The big deal at the moment is CES, The Consumer Electronics Show in Las Vegas. Mitsubishi have just unveiled a new type of rear projection television that uses three separate lasers to project the picture onto the screen.

Industry guru’s say this could be a big gamble for Mitsubishi, as Sony are abandoning rear projection all together as consumers move more and more toward LCD and Plasma flat panel technologies. Even using lasers, these sets are still a little “deep”.

Mitsubishi believe they can succeed with this product, however, because the laser DLP system provides as much as twice the colour depth of existing technologies, while consuming about a third of the power that a similar sized LCD television would need.

Also adding to the possible draw of these sets, they are lighter than their LCD rivals (and we all know how heavy plasma sets are), and the theory is that the laser technology will be very reliable and last a long long time, probably offering a much better service life than LCD sets.

I guess we’ll have to wait and see if they hit store shelves this year as Mitsubishi tells us they will.