The authors describe recent progress in the development of HgI/sub 2/ energy dispersive X-ray detector arrays for synchrotron radiation research and their associated miniaturized processing electronics. A five-element HgI/sub 2/ array detector was deployed under realistic operating conitions at Standford Synchrotron Radiation Laboratory, and an energy resolution of 252 eV FWHM (full width at half maximum) at 5.9 keV (Mn-K alpha ) was obtained. The authors also report energy resolution and throughput measurements versus input count rate. The results from the HgI/sub 2/ system are compared to those obtained under identical conditions from a commercial 13-element Ge detector array.< <ETX xmlns:mml="http://www.w3.org/1998/Math/MathML" xmlns:xlink="http://www.w3.org/1999/xlink">></ETX>