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AnchorDesk

Patrick Houston
Get the boss to buy you a slick LCD. Here's how

Patrick Houston
Editorial Director, AnchorDesk
Monday, June 30, 2003
TalkBack!Add your opinion
If you still have a clunky old CRT monitor squatting atop your desk, get ready to get rid of it. The time is ripe to start pressing your boss for a big, sleek LCD. Never mind that your boss may be the no-frills type. This isn't a frivolous luxury. Prices for LCD monitors continue to fall to the point where they can rival CRTs, but that's not the only justification. You can also argue that an LCD will boost your productivity and save the company money.

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I OFFER YOU this advice based in part on what I learned last week while in Japan for some briefings with Sony Corp. The itinerary included a meeting with the product and technology planners behind Sony's PC displays group, and they offered me a glimpse at more than a dozen new displays scheduled to be debuted in the next few weeks.

The market's shift from conventional CRTs to LCDs is already well underway. LCD sales have been soaring. Sony, long known as a maker of high-quality CRT monitors, shipped twice as many LCDs last year as it did during the year before. Forecasts have this year's LCD monitor shipments--40 million worldwide--nearly tripling by 2006.

Of course, part of this growth is due to the fact that LCD monitors keep getting more and more affordable. LCDs were once priced at luxury levels of $1,000 or more, depending on the size. But this year alone has brought a drastic price drop of 30 percent or more. An 18- or 19-inch model that used to cost $1,000 now goes for about $700 or less. Seventeen-inch monitors have dipped into the $500 range.

What's more, big displays can (at least in theory) help you do more with less. The idea is that LCDs provide more real estate upon which to display several applications at once. But Sony's taking the rationale beyond that.

SONY'S NEW DISPLAYS mark the first major revamp of its flat-panel monitor line in more than two years. But it's not just the products that are new. So is the market strategy behind them. Sony is, for the most part, a consumer electronics company. But the company has also long been a leading supplier of monitors to corporations. (The company-issue monitor on my desk is a Sony.) If fact, the company says about half of the monitors it sells find their way into companies.

So six of the 10 new Sony monitors are being targeted especially at businesses. They include several new, corporate-friendly features. One is a new stand that allows you to adjust the height, tilt, and angle of your monitor to make it more ergonomic. Another promises to cut power consumption by as much as 40 percent.

Jim Neal, a senior marketing manager for Sony's information display unit, says Sony's done some math and the various savings involved in deploying LCDs could allow your company to offset the cost of a new LCD in about a year and a half.

Sony plans to make this calculation a linchpin of its pitch to business buyers. And a pitch it is. I've been trying to cast some skepticism on the spin. The only hole I see so far is that you can still get a lot of CRT for way less money than an LCD. But I still believe Sony's claims are legit.

LCDs take up less desktop real estate than CRTs. Because they flicker less, they're easier on the eyes. Those with adjustable arms, like the one that comes with Apple's iMac, are much more ergonomic. If you're more comfortable and less tired, you can get more done. A happier you is a more productive you, right? And, hey, you can help trim the company's power bills at the same time.

That's the case I plan to make to my boss. Let's see if she'll buy it and buy me a slick new LCD monitor to replace the clunker that's on my own desk now. I'll let you know if it works.

What do you make of my case for a new LCD? Have you bought a new LCD for yourself or your business or been involved in making such a decision? If so, how did you justify the purchase? TalkBack to me. 

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