.com/technicalpapers/IMRabstract.pdf

Regards,
Nelson

"John Larkin" <jjlarkin@highSNIPlandTHIStechPLEASEnology.com> wrote in
message news8jl90tn1v83eohdrf6d6vr305ut1jb14e@4ax.com...

On Thu, 6 May 2004 18:47:50 -0400, "Nelson J. Navarro"
nnavarro@_removethis_adelphia.net> wrote:

Hello,

I'm wondering, does anyone know if Extreme Devices' cold cathode
technology
ever went anywhere? Do any CRTs make use of it?

http://www.eetimes.com/story/OEG20020104S0027

Regards,
Nelson Navarro




Sounds like they've joined the couple-of-dozen other companies that
have washed out on microtips/amorphous diamond/carbon
nanotube/schottky cold emitters. The field strengths and current
densities necessary to get cold emission wind up destroying the tips
or emitting very erratically. Cold emitters tend to need outrageous
vacuums, too.

Everybody's going LCD anyhow.

John