HP Introduces New Technology to Save Mobile Battery Life

fenimor writes "HP researchers have developed new technology to save battery life on mobile devices. Targeting one of the main culprits of battery consumption -- the display -- they've developed an energy-aware solution that dims parts of the screen that aren't in use. Display battery life lasts from two to 11 times longer, depending on what the user is doing."

Comments

HP innovation!

[BWJones]

Now, this is the kind of thinking and research development that I would expect from HP! This technology combined with optimizations in the OS like Quartz could be a real boost to the way we interact with our portable devices, allowing for progressive dynamic layering of items that are important to view. Shoot, one could even link it into search engines to render only what is relevant for display.

Now if they could just put a little innovation into their calculators again....

Re:HP innovation!

[ackthpt]

Now, this is the kind of thinking and research development that I would expect from HP!

What? They're not supposed to just buy up some half-baked company that's struggling with quality issues and try to merge the two disparate entities together using words like "Synergy"?

Dang. It is a rebirth of HP!

Re:HP innovation!

[friedmud]

I recently had a similar experience to "highlighting of what you're looking at" and I enjoyed it.

It came with the new Xorg+New Nvidia Drivers+KDE Beta... with those three things you can turn on transparency where every window EXCEPT the one that is currently in focus is transparent.

Combine this with "Focus follows mouse" and it basically "highlights" the thing you are currently working on... while everything else melts into the background... literally!

If they integrated this with flat panels I could see it being useful for the only thing that was at full brightness is the window that is currently active... while the rest has been dimmed. I think this is pretty close to what the research in this story did (except it looks like they might have been even more fine grained than that).

Not only would it be a usability improvement... but also a savings in power. I'm interested to see if they can bring it to market!

Friedmud

Re:HP innovation!

[iowannaski]

While it would be incredibly cool if this technology could be used with PC LCD monitors, don't get too excited yet.

LCD screens generally rely on a single backlight for illumination. Swithing to multiple backlights is certainly possible, but don't expect to be able to control power consumption on a pixel by pixelbasis anytime soon.

Re:HP innovation!

[pantherace]

Kcontrol -> Desktop -> Window Behavior -> Translucency Tab. That controls transparency, and the Focus tab has Focus follows Mouse.

Self Defeating

[AKAImBatman]

Watch a typical Windows user sometime. What's the first thing they do to whatever application they open?

If you said "Maximize it!", then you're right! Sadly, this ends up being self-defeating. :-/

Re:Self Defeating

[mrchaotica]

Or they're using IE and some website has set their window to be fullscreen for them, which is the more common scenario in my experience.

Creative Displays

[null etc.]

I'd like to be the developer that codes the algorithm for dimming the unimportant parts of pr0n images. I'd need plenty of research images, of course.

Meh..

[Staplerh]

Meh, I can buy a sticker that promises to do most of this, and all for a few small payments. Heck, it was even covered on Slashdot so it has to be true!

Unimportant pixels

[Faust7]

worked with Ranganathan to develop software that monitors a PDA's screen when it is in use and automatically dims the unimportant pixels.

Occasionally I get devices from companies that have proactively singled out these unimportant pixels.

Its great! I am using it right now!

[Mr. Flibble]

It is incredible... but I can only see what I am typing... and my mouse cursor sometimes.

This is my blog I am posting to right? Must be... Cant tell though...

OLED

[amembleton]

Won't these problems be solved with OLEDs?

As far as I understand, Organic light-emitting diodes (OLEDs) will emit light from each pixel much like an LED does. This will not require a battery sucking back-light, and if necessary it would be easy to dim areas of the screen, just make parts of it darker/black and less/no light will be emitted from it.

More info: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OLED

LCDs and Dimming

[Anonymous Coward]

You can't dim a 'portion' of a standard LCD monitor; the monitor is backlit by small flourescent tubes at the top and the bottom of the display, and it is those that take most power to drive. On desktops they have multiple tubes at the top and bottom (and you could shut one or two off to save power), but for notebooks they usually have only one, and by dimming that one you end up dimming the whole display, not a portion of the display.

If they can light up only a portion of the screen they must be using white LEDs or something like that where they can light up as many or as few as they want. If this is the case, i wouldnt hold my breath as to when it will reach the market.

Re:After reading TFA...

[crummynz]

Or is it...sentient? :P

Yup. The irony is, the CPU time it takes to keep this artificial intelligence running nullifies the effect of dimming pixels you aren't reading :/

I worry about burn-in...

[Junior J. Junior III]

When there are two boob-shaped areas of my screen that appear to be burned in more than the rest of my screen, then people will know about my, ahem, viewing habits.

Re:savings?

[clutch110]

Why are you mixing the military, nudity and computers anyway? Don't you get court martialed for that?