Television digest with electronic reports (Jan-Dec 1953)

2 turing know-how on its basic commercial color receiver — repeating its historical performance of 6 years ago which gave black-&-white major impetus. CBS showed off two new developments — color receiver tube and a camera both of which may have considerable promise, but half-hour colorcast from WCBS-TV indicated that final judgment should be withheld pending further refinement. From technical performance standpoint, CBS undoubtedly would have been wiser to hold off public showings for 6 months or so. Competitive commercial considerations are something else, must have prompted decision to show now. CBS's end product reminded us of RCA's early color demonstrations. Colors varied from time to time and from receiver to receiver. Resolution was generally unsatisfactory. Tinges of various colors sometimes pervaded whole picture. CBS's best pictures were quite passable, but best were seldom achieved. Newspaper critics were quite harsh, almost all terming results "disappointing". Few considered fact this was a first showing or tremendous haste and pressure involved — situation very reminiscent of 1949, when tables were turned and RCA was fighting desperately to stave off approval of CBS's field-sequential system which had years of refinement behind it. Some of CBS's competitors watched colorcast on their own receivers. One engineer termed it "ghastly", but conceded that CBS has shown better pictures. They hope CBS will do better at official FCC showing Oct. 15 — since everyone is pulling for quick Commission approval of standards. Most attention was riveted on new color tube, naturally, since cost, performance and availability of sets hits man-inthe-street most directly. But CBS's efforts to provide stations with cheaper equipment — actually employing a fieldsequential camera with single image orthicon — was what CBS pres. Frank Stanton called "our atomic bomb". No one knows whether CBS's approach to pickup equipment will prove a permanent answer to station costs, but it may hold good promise of quicker, cheaper entry into colorcasting for some stations. Confused newspaper and trade gossip preceded showing of new tube. Then, when tube was finally demonstrated, it was impossible to judge its quality, because there was no way of telling whether imperfections in final picture were caused by novel camera or the tube itself. Chances are tube is quite good, however. It's an adaptation of the RCA, or shadow-mask, type — not the Lawrence grid-type, as previously rumored. We talked to technical press editors who saw tube on special closed-circuit demonstration at CBS-Hytron plant in Danvers, Mass, earlier in week. They raved about it, considered it as good as RCA's if not better in some respects. CBS touted tube as "revolutionary, low-cost and vastly improved. .. ready to go into mass production." It also said it will cost only 30% more than "comparable" black-&-white tubes when mass production is reached. Some reporters read no further, rushed into print with stories to effect that 21-in. color tubes will be available shortly for §20-$30, compared with the $175-$200 currently quoted for RCA-type 15-in. But CBS-Hytron pres. Bruce A. Coffin made it clear that only 15-in. samples will be available this year; that pilot production will start at Newburyport, Mass, plant in February; that mass production at still-to-be-completed Kalamazoo plant won't start until next September (Vol. 9:39) when 15,000 per month production rate will become possible. Elaborating further on cost factor at Oct. 8 press conference, Stanton said that when Coffin stated mass-produced color tubes would cost 30% more than "comparable" black-&-white tubes he meant cost of black-&-white tubes at the same relative stage of development — namely, when they were first introduced. Further nailing down prices, in answer to our questions at the press conference, CBS officials said first CBS-Columbia sets to be offered after FCC approves