I’ve seen it on many flat screen tv’s recently. I think I have seen it mostly on Sony models. Does it stand for something? Is it a brand? Please tell me what WEGA means.
It is Sony’s very high end brand of TV. About a 60% price increase over their Trinitron line. Widely considered the best of the TV’s you can buy in your local BestBuy or Circuit City. Also the heaviest.
Second hit in Google for “WEGA”:
I think it’s just a brand (Sony seems to like odd four-letter names), like Vaio, Aibo and Clié.
Flat Screen means the screen doesn’t curve, I guess, esp around the edges. doesn’t much matter to me, however, if it does.
Wow! truly amazing, now how about wide screen, why do they call it that?
“Wide screen” generally refers to television screens (direct view, which have a traditional tube, or projection, which rely on an LCD projector onto some form of screen) that have a 16:9 width to height ratio, instead of the standard 4:3 ratio. The wider screen lets you view movies in a format closer to the way in which they were made; most movies are shot in 1.85:1 and 2.35:1, so 16:9 (which is 1.77:1) is much closer than 4:3 (1.333:1).
Whooooosh.
If I’ve been whooshed, it must have been pretty subtle or I must be pretty thick, 'cause I still don’t get it. Care to explain?
“Subtle” is a pretty good word for it. 
I sort of imagine Mangetout saying it in John Cleese’s voice.
Trivia Hijack: The original name for the line was Vega, not Wega (trust me – I covered the press event when the line debuted). The graphic for the name just looked like WEGA because the V was doubled. This confused the public, and a lot of the industry, and most people called like it looked – Wega. Eventually, Sony gave in and started calling it Wega as well.
Hmmm… guess that’ll teach me to read threads in between emails. I didn’t read handy’s post and Mangetout’s back-to-back, and missed the link.
Colour me stupid.
Thanks, all. Cool information, especially Cap’n Crude’s tidbit about the original name of the brand.
Now I just need to find out if Mangetout really does a good John Cleese impression.
IMHO hijack:
I recently bought a 32 in flat screen TV. I compared a Sony WEGA with the flat screens offered by the other brands, and chose Panasonic’s “Tau”. The WEGA looked a hair better in black level, contrast and color rendition, but not enough to justify the substantial price difference.
Are Trinitron and Wega the same thing? I thought I was buying a 32" Trinitron TV, but the box said WEGA in big letters on the side. I have a Trinitron 17" monitor, and they seem the same to me.
And those Wegas really are freakin heavy. We needed 4 people to carry it up the stairs.
WEGA is a specialised version of Sony’s Trinitron line. The most noticeable difference is that the front of the WEGA screen is flat, while the regular Trinitron screen has a curved front. So a WEGA is a Trinitron, but a Trinitron is not necessarily a WEGA.
See the link that DarrenS posted, specifically this section.
Regular Trinitrons are flat in the vertical direction, and curved in the horizontal direction, like the side of a vertical column. The WEGA is flat in both directions, so flat that it looks concave at first. (Or did, back when flat screens were rare.)
The actual difference between Trinitron and other TVs is that Trinitrons use a grill for a shadow mask, while other TVs use a plate with holes. Look at this page for explanations on how the shadow mask works, then go to the next page on that site to see how a Trinitron works. (Incidentally, that link is to Tom’s Hardware Guide. The HowStuffWorks page on this topic is awful.)