Walgreen's 17,000 square foot display turned on in Times Square

Fri Nov 21, 2008 1:44PM EST

See Comments (18)

17,000 square feet. 340 feet tall. 13 60-inch plasma televisions. 8,000 nits of brightness. And 12 million light emitting diodes.

Even with these incredible specs, the new 17-story Walgreen's sign located at 1 Times Square isn't the worlds largest display, but its the most complex display ever, construction-wise and operation-wise, according to its developers (via The New York Times).

D3 LED, the developers of the sign, decided to use a mixture of display types, ranging from LEDs to standard Plasma HDTVs, to create "a single moving image with 20 times the resolution of standard HDTV." 

Moving images are produced by a group of 32 custom-built computers feeding 150 GB uncompressed of data (wow) every 30 seconds to the display. The New York Times also adds that the data is left uncompressed due to the fact that the compression and decompression process of the data would take far too much raw computing power.

While the display is obviously very data hungry, it also requires tons of electrical power to function. Average power usage is somewhere around 250 Kilowatts (250,000 watts, whereas your average HDTV uses anywhere from 150-300 watts), although the display's power usage can climb up to 1 megawatt, depending on what image is displayed.

Other cool facts about the display: It has a range of color that far surpasses standard televisions and even exceeds the number of individual colors a printer can create. Also, the display does not have a uniform resolution—the area that is closer to the ground where there is high foot traffic has a higher resolution which gradually decreases as you elevate.

I could ramble on and on about how unbelievable this beast of a sign is, but of course, pictures do it much better justice than my words ever could. Gothamist (via Gizmodo) and The New York Times Blog have some great images up as well.

Since I'm unfortunately located on the west coast, I have yet to see this behemoth with my own eyes. Are any of you located out in the Times Square area? What are your impressions? Fill me in with your comments below.

The New York Times - LEDs Light Jumbo Sign in Times Square

Gothamist - Times Square Brightens Up with 17-story Walgreen's Sign

Gizmodo.com - 17,000 Square Foot LED Billboard Flipped On at 1 Times Square, Wraps Around Entire Building

Top 5 Posts

Comments on Walgreen's 17,000 square foot display turned on in Times Square

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  • 7 Posted by somebodys_here on Thu Sep 3, 2009 9:32PM EDT Report Abuse

    Ah... only in America. We're a monument to our own excess. I love it.

  • 8 Posted by sccrdude2120 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 9:07PM EDT Report Abuse

    thats whack i have that in my living room except i got 14 - 62 inch plasma televisions

  • 9 Posted by mylover_man on Thu Sep 3, 2009 7:31PM EDT Report Abuse

    I agree with the others. What a waste of power and money. When the rest of us are trying to conserve not only energry and money the people with to much ,waste what we save, thus canceling all our efforts to conserve.

  • 10 Posted by nbp2013 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 7:34PM EDT Report Abuse

    without a dought the biggest waste of time, money, energy, and thought i have ever seen. They could have used that money on building homes for the homeless. Just like Obama could have spent his campiagn money on the homless. That would have gotten my vote.

  • 11 Posted by kbmin95 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 4:48PM EDT Report Abuse

    Speechless. Don't know if that's in the good way or the bad way.

  • 12 Posted by audreytruss on Thu Sep 3, 2009 2:59PM EDT Report Abuse

    WOW! Pay employees crap and putup a wasteful (in every way) sign. Way to go!

  • 13 Posted by audreytruss on Thu Sep 3, 2009 2:59PM EDT Report Abuse

    Wow! Pay employees crap and spend much money on a wasteful(in every way) sign. Way to go!

  • 15 Posted by sslyfox2003 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 9:38PM EDT Report Abuse

    I can not believe Walgreens did not try to turn their new display GREEN.....use solar for the daytime to help offset the power used at night?? I think using all that energy is a waste and although it looks cool....Times Square has enough lights and flashing objects that we really didn't need another!!

  • 16 Posted by azpcpro on Thu Sep 3, 2009 3:00PM EDT Report Abuse

    1Mw??! And just how often does it consume these vast amounts of energy? Is it 250 kilowatts every......Day?.....Hour!?....minute?!! SECOND?!?!?!? Just proves that the "big" people and corporations just simply don't give a flying frack about and/or are completely oblivious to the fact that the world around them is changing, we are changing. PEACE!

  • 17 Posted by jdb_1023 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 4:31PM EDT Report Abuse

    As this display is using LED's it is probably by far much more efficient then the older lighting displays in Time Square. Keep in mind Light Emitting Diode (LED) technology is 65% more energy efficient then traditional lighting. I too would agree that it is too large and would side on the debate that it is an eye sore, but from a marketing standpoint, you can not ask for better real estate then Time Square. Walgreens is also one of the largest, most generous contributors out there, and they are able to be one of the most generous organizations out there by selling, selling, and selling. Agree with it or not, this display brings more exposure to Walgreens, hence more sales, which equals more donations to those that need it.

  • 18 Posted by rich_yan33 on Thu Sep 3, 2009 8:40PM EDT Report Abuse

    Why do we even talk about an energy plan in this country?

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