College visual display big time

POTSDAM — Clarkson University students have spent the school year enjoying a state-of-the-art visual display system in their new student center.

The 8-by-10 foot display is composed of 80 MicroTiles from Christie Digital Systems and offers broader color palettes and crisper images than traditional light-emitting diode and liquid crystal display flat-screen monitors. The tiles have been put to a multitude of uses since they were introduced in September.

"We've used them for an open house where our president was traveling; we used Skype and he was able to come in and address the audience and have a two-way conversation with the open house," said Kevin P. Lynch, the college's chief information officer. "We've watched movies. When we have bands we use it as a backdrop. Students will even bring in and hook up an Xbox or a Wii and play video games on this giant wall."

The 80 tiles, which use digital light-processing projection and LED technology, snap together to produce a single image but also can display multiple smaller images at once. They are part of a wall display developed by Philadelphia-based Video Visions Inc., and are accompanied by Crestron Touchpanel technology that allows students to change television channels and volume levels with ease.

According to Christie's website, each MicroTile offers seventy times more pixels than the most popular 4-millimeter surface-mount LED displays. Unlike most monitors, the tiles' images are visible even in direct sunlight.

"The location we're in has very high ambient light. There are times when the sun shines directly on the display, and we were concerned with conventional LCD technology that we would get a lot of glare," Mr. Lynch said. "Another driving factor was the fact that with a mosaic of traditional LCD or LED displays, each screen has to be color matched to the ones next to it to get a consistent image. The MicroTiles electronically do all that."

The tiles, which weigh 20 pounds each, automatically detect and adjust to neighboring tiles' images. Christie's website says each tile can be removed individually for repair or replacement should it malfunction or be damaged.

Although the initial cost of the MicroTiles was higher than the cost of a corresponding LCD display, a lifespan of 7 1/2 years of nonstop operation exceeds that of conventional flat-screen monitors.