Pixel Qi Screens are for Laptops and Tablets, Not Just OLPC (Video)

While at CES, Timothy Lord talked with Pixel Qi Chief Operating Officer John Ryan about how the company, which was originally founded to make screens for the One Laptop Per Child project, is now moving into the commercial market for laptop and tablet screens. Pixel Qi screens are not only inexpensive to make, but are easier to read in sunlight than standard LCDs -- and use less power, too. What they're doing now, says Timothy in the video, is "pretty cool," so check it out.

Comments

Timothy Lord

[Hatta]

Was he the only journalist at CES? I never heard that name before last week.

Do they have stylus/touch capability?

[msobkow]

The "Alan Kay" Dynabook I keep talking about doesn't really need colour for it's most important function -- replacing a notepad. If the Pixel Qi screens have a high resolution stylus/touch capability, they might be ideal for such a device.

i.e. The Dynabook was conceived to be a useful, utilitarian device, not a video or game playing machine.

Re:Do they have stylus/touch capability?

[pavon]

Agreed. Asus was getting really close to what I wanted in a tablet when they released the Eee Note. Then the iPad came out and killed any consumer interest in any other niche products.

Re:Do they have stylus/touch capability?

[pavon]

They can be hard to find as they were never released in North America, and only sparsely distributed in Europe. The initial reviews also complained about some lack of polish in the included software; things that most eBook readers have nailed by now. For example the device is too small to read most A4/letter size PDFs a full page at a time, and the software doesn't support rotating the document to view it full width, so you have to constantly scroll both side-to-side and up and down when zoomed in on the PDF.

But the responsiveness of the stylus is supposed to be excellent. They have even lower lag than even expensive Wacom Cintiq displays or Windows tablets, which themselves have far, far lower lag than Android or iOS.

Re:Do they have stylus/touch capability?

[c 0xFF]

The screens themselves can probably be paired with any touchscreen and controller. See the Notion Ink Adam for an example of a capacitive touchscreen matched with the Pixel Qi.

Re: the Dynabook, purely utilitarian devices will not sell ... as someone once put it, the more game-like a product is, the more people will want it. (Paraphrasing, sorry). Relevantly, this was in reference to the introduction of color computer monitors in the '80s. Likewise, a Dynabook-like tablet will only be successful if it at least feels like a game, which means a color display.

What am I missing?

[quangdog]

These displays sound great - lower power, better color, sunlight viewability... but the British stiff they interviewed said that they haven't been able to get them into mainstream portable devices. Why? What are the drawbacks?

Re:What am I missing?

[Elgonn]

Price and supply. They're really just not available cheaply and in large quantities.

Re:What am I missing?

[mark-t]

It's only lower power if you don't utilize the backlight, and thereby also lose color.

The color display suffers from just as much contrast problems in sunlight as regular LCD monitors do.

There are other more promising (IMO) color displays on the horizon that offer high refresh rates, full color, and utilize a passive display that draws *NO* power whenever it is showing a static image.

Re:What am I missing?

[publiclurker]

If they still operate like the one in my OLPC computer (I can't view the link at work), you disable color to make the screen daylight viewable. while annoying to some people, I think it's a fair tradeoff , and it works remarkably well.

Re:What am I missing?

[viperidaenz]

Care to share these "products on the horizon"?

Re:What am I missing?

[theweakend]

Keep in mind that was an early version, the viewing angels are really what made it look so bad and besides the notion ink really was a medicore device but it is settled get ics.

Re:What am I missing?

[theweakend]

"This module supports 1024 x RGB x 600 Wide-SVGA (WSVGA) mode and can display 262,144 colors. This module also supports two low power modes: a transflective mode with lower color and a reflective black and white (64 grayscales) mode." According to the spec sheet at http://www.makershed.com/Pixel_Qi_display_p/mkpq01.htm

Re:What am I missing?

[JonySuede]

http://www.mirasoldisplays.com/ from qualcomm is just one example

Re:What am I missing?

[Dan East]

The "problem" is that there is a particular trend at this moment, and Pixel Qi does not fit in that trend. The trend being ultra high DPI, colorful, high-contrast displays. You've got devices like the iPhone and iPad sporting "retina" displays, which being something Apple has touted, is very much in the mind of consumers. Then you've got devices like Samsung's Android phones, with gorgeous colors and insane contrast ratios due to OLED technology. What stole the show at CES? Samsung's ultra thin, bezel-less OLED TVs. Consumers are interested in HD and picture quality, because that is what the industry has brought to everyone's attention (and rightfully so - I'm glad people are taking a little more notice over quality these days. I remember the days when most people couldn't be bothered to adjust the color / hue settings on their tube TVs to something even close to reality.)

Pixel Qi display technology offers more flexibility and versatility, but it is a step backwards in clarity, refresh rate, contrast ratios, etc. So OEMs are probably afraid to include technology that looks substandard under typical day-to-day use, although it is far more useful under other conditions like direct sunlight.

I think one of three things will have to happen for Pixel Qi to find more widespread usage. 1) Increase their visual quality of their display under non-reflective mode to be in the ballpark of your typical modern LCD panels. 2) Wait until the hype dies down over retina displays, OLED, etc, which may take a year or two. 3) Make inroads into non-consumer devices, such as military equipment, industries like the telephone company where field techs use ruggedized laptops and other instruments with displays that need to be viewable under direct sunlight, displays in cars, wristwatches, etc.

Re:What am I missing?

[Anonymous Coward]

I don't need to Google the Notion Ink Adam; I have one. The screen is not nearly as bad as the Google would lead one to believe and is fantastic if you use it outside. (The software is by far the biggest failing of the Adam; the screen is the only thing that makes it worth having.)

Re:What am I missing?

[dmbasso]

Dear troll, you are entitled to your opinion. As I have one XO, I know how great these screens are (it is my opinion). It is also my opinion that you could have said 'X is much better than Y', instead of 'X is crap'. Therefore, my final opinion is (with all due respect) that you are a cunt and you should go fuck yourself.

The only one from slashdot.

[pavon]

Timothy Lord is this timothy, who has been working at slashdot pretty much since it was formed.

Re:The only one from slashdot.

[derGoldstein]

So weird seeing an editor. For a while I thought that only CmdrTaco was a living human, and the rest were AI's modeled after hyperactive drunks.
This guy actually accepted some of my submissions. Frickin' twilight zone...

Re:The only one from slashdot.

[Bill, Shooter of Bul]

For a while I thought that only CmdrTaco was a living human, and the rest were AI's modeled after hyperactive drunks.

No, the Editors are hyperactive drunks that modeled their lives after AI, the movie. Which explains all the Haley Joel Osment references around here.

Mediocre Color

[pavon]

These displays sound great - lower power, better color, sunlight viewability... but the British stiff they interviewed said that they haven't been able to get them into mainstream portable devices. Why? What are the drawbacks?

They don't have better color than a standard LCD or AMOLED. The original PixelQi displays have significantly worse saturation. In my mind this makes well suited for devices such as eBook readers whose primary use is reflective greyscale mode, but can also display color as well. Marketing departments however think that anything with a color display will automatically be compared to the iPad, and they are probably right.

Resolution sucks

[backslashdot]

The Pixel Qi resolutions suck .. tablet displays going forward will need 250 ppi or high. Even laptops will likely require 200 ppi and up to be competitive in 3Q and 4Q of this year.