Anything that makes a laptop lighter is a welcome development and a good place to start addressing the challenge may be the LCD. Toshiba Matsushita Display Technology Co., Ltd. (TMD), and Toshiba America Electronic Components, Inc., TMD’s sales and marketing arm in the Americas, have announced development of new 10.4" and 10.6" thin-film transistor (TFT) liquid crystal display (LCD) panels for notebook PC applications, each incorporating an LED backlighting system to provide low-profile, lightweight, and low-power consumption features. The newly developed products allow Toshiba to provide a wide selection of LCDs for customers to choose from ranging from 8.9" to 13.3". TMD has been expanding its lineup of LED-backlit LCD products for notebook applications, combined with proprietary low-temperature poly-silicon (LTPS) technology, beginning with the world’s first commercialization of an LED-backlit 11.1" WXGA+ resolution LCD panel for notebook PCs in October 2005. According to the company, compared with a conventional cold cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL) backlighting system, the LED backlighting has distinct advantages such as reduced thickness, reduced weight, increased brightness, and decreased power consumption. It also features lower operating voltages, which provides another advantage in design and safety aspects. An LED backlighting system contributes to increased durability against impacts and vibration. Including the two newly developed panels, TMD’s lineup of LED-backlit TFT LCD panels now offers the above-mentioned size range along with pixel resolutions of XGA, WXGA, and WXGA+.In these notebook PC panels TMD has also adopted thinner glass substrates of 0.3 mm or less, reduced the number of component parts to the minimum requirement and optimized layout design for weight reduction. For example, TMD has succeeded in decreasing the weights to 120g for a 10.4" XGA module and to 135g for a 12.1" XGA module. These improvements have helped to reduce overall module thickness to only 2.5mm for several of TMD’s notebook PC LCD products. TMD has also achieved a brightness level up to 300 candelas per sq. meter (cd/m2) in certain products in this family. The new 10.4" and 10.6" LCD displays are available now from TAEC. Pricing in sample quantities is $350 each for both models.