Patent ID: RE41166

Claim:
A method of driving a surface discharge plasma display panel having a first substrate and a second substrate space apart and facing each other, and common electrodes, scan electrodes, and address electrodes arranged between said first and second substrates, said common electrodes being arranged in parallel with said scan electrodes, said address electrodes being arranged orthogonal to said common electrodes and said scan electrodes to form respective intersections which each define a corresponding pixel, comprising: a resetting step of applying a first voltage between the scan electrodes and the address electrodes to accumulate wall charges in the respective pixel by a facing discharge between the scan and address electrodes, and removing the wall-charges accumulated by the facing discharge; an addressing step of applying a second voltage between a corresponding scan electrodes and selected address electrodes so that a facing discharge occurs, to form wall-charges in the selected pixels; and a sustained discharging step of applying a third alternating-current voltage between the scan electrodes and the common electrodes so that a surface discharge occurs in the selected pixels.