I agree just played a Baywatch for the first time and have no idea why new machines don't have these big screens. Also color DMD would be nice as well going forward if not anything to do with LCD. This is what I am talking about bringing in something new to the game. It's 2013 and I feel new features need to be done for the asking price of these games built today.

put on of those on my baywatch and on my WWF, i realize its not big screen just want the color, and I'll be a happy man.

Cost is why the big DMDs weren't used much (and will most likely never be used again), plain and simple.

I think the color DMD could be really cool on those Sega games. I have an Apollo 13, and the DMD is definitely impressive. It would probably be incredible in color.

even if they just replicated the colours and not modify colours. The pins with the super dmd's are always a bit cheaper because of the fear of the dmd failing.

I would guess that due to the small amount of games that use that size vs the standard size, that it may be extremely low profit margins, or even none at all. 3 or 4 games used that sized end correct? How many would they need to sell to make a profit, and how much more would they cost vs the standard color dmd? 100-200 would be my guess. Would any owner of the bigger sized dmd games be willing to lay down 499-599 for the panel?

(Not trying to put down the idea by any means, just being realistic.)

We've been asked about this a lot but haven't really been able to spend much time looking into it due to other projects.

I'm sure we could work out the technical issues. However given the added cost of a larger LCD panel (or adding a bezel for the existing panel), I don't think an LCD solution would be more cost effective than the plasma displays that are still on the market.

If/when those plasmas disappear, we could introduce something that would keep those games running.

Randy

Could something like a monolithic LED display be feasible for these? Though an LCD would be ideal (monochrome Sigma being more desirable). In my opinion the time to start developing aftermarket replacements is now, Vishay no longer makes these and supply on Pinball Life comes and goes. It's difficult enough to find them, especially for an OP.

Look at how much the price of TVs have gone down in price. When Pioneer was selling a 50in for about 5k about 7 of 8 years ago and now 50 in is under 1k. A 70in sharp TV at Costco is around 1,600 and even 80in is 3,500. I just don't understand as technology advances and nothing new is brought to pinball bec everyone blame cost. A few hundred more for bigger and color DMD would work and show improvements. If your already spending 5 to 7k for new games as it us and not getting much when you compare to the 90's area pins for the most part.

Monolithic only makes sense for densely packed elements... the wafer cost for the unused area between discrete isolated high power diodes would be extraordinary. Besides small OLED screens, I'm not aware of any monolithic LED displays.

The existing LED DMD's are made up of either discrete diodes on a board, or small packaged matrices of discrete diodes and diffusers.

The cost of both LED and LCD solutions is really driven by volume. Since all of this is built custom and there are limited applications outside of pinball, there's little opportunity to drive costs down.

LCD panels come close because they are widely used for notebook displays. But because the volume we buy is so small (hundreds vs hundreds of thousands) we can only obtain overstock purchased by traders which results in significantly higher costs than those paid by notebook manufacturers. Of this limited overstock, we then have to filter out panels rejected by the notebook manufacturers due to pixel defects which results in even higher cost.

Unfortunately, I haven't identified a market shift or technology driver that would significantly reduce prices in the near future. New and improved LCD panels are coming that displace the older technology but so far have not reduced prices.

Different situation completely. The large size creates a niche market (the same can be said for the small sized dmd used in games like tmnt and checkpoint) and none of the games that use them go for anywhere near 5-7k, most can be found for 2k or under. The numbers produced for the large dmd games is nowhere near the numbers made for the standard sized dmds, which will always create less of a demand.

Besides, what is the percentage of households in the United States (or world) with a tv? HUGE market. Now how many households in the United States (or world) have a pinball machine? This is still a niche hobby, even though it has grown. Comparing the economies of scale for a tv vs a dmd for a pinball doesn't make much sense. If they were truly comprable, dmds would be about 50 bucks (and I would not complain about that at all!)

It would be neat to see, but I don't see it being a priority.

Oh god... large display plus color... cost nightmare!

Expensive, yes. But is it worth it? Yes!!

Wouldn't ColorDMD be able to use the same screen they use for the B/W games? The LCD's are already oversized. So at $400 a screen for color vs. the cost of the original large screen (close to the same?), I think most people would choose color as a replacement.

I checked on that a while ago. From what I recall the screen wasn't quite wide enough. To use the same screen we'd probably need to fabricate some kind of bezel and make the image a little smaller.

Price for a customizable single-color display would probably end up pretty close to the plasmas.

Yes...but you'd have CUSTOMIZABLE color for your DMD at the same cost of the plasmas. Sign me up!

...and they'd be more reliable, and consume less power.

Batman Forever would look sweet with a green display...

+1

I wouldn't mind if slightly smaller with a bezel, for Baywatch could try out blues, reds or yellows and also get away from the neat 5v issue

Even if it's a slightly smaller panel I would definitely be interested in a Sigma display for large Segas. Plasmas use high voltage parts that are likely to fail even before the display outgasses. LCD are proven to be much more reliable.