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AMOLED Displays Are Now Cheaper To Produce Than LCD (androidauthority.com)

Posted by msmash on from the evolution-of-display dept.

An anonymous reader quotes an article on AndroidAuthority: Optics pundits have been crowing about AMOLED destroying LCD for a while now: they are thinner, brighter, more energy efficient and arguably offer better colors, higher contrast, and deeper saturation than LCD. The biggest barrier stopping AMOLED from taking over as the smartphone display technology of choice has been price. Until now that is. As predicted two years ago, it has only taken 24 months for AMOLED production costs to fall below that of LCD. Production costs in the first quarter for a 5-inch Full HD smartphone display are $14.30 for an AMOLED panel and $14.60 for an LCD display. In the fourth quarter of 2015, these figures were $17.10 and $15.70, respectively. [...] With AMOLED production costs dropping below LCD for the first time, AMOLED panels will soon become the default display technology choice for manufacturers on their mid-range and entry-level devices as well.

112 of 157 comments (clear)

  1. To bad the screens burn in... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 5, Interesting

    I like to leave my phone plugged in, next to me on my desk, and in developer mode where keeping the screen on is an option. The icons burn into place eventually. I no longer keep the display on all the time and it sucks I can't simply glance at my phone for weather and other info.

    Has this issue been resolved? Granted my phone is 3 years old now.

    1. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by ickleberry · · Score: 5, Funny

      You are supposed to buy a new phone every year, the industry sees you as a problem customer who can be whipped into compliance with shorter-lasting displays and batteries

    2. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 4, Informative

      From what I understand, the blue OLED ages at a faster rate than the rest of the display, which means that it will appear to turn yellow over time. If you have a static image on the display, then it will age unevenly.

      LCD panels don't age in a way that makes the colors change, so they don't get burn in (the closest thing they get to burn in is image persistence, which is only temporary.)

    3. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by MobileTatsu-NJG · · Score: 5, Interesting

      Heh. I was at Best Buy a few days ago and they had this bigTV advertising how awesome it is because it's OLED. It was so awesome that when the demo changed to some moving footage the ghost of the "OLED IS AWESOME!" text was still there.

      Basically they demonstrated not only that those screens burn in but that they do it pretty fast, too! Glad I didn't order this TV through Amazon.

      --

      "I like to lick butts!" by MobileTatsu-NJG (#32700246) (Score:5, Informative)

    4. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by WaffleMonster · · Score: 2

      From what I understand, the blue OLED ages at a faster rate than the rest of the display, which means that it will appear to turn yellow over time. If you have a static image on the display, then it will age unevenly.

      LCD panels don't age in a way that makes the colors change, so they don't get burn in (the closest thing they get to burn in is image persistence, which is only temporary.)

      They do but less pronounced. Changes in output spectrum due to backlight aging is still enough to make it worthwhile for artists/photo pros to periodically recalibrate. This is also why brightness controls tend to be driven by PWM.

    5. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by frovingslosh · · Score: 1

      And with burn-in and shorter OLED life, you'll soon have the joy and excitement of getting a new 70 inch TV every year.

      --
      I'm an American. I love this country and the freedoms that we used to have.
    6. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by ryanmc1 · · Score: 2

      yes, since you are using it at your desk, it is called a weather widget on your computer

    7. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by AmiMoJo · · Score: 1

      You would think they would have learned from plasma TVs. Plasma screens can't be beat for image, but especially in the first 1000 hours you have to be careful about burn-in.

      Such a shame they stopped making them. When my Panasonic dies whatever replaces it will have inferior colour.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    8. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by rbrander · · Score: 1

      Amen. I feel lucky (OK, I also feel smart and smug) to have bought a plasma right near the end - but just before I had to get a "Smart TV". (I noticed a TV in a hotel the other week took about 20 seconds just to "boot"....about the same time the tubes took to warm up in the 19" B&W I watched Roy Rogers on in 1964...apparently, some things really don't change...)

      At a friend's insistence, I took his "New TV burn in" DVD and wore out an old DVD player; it just cycled through screens of solid colour for the next 100 hours...then I started using it but would leave that DVD on all night until it had 200 hours in.

      And I've been careful about static images. It hits age 5 this year and I think I'll get another 5 out of it...which I will need before the whole OLED/4K/HDR/whatever mess settles down into one protocol and one winning technology...

    9. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by niftymitch · · Score: 1

      I like to leave my phone plugged in, next to me on my desk, ....

      OK this is almost silly.
      An old phone connected via WiFi only will let you see Weather,
      messages from Mom and listen to cached cloud music. Buildings
      have such terrible cell reception that WiFi is nearly required.

      At no time should a company allow portable devices to connect
      to a network with company data or resources. Employees
      want to be connected so establish a non production network
      hobble the bandwidth as needed to something like 10/100 max.
      Sure, require a password that is changed sort of often post it in the
      breakroom.

      Block a lot of sites or white list a short set.

      Now your old LED phone has value and your
      new OLED phone will not burn so quickly.

      --
      Truth is stranger than fiction, but it is because Fiction is obliged to stick to possibilities; Truth isn't. Mark Twain.
    10. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by macs4all · · Score: 1

      Maybe not, but I have a cheaper Phillips LCD TV which is only about 5 years or so old and it has developed an odd tendency for some of the vertical lines to not function until the TV "warms up" (probably some failing components that have to heat to begin to function normally). Basically you have some random small black lines cutting through the picture for the first 5 minutes or so of operation. Not a major problem but LCD does have some wear/quality issues as well.

      Sounds like some bad solder connections to the driver electronics. Blame that fucking EU and their fucking fucking RoHS initiative. There's a reason the automotive and Aerospace industries were exempt from RoHS.

    11. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by religionofpeas · · Score: 1

      Even with life span of 10k hours, a TV should last me over 10 years.

    12. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by tdelaney · · Score: 1

      I hated plasma screens - they always looked "smeary" to me. Only way I can think of to describe it. Maybe I only saw bad ones, but I saw enough to think that's unlikely.

      I also hated the amount of heat they put out ...

    13. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by HalAtWork · · Score: 1

      Exactly why I bought LCD instead of OLED tablets for my family

      --
      Twinstiq, game news
    14. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by mattack2 · · Score: 1

      I have no idea how long ago you saw plasmas, but those issues, burn in and power usage (which you alluded to), were largely covered. (That is, while they may still use on average some more power, it's not the tons and tons more that used to be.)

      I "only" have a plasma because I got it after my old Trinitron died (many years ago now)..

      But plasma TVs were the first thing I thought of when reading the thread title -- cheaper and better looking than the competition. Unfortunately plasma production has basically or literally stopped, and they aren't making giant ones either.

      My TV technically has burn in, but I can't notice it when there is a show there, only when it fades out, e.g. before a commercial. (I see a time bar from one old recorder that you can have it up all the time, and again, with no picture showing, can see a very slight difference in the letterbox area.)

      Even with that, I'd buy a giant plasma if I could.. Currently the big big TVs are only LCD. Maybe OLED will come out that big soonish.

    15. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by Joce640k · · Score: 1

      That's not a problem with LCDs, that's a problem with your particular TV.

      --
      No sig today...
    16. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by windwalkr · · Score: 1

      LCD panels don't age in a way that makes the colors change, so they don't get burn in (the closest thing they get to burn in is image persistence, which is only temporary.)

      I keep hearing this repeated, but it isn't really accurate. We have some iPad 2 devices which were used with their screen permanently active for a few weeks, frequently showing the same image. They're still burned in with the same image several years later, despite us changing the usage pattern to avoid displaying a static image.

    17. Re:To bad the screens burn in... by ArmoredDragon · · Score: 1

      I've had this happen with my ipad 2, and it has always gone away after playing videos or something.

  2. dat burn-in tho... by sanosuke001 · · Score: 2

    http://www.alphr.com/realworld...

    I used a music app on my phone for a while and after a few months, it's buttons were permanently burned in because I left the screen on so I could skip songs while driving. It kinda sucked.

    --
    -SaNo
    1. Re:dat burn-in tho... by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 2, Funny

      Shouldn't be a problem with Android or Apple UIs. The UIs change so often that it's very unlikely the image would burn-in.

    2. Re:dat burn-in tho... by Lumpy · · Score: 4, Interesting

      find a video of a travelling red/black bar and play it for an extended time on the screen. This is how you fixed burn in problems on plasma TV's and it should work the same on an OLED.

      https://www.youtube.com/watch?...

      --
      Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
  3. Well that's awesome but... by foxalopex · · Score: 4, Interesting

    I've always admired OLEDs based screens for their colour accuracy and amazing flatness. With falling costs they would actually make the perfect display. Unfortunately, I am not sure if they resolved the issue of the pixels gradually burning out especially when it comes to blue leaving you with a yellow screen over the long term. It might not matter so much in a phone which typically arn't used more than a few years but that's not something you would want in a TV or monitor.

    1. Re:Well that's awesome but... by fustakrakich · · Score: 1

      Do people still keep their TVs? I don't see too many 10 year old flat screens.

      This wouldn't a real big issue if only we could replace parts, but the better profits are in sealed units.

      --
      “He’s not deformed, he’s just drunk!”
    2. Re:Well that's awesome but... by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      I don't see too many 10 year old flat screens.

      10 years is still okay. Still fine for mobiles too. But you will get no where near that kind of life on an all American TV or a computer monitor which will get far more use than any of the current AMOLED devices out there.

      Typical mobiles and tablets will just start showing signs of burnout in their usable life 3-5 years. Now imagine the same device with 5 times the duty factor.

    3. Re:Well that's awesome but... by jandrese · · Score: 2

      10 years is not very old for a TV set. Back in 2009 when the digital switchover and HD forced the issue, many of the TVs scrapped were from the 80s and 90s. There are no major changes to broadcast TV coming down the pike (3D is dead in the water, 4K gets a big meh from your average household) so no reason to buy a new set unless the old one craps out. I'm sure shitty capacitors will do in a number of those sets, but a good many of them will still be in use in 2019.

      --

      I read the internet for the articles.
    4. Re:Well that's awesome but... by Strider- · · Score: 1

      My 8 year old Sharp LCD still works fine. Displays 1080p material just fine.

      --
      ...si hoc legere nimium eruditionis habes...
    5. Re:Well that's awesome but... by Andy+Dodd · · Score: 1

      When the digital switchover happened, most TVs in my parents' house were older than I was (1979).

      Also, my parents were a classic example of the FCC fucking up when determining "minimum watchable" SNR - LARGE numbers of people in fringe areas were perfectly happy with video that was well below SNRs for analog TV that the FCC considered to be below their definition of "watchable".

      --
      retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
    6. Re:Well that's awesome but... by dj245 · · Score: 1

      10 years is not very old for a TV set. Back in 2009 when the digital switchover and HD forced the issue, many of the TVs scrapped were from the 80s and 90s. There are no major changes to broadcast TV coming down the pike (3D is dead in the water, 4K gets a big meh from your average household) so no reason to buy a new set unless the old one craps out. I'm sure shitty capacitors will do in a number of those sets, but a good many of them will still be in use in 2019.

      Incremental improvements have a way of stacking up. If the glass vendor improves their coatings and can cut glare by 5% a year, the panel vendor improves contrast ratio by 5% a year, the processor vendor improves power consumption by 5% per year, these are all small improvements but after 10 years you have a product that is substantially better in many measurable ways. I replaced an older 27" 1920x1600 panel a while back and the new monitor is a huge improvement as far as picture quality goes. I gained a bit of desk space, and it cost substantially less both in real dollars and inflation-corrected dollars. The old one was "fine" but technology moves on. I have yet to look at any TV/Monitor and be completely, 100% satisfied that it could not be improved further. I think we have many years ahead of us before monitors are a fully mature technology and the only improvements to be made are related to cost reduction.

      --
      Even those who arrange and design shrubberies are under considerable economic stress at this period in history.
    7. Re:Well that's awesome but... by NormalVisual · · Score: 1

      But you will get no where near that kind of life on an all American TV or a computer monitor which will get far more use than any of the current AMOLED devices out there.

      My pair of cheap-ass Sceptre 1680x1050 displays are on their eleventh year now. No problems with either of them and still on the original CCFL backlights, but I would like to get some higher-resolution ones at some point.

      --
      Please stand clear of the doors, por favor mantenganse alejado de las puertas
    8. Re:Well that's awesome but... by mikael · · Score: 1

      They only just started being adopted for computer monitors in 2005/2006. We still had some CRT monitors in our lab at that time. The replacements were LCD flatscreens with 4:3 aspect ratio. Then those were replaced with screens that could do colorimetric accurate displays or cinematic screens with the 16:9 aspect ratio. That was the time where people were getting pissed that they couldn't use the whole screen of their TV/laptop/notebook to display a movie without getting dark areas or losing bits of the picture. So TV's moved to cinematic resolution, that forced the manufacturers to change their processes, and that affected laptop manufacturing as well.

      --
      Vintage computer adverts: http://www.vintageadbrowser.com/computers-and-software-ads
    9. Re:Well that's awesome but... by dbIII · · Score: 1

      But you will get no where near that kind of life on an all American TV or a computer monitor which will get far more use than any of the current AMOLED devices out there.

      I disagree, I've still got a pile of 19" LCD monitors from 2003 at my workplace that are still operating as if new. I think less than 5% have failed over the years, at least one from impact due to falling off a desk. It turns out that people are still happy with screens that old if they get to use three of them.

    10. Re:Well that's awesome but... by stoatwblr · · Score: 1

      "I've still got a pile of 19" LCD monitors from 2003 at my workplace that are still operating as if new. "

      You're lucky. Monitors of that vintage usually die from cooked CCFL inverters long before anything else falls over (14-16 months in $workplace experience)

      Led backlights have much longer service lives and that's why we set a policy of avoiding CCFL over a decade ago.

  4. Which AMOLED by afidel · · Score: 2

    Is that a nasty display with horrible color accuracy like the Atrix 4G or a nice quality panel similar to the one used in the Galaxy S5? Because I'd rather have LCD than a bad AMOLED.

    --
    There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
    1. Re:Which AMOLED by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1

      AMOLED displays cause horrible eyestrain for me due to the high-intensity blue lights they emit. What's worse is LCD displays with CCFL backlights have been removed from production monitor/TV panels, so I have no alternative but to use these awful LED displays. Screw manufacturers screwing with our eyesights.

    2. Re:Which AMOLED by JBMcB · · Score: 1

      Can't you just go into the calibration setup and drop the blue level a bit?

      --
      My Other Computer Is A Data General Nova III.
    3. Re:Which AMOLED by Rei · · Score: 3, Interesting

      Indeed. When I got my last phone, which has an IPS display, I compared with two coworkers who had recently gotten phones (similar price range) with AMOLED displays. The color quality was far better on my phone, something they both agreed on. Colour on AMOLED in all cases felt "oversaturated" in some colours while others looked lacking or "off". For anyone who's ever worked with LED grow lights, where your colors are broken down into distinct bands and it messes with your vision, it was that sort of effect on the small scale. In particular, it left the whites not really feeling completely white. The images on theirs also looked blurrier even though we had comparable resolutions.

      I'm not sure why the AMOLED woulds seem blurrier, but the colour issue makes good sense; IPS uses a white LED backlight while AMOLED uses tiny RGB LEDs. White LEDs don't directly emit light; the light hits a phosphor and that emits broader spectrum light. The IPS polarization filters are paired up with colour filters which cut off out-of-band light but do not narrow (to any relevant degree) the spectrum of light passing through them. Color LEDs, however, emit light on a single frequency. It's actually one of their strengths in many contexts. But it's very poor for reproducing accurate colour.

      At least given the state of the technology the last time I compared, I would definitely not switch to AMOLED. If that means my phone is a tad larger and heavier due to the display size and increased battery draw, so be it. I want image quality.

      --
      Hourglass says she knows a kid in Iowa who grows up to be president.
    4. Re:Which AMOLED by Rei · · Score: 2

      It's not an issue about the presence or lack of blue light, it's about the quality of the blue. Colour LEDs emit in very narrow bands. And many people (myself included) find narrow-band blue to be really piercing.

      --
      Hourglass says she knows a kid in Iowa who grows up to be president.
    5. Re:Which AMOLED by Nemyst · · Score: 1

      AMOLED is a completely different technology to blue LEDs though.

    6. Re:Which AMOLED by WaffleMonster · · Score: 2

      AMOLED displays cause horrible eyestrain for me due to the high-intensity blue lights they emit. What's worse is LCD displays with CCFL backlights have been removed from production monitor/TV panels, so I have no alternative but to use these awful LED displays. Screw manufacturers screwing with our eyesights.

      Look for displays with RGB or GB-R led backlighting or any combination that does not involve crappy white LEDs. A little more expensive found in "professional' displays with wider gamut but worth every penny in my view. These do not have an annoying blue spike in output spectrum that makes everything look strange/dead.

    7. Re:Which AMOLED by WaffleMonster · · Score: 2

      Indeed. When I got my last phone, which has an IPS display, I compared with two coworkers who had recently gotten phones (similar price range) with AMOLED displays. The color quality was far better on my phone, something they both agreed on.

      Colour on AMOLED in all cases felt "oversaturated" in some colours while others looked lacking or "off".

      A problem with AMOLED some vendors are taking shortcuts to cut costs using pentile displays with copious amounts of missing subpixels they figure nobody will notice/miss. I think we need better labeling up front so people know exactly what they are buying. I don't know exactly what you saw but your description is a common reaction to crappy pentile displays.

    8. Re:Which AMOLED by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Is that a nasty display with horrible color accuracy

      Displays don't have horrible colour accuracy. The OS's colour management and display routines do.

    9. Re:Which AMOLED by danbob999 · · Score: 1

      you can also have a bad LCD...

    10. Re:Which AMOLED by Andy+Dodd · · Score: 2

      My guess is that it isn't the narrowband issue that's a problem - the issue is that many of the displays are likely not calibrated or colormatched at all, so a display that has a very wide gamut is using fully saturated primaries when displaying colors that are not supposed to be that saturated.

      If you displayed sRGB "blue" as a fully saturated blue on an AMOLED display, you'd likely wind up with vastly oversaturated colors. To properly take advantage of the display's gamut, you'd have to calibrate it to only display partially saturated primaries for the sRGB primaries, and only display "full saturation" when the content is from a wider-gamut colorspace like Adobe RGB.

      Reality is, it's easier to market an oversaturated display than a "correct" one to most people.

      --
      retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
    11. Re:Which AMOLED by Andy+Dodd · · Score: 1

      Many AMOLED displays use a pentile arrangement where you don't have individual red/green/blue pixels per pixel site. Might explain the reduced perceived resolution.

      And yeah - in theory AMOLED's far more saturated primaries should be a major advantage, especially when viewing wide-gamut content like Adobe RGB - but if you don't desaturate the display for sRGB content it's going to look bogus.

      I wonder if the gamut of most mobile AMOLEDs is wider than DCI P3... not like consumers ever get content in the P3 gamut.

      --
      retrorocket.o not found, launch anyway?
    12. Re:Which AMOLED by thegarbz · · Score: 2

      Colour on AMOLED in all cases felt "oversaturated" in some colours while others looked lacking or "off".

      That's not the display's fault, it's the driver / OS. AMOLED can display as perfect of a colour gamut as possible with 3 primary colours. This is a GOOD THING. The problem is when someone then buys such a display and then slaps it into a device that does no colour management on the output. It's the same reason Slashdot looks horribly saturated on my desktop monitor when viewed with Chrome, but looks fine in Firefox (colour management + non standard display).

      In particular, it left the whites not really feeling completely white.

      That's a long levity routine. Let me guess it looked a bit blue? Another cheap way to make LCDs more resistant to the inevitable fade which is the result of blue pixels dying at a faster rate than all others is to make the blue pixels larger. That has a lovely side effect of a blue bias out of the box.

      The images on theirs also looked blurrier even though we had comparable resolutions.

      That's the sub-pixel layout also partly caused by the blue pixels being larger than all others. Using a pentile layout is actually a good thing for displaying things like text, but sucks for straight lines, and except when vendors use it to effectively lie about image resolution. Just like a 12mpxl camera can't actually produce 12 million colour accurate pixels and relies on neighbour interpolation to generate the 12 million pixels on screen, phone vendors were lying about that too.

      Color LEDs, however, emit light on a single frequency. It's actually one of their strengths in many contexts. But it's very poor for reproducing accurate colour.

      That is very much the opposite in both theory and practice. Unfortunately you've been exposed to some bad practices, which is a shame because AMOLED has so much more to offer in terms of colour reproduction than LCDs ever will.

      At least given the state of the technology the last time I compared, I would definitely not switch to AMOLED.

      Give it another go or at least look into it again. You weren't let down by the technology. You were let down by a crappy vendor.

    13. Re:Which AMOLED by operagost · · Score: 1

      Most people probably don't realize there is a setting for this, but yes, there should be a menu for display settings that allows you to set the temperature for the LED backlight. I have it in my Sharp.

      --

      Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
  5. No thanks by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Do you want an LCD with a decades-old lifespan or AMOLED with burn-in problems within a few months?

    1. Re:No thanks by ledow · · Score: 2

      Really?

      My Samsung phone is three years old and has AMOLED screen - not a problem. Girlfriend has the same phone for the same amount of time... no problem.

      And I deliberately disable all screensavers and moving shite on the screen, so it's spends 99% of its powered-on life showing the same icons in the same place.

      I don't know what cheap crap you're buying but it's go nothing to do with the underlying tech of AMOLED.

    2. Re:No thanks by Lumpy · · Score: 2

      manufacturers want the AMOLED.

      they utterly HATE with a passion anyone that keeps a product more than 1 year without buying a new one. Those kinds of customers are scum that are stealing from them.

      --
      Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
    3. Re:No thanks by Lumpy · · Score: 3, Informative

      LCD's from a decade ago. I have TONS of LCD monitors with LED back lights that still work perfectly 6-8-10- even 12 years later. Hell I have a pair of ELO touchscreen monitors that are 14 years old that still work great and they have the old CFL backlights.

      anything made today? it's all shit made as cheap as possible to make sure they break.

      --
      Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
    4. Re:No thanks by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      My Samsung phone is three years old and has AMOLED screen - not a problem. Girlfriend has the same phone for the same amount of time... no problem.

      Yes really. AMOLED has a well defined degrade characteristic. My 4 year old phone shows sign of burn in which are immediately obvious with a test pattern but generally not an issue in normal use.

      Thing is given it's use throughout the day I fully expect to have the same issue with a computer monitor in 9 months given the duty of the screens. AMOLED is fine for phones, fine for tablets (unless you're my parents and spend hours watching movies on tablets, their's is wreaked by the way, very obvious yellowing in the middle of the screen), but it's an unworkable scenario for a computer monitor or a family TV (though personally it would be fine for a TV for me given how much I use it).

    5. Re:No thanks by Solandri · · Score: 2

      You ever wonder why screensavers are called that? Because they were invented to help prevent burn-in on CRTs (the phosphors would degrade with use over time), thus saving the screen. Seriously, this problem was solved decades ago. The only usage where you need to watch out for burn-in is for always-on displays, like airport flight schedule displays.

      On a phone or tablet, you can help by using the device in different orientations or upside down - the software doesn't care, and only the position of the physical volume buttons changes (the screen off button doesn't really matter with AMOLED since it doesn't have a backlight to turn off). Heck, I grab my phone upside down half the time anyway.

      I much prefer this little nuisance over the poor blacks and lousy color saturation (sRGB was a huge step backwards from the NTSC color space that was used in the CRT days) everyone seems to have gotten used to with LCDs.

    6. Re:No thanks by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Do you want an LCD with a decades-old lifespan or AMOLED with burn-in problems within a few months?

      There is no way my phone will last for decades. Too many parts of it are tiny and fiddly. It only has to last for five years tops, more like three, before I'm on to the next device.

      For a desktop display, I share your concerns. For small devices, it doesn't really matter.

      --
      "You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
    7. Re:No thanks by jandrese · · Score: 1

      I work with a ton of ancient 1280x1024 LCD displays and they're still perfectly adequate for the job. The biggest problem with them is the scarcity of ports, many only have VGA and Component input and some machines are starting to come with only HDMI and Displayport. None of them have issues with burn in or anything like that.

      --

      I read the internet for the articles.
    8. Re:No thanks by WaffleMonster · · Score: 1

      My Samsung phone is three years old and has AMOLED screen - not a problem. I don't know what cheap crap you're buying but it's go nothing to do with the underlying tech of AMOLED.

      AMOLED is made of millions of tiny light bulbs that get dimmer as long as they are on.

      You can improve the light bulbs or compensate for it with calibration tables but it has everything to do with the underlying technology.

    9. Re:No thanks by Lumpy · · Score: 2

      Displayport to VGA adapters are easily found. i have two VGA side monitors that run off of displayport connections on the video card by using two $6.95 adapters.

      --
      Do not look at laser with remaining good eye.
    10. Re:No thanks by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 1

      My main and only monitor is an old ViewSonic VP171s. It has both a VGA and DVI input. At first I was using only the VGA, then after a few years I switched to the DVI. I'm now using an HDMI-to-DVI cable and it works fine.

    11. Re:No thanks by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 2

      Hello manufacturers! My ThinkPad 760XL says hi!

    12. Re:No thanks by U2xhc2hkb3QgU3Vja3M · · Score: 2

      What about computers, where program interfaces are always in the same spot in your daily usage?

    13. Re:No thanks by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      anything made today? it's all shit made as cheap as possible to make sure they break.

      No. Just a different target audience. 14 years ago LCDs were cutting edge, high end and expensive with no reason to skimp on quality to lower the price. The only thing that has changed is there's now more choice in the low end.

      There's still plenty of quality out there if you're willing to open you wallet, but people will give you blank stares if you tell them you spent $700 on a 1080p display.

    14. Re:No thanks by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      Which doesn't make much sense as the US carriers at least all have 2 year replacement periods (actually 16 month...). Why make the user experience miserable near the end when they are shopping for their next phone?

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    15. Re:No thanks by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      In computer monitors, most people buy TN garbage, and if you want a nice display you get IPS. AMOLED is not meant for durable goods, the blue pixels fade after only a couple years.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    16. Re:No thanks by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      You ever wonder why screensavers are called that? Because they were invented to help prevent burn-in on CRTs (the phosphors would degrade with use over time), thus saving the screen. Seriously, this problem was solved decades ago.

      You fail to understand the technology. CRT's burn in the front of the phosphor tube by over exciting the same area. AMOLEDs don't burn in as such, they burn out. Running a screensaver instead of turning them off would simply make the problem far worse than it already is, which is the fact that the blue pixels die at a faster rate than the others. The problem is very real and can't be fixed by your magic software.

    17. Re:No thanks by AmiMoJo · · Score: 4, Insightful

      15 years ago it was "look at this LCD shit, built down to a price and dies after a few years, dead pixels everywhere, scaling sucks, I'll stick with my trusty 20 year old 20kg CRT thanks!"

      It's just survivor bias. There has been cheap crap forever, we just think older stuff was more reliable because we have some examples of it surviving for a long time. Cars are the worst, people moan that modern ones are too complex and suck while forgetting that the old ones tended to fall apart as everything rusted away after 5 years.

      --
      const int one = 65536; (Silvermoon, Texture.cs)
      SJW, n: "Someone I don't like, and by the way I'm a fuckwit" - AC
    18. Re:No thanks by MatthiasF · · Score: 1

      How dare you make a reasonable assertion in response to selection bias and anecdotal evidence.

      Who do you think you are.

    19. Re:No thanks by jrumney · · Score: 1

      It's really only a problem for a TV if you spend most of your time watching the same channel, so leave your TV susceptible to logo burn-in, or bottom bar burn-in if it is a news channel.

    20. Re:No thanks by jrumney · · Score: 1

      On a phone or tablet, you can help by using the device in different orientations or upside down - the software doesn't care, and only the position of the physical volume buttons changes (the screen off button doesn't really matter with AMOLED since it doesn't have a backlight to turn off). Heck, I grab my phone upside down half the time anyway.

      Except the standard Google Launcher does not rotate at all, and a lot of programs only work in 3 of the 4 possible orientations (usually not upside down portrait mode).

    21. Re:No thanks by dbIII · · Score: 1

      For devices prone to burn-in such as plasma displays there is often firmware that shifts the image slightly if the device has been on for a long time.

    22. Re:No thanks by amiga3D · · Score: 1

      They're so damn cheap though that it hardly matters. I paid 400 dollars in 1993 for a 32" TV from Sam's Club. I finally ditched it in 2010 for a 48" 240hz 1080p flat screen TV that cost me 500 dollars on a black Friday at Tigermart. It was actually cheaper adjusted for inflation than the 32" boat anchor I bought in '93. I want a new TV but the damn flat screen wont quit working. Meanwhile my grandkids are watching the 32" beast at my son's house. I haven't had a TV go bad on me ever, I just get tired of them after a decade or so.

    23. Re:No thanks by Oligonicella · · Score: 1

      Yours may have. Mine did not.

    24. Re:No thanks by Coren22 · · Score: 1

      I have dual IPS displays on my desktop at home, I can't say I have ever seen this problem. It appears from Google that this is some kind of image burn in problem, but I have never seen that issue with IPS displays, but perhaps I have been lucky.

      --
      APK likes to ask for responses to the same things over and over. Maybe he just likes the responses?
    25. Re:No thanks by nhat11 · · Score: 1

      Very good point, I forgot LCDs looks ok and those dead pixels sucks

  6. Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by Anonymous Coward · · Score: 1, Interesting

    I'm not too bothered about the display on my phone, but I'm desperate to see LCD replaced in the desktop monitor market. I'm still hanging on to a Sony FW900 CRT monitor, and it is astounding how good it looks next to a supposedly professional grade LCD.

    LCD has been the worst display technology ever created, with abysmal viewing angles, appalling contrast, slow respone times (with 60Hz still the standard, compared to 120Hz+ that we enjoyed on CRTs in the 90s), poor colour recreation, bad colour uniformity accross the screen, and bad motion recration. Unfortunately, due to its low production costs, durability, thinness and low power consumtion it has managed to see off far superior display technologies.

    With OLED beating it in thinness, power consumption and now cost, hopefully we might finally get a display technology that's can deliver a decent image. There's just the problems of image retension and lifespan to seal with...

    1. Re:Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by Rei · · Score: 1

      I'm not too bothered about the display on my phone, but I'm desperate to see LCD replaced in the desktop monitor market. I'm still hanging on to a Sony FW900 CRT monitor, and it is astounding how good it looks next to a supposedly professional grade LCD ... hopefully we might finally get a display technology that's can deliver a decent image.

      Hmm...

      --
      Hourglass says she knows a kid in Iowa who grows up to be president.
    2. Re:Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by Sique · · Score: 3, Informative

      You could actually power an LCD with 120 Hz, that's not the problem. There is just no reason to do so, differently than with CRTs. CRTs have a luminescense coating on the inside of the tube. It gets hit by the electron ray (cathode ray, hence the name), and lights up. It takes some time, until it goes out again. If this time is too long, all movements on the screen are blurred. If this is too short, the screen gets too dark and flickers. If we use a stronger cathode ray, the luminescense coating wears out too quickly and burns in. So the only way we can have a bright, non-blurry CRT picture is increasing the frequency. In an ideal world, a picture frequency of around 20 would suffice. Cinemas use 24 pictures per second, and not many complain about the picture flashing too much or movements being blurry. It works, because the time between picture frames is much smaller than the time we see the single picture frame. LCDs at 60 Hz are completely ok, but a CRT at 60 Hz flickers like an old TV set.

      --
      .sig: Sique *sigh*
    3. Re: Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by Type44Q · · Score: 1

      compared to 120Hz+ that we enjoyed on CRTs in the 90s)

      A lot of those CRT's had no problem pushing 200+ hertz at the lower resolutions we typically gamed at in those days...

    4. Re: Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by Type44Q · · Score: 1

      You could actually power an LCD with 120 Hz, that's not the problem. There is just no reason to do so,

      Doesn't that depend on the content?

    5. Re: Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by jandrese · · Score: 1

      My LCD runs at 120 Hz, but it was a "3D Gaming" display and is unfortunately a TN panel.

      --

      I read the internet for the articles.
    6. Re:Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by Sique · · Score: 1

      It looks fine, if you just watch movies. It does not if you try to work with black-on-white documents.

      --
      .sig: Sique *sigh*
    7. Re:Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      LCD has been the worst display technology ever created, with abysmal viewing angles, appalling contrast, slow respone times (with 60Hz still the standard, compared to 120Hz+ that we enjoyed on CRTs in the 90s), poor colour recreation, bad colour uniformity accross the screen, and bad motion recration.

      Try not buying the cheapest monitor you can find.

      Aside from contrast ratio a good LCD has every CRT beat in all other aspects, except for one which is refresh rate and even there a good screen is more than good enough.

      My LCD has better colour rendition, a 179degree viewing angle (would be 180deg but there's a bezel in the way) than even the nice Eizo CRT I used to own, and frankly the contrast is more than good enough and limited by the fact I don't watch movies at 1am with all the lights out. Oh and it's over 8 years old and according to the specs its replacement models kick the crap out of it.

    8. Re:Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by operagost · · Score: 1

      60 Hz refresh in an LCD does not have the same impact as 60 Hz in a CRT. The proof is literally right in front of your eyes.

      --

      Gamingmuseum.com: Give your 3D accelerator a rest.
    9. Re: Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by Mryll · · Score: 1

      Yep, they're not cheap yet but they'll get there. Really pleased with mine.

    10. Re:Can We Have A Computer Monitor Now? by lars_stefan_axelsson · · Score: 1

      Cinemas use 24 pictures per second, and not many complain about the picture flashing too much...

      Actually they probably would. In a traditional film projector for 24 frame/sec projection, the individual frame is "double gated" (or even triple gated), i.e. the gate has two slots in it, showing the same frame twice. This is to reduce flicker, which would be much more noticeable if the frame was only projected once.

      --
      Stefan Axelsson
  7. AMOLED TV by Sam36 · · Score: 1

    But what about AMOLED TV??

    1. Re:AMOLED TV by Locke2005 · · Score: 1

      Aren't the LG OLED TVs Active Matrix? However, they are really pricey due to still low yields on making OLED screens that large. Give it a couple years for the price to come down. I think the big market for AMOLED is wearable computing, that can be done now at a decent price.

      --
      I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
    2. Re:AMOLED TV by macs4all · · Score: 1

      Aren't the LG OLED TVs Active Matrix?

      What??? Methinks you're mixing up your technologies.

      Isn't that what the "AM" in AMOLED stands for?

      LEDs are fast to turn-on, but MUCH slower to turn-off due to trapped-charge from junction capacitance (IIRC). The Active Matrix means the same thing it did for LCDs: There is a driver transistor (actually a push-pull pair of transistors) for EACH pixel, and the "pull" transistor is responsible for discharging the LED more quickly, this significantly decreasing ghosting, which we see as "motion blur".

  8. I wouldn't call the death of LCD just yet. by Agent0013 · · Score: 3, Insightful

    For the wall mounted TV panels I have gotten Plasma and love it. I don't really understand why LCD is much more popular because all of the things you would want in a picture seem to lean to Plasma as better. Better contrast, darker blacks, brighter more vibrant colors, better viewing angle. The only thing that LCD has on it's side is better bright light viewing, but my TV is not in the sun-room, so that is not a problem for me and probably most people. And burn-in has not been a problem with the two of them that I have had. On the first one you might see after images for a minute when you left something paused, but they always went away quickly.

    Sometimes there are strange "Sheeple" reasons why some things succeed and other fail in the marketplace.

    --

    -- ssoorrrryy,, dduupplleexx sswwiittcchh oonn.. -Quote found on actual fortune cookie.
    1. Re:I wouldn't call the death of LCD just yet. by swb · · Score: 3, Informative

      Heat and power consumption? A customer has a plasma set near in a confined space I have to work and it's like standing by a space heater.

    2. Re:I wouldn't call the death of LCD just yet. by drinkypoo · · Score: 1

      Better contrast, darker blacks, brighter more vibrant colors, better viewing angle.

      If you have a quality LCD, Plasma is only infinitesimally superior in any of those regards. Meanwhile, it consumes a lot more power and tends to take up more space for equal cash outlay.

      The only thing that LCD has on it's side is better bright light viewing, but my TV is not in the sun-room, so that is not a problem for me and probably most people.

      I suspect both that most people have the largest windows in the living room, and that most people have the largest TV in the living room; therefore most people would have the most problem with light in the room they're most likely to watch TV in.

      And burn-in has not been a problem with the two of them that I have had. On the first one you might see after images for a minute when you left something paused, but they always went away quickly.

      But that actually sucks! It's what sucks about IPS LCD, too, at least the early ones. I have an early Viewsonic IPS and it's awful in that way. I would use my normal LCD of the same size (25.5") but it has three dead pixels in awkward places.

      --
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    3. Re:I wouldn't call the death of LCD just yet. by David_Hart · · Score: 1

      Heat and power consumption? A customer has a plasma set near in a confined space I have to work and it's like standing by a space heater.

      Power consumption isn't that much more than LCD. The main driver was production cost. Cost per inch of Plasma TV's were higher than LCD. Finally, as far as I know, they never solved the problem of being able to produce smaller plasma TVs (i.e. 40 inch or less) which is a large portion of the market.

      I have one of the last 52" Plasma models produced by Samsung and it's still going strong (much as I would like to replace it with a bigger LCD TV). I primarily got it for movies, which look awesome on it. And, even though I also use it for gaming, I've never had any problems with burn-in. I'll probably end up replacing it with a 4K TV in about 2 years once 4K content (i.e. movies) and 4K standards are more fully baked.

    4. Re:I wouldn't call the death of LCD just yet. by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      Power consumption isn't that much more than LCD.

      Maybe if you're comparing the latest and greatest plasma produced to the first ever LCD. The power consumption was FAR higher, far enough that it heated the room with waste energy. .

  9. And Apple doesn't have it by monkeyxpress · · Score: 1

    Samsung leads the way with these panels, and puts the best technology into its own flagship models. Apple is quickly trying to fix this problem by investing in AMOLED, and it looks like they will move to the technology in 2018 through a partnership with JDI (just in time for the iPhone 8). In the mean time, I'm guessing the iPhone 7 will have a quantum dot display, as this can match AMOLED for color saturation (interestingly, this strength of AMOLED is something Tim Cook was spreading FUD about last year - I lost a lot of respect for his integrity when he did that), and brings the power consumption difference much closer. The remaining strength of AMOLED is then being much thinner (no backlight), and handling flex better. All in all, this road map will let them make their rounded rectangles progressively thinner.

    1. Re:And Apple doesn't have it by thegarbz · · Score: 1

      I'm guessing the iPhone 7 will have a quantum dot display, as this can match AMOLED for color saturation

      Given how an AMOLED has perfect colour saturation in terms of breadth of the emission spectrum for each colour, I will wait on that. I'm skeptical for two reasons: Firstly all the marketing claims that they have better colour than AMOLED which I find hard to believe that they are capable of unless they are using more than the 3 primaries or have invented new colour spectrum that humans can't see, and secondly because this is still somewhat experimental.

      I don't see why the iPhone 7 would have a QDLCD display before AMOLED. Either they are researching in QDLCD, or they are implementing an existing widely used technology. I don't see the sense in going for the experimental cutting edge as a stop gap for the mass market product.

    2. Re:And Apple doesn't have it by Locke2005 · · Score: 2

      Haven't you learned by now, you pay them their $99/year AppleCare extortion fee, and they just fix it for you...

      --
      I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
    3. Re:And Apple doesn't have it by monkeyxpress · · Score: 1

      QDLCD is not particularly cutting edge. You just swap out the colour filter for a QD film. It has been used in TVs for a while now, but nobody other than Apple is really doing much innovating with LCD in the mobile space (especially now, as the article states, AMOLED is cheaper). Apple's problem is that it is a premium company who doesn't have access to AMOLED panels (I guess Samsung Displays would probably sell to them, but then they end up dependent on them for a key component again).

      Major interim benefit of QDLCD is that you don't lose as much energy as with a colour filter. The backlight dominates power consumption in the phone (well, when you're in an urban setting anyway) so reducing this will let them make the battery smaller which seems to be their main design goal these days.

    4. Re:And Apple doesn't have it by UnknowingFool · · Score: 1

      this strength of AMOLED is something Tim Cook was spreading FUD about last year

      This is what Tim Cook said about OLED in Feb 2013 (not last year):

      When you look at displays, some people are focused on size. There’s a few other things about the display that are important. Some people use OLED displays, the color saturation is awful.

      In fact, reading articles from back then, over-saturation was a problem for AMOLED displays. Since that time OLED technology has worked on many of the shortcomings including contrast, saturation, and cost. However not all OLED displays are equal as the Android forums have noted as a few months ago. I don't see that as FUD.

      --
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    5. Re:And Apple doesn't have it by thegarbz · · Score: 1, Insightful

      It has been used in TVs for a while now

      Right I missed that. Did a bit of digging. Not as good as OLED colour wise. Not as good as Plasma either. Slightly better than standard LCD (but then so is my 10 year old monitor). Shows that you should never believe the marketing. But I guess it's still cutting edge in that it's not available in any high-DPI displays that I can see.

      Major interim benefit of QDLCD is that you don't lose as much energy as with a colour filter. The backlight dominates power consumption in the phone

      I read that as something else. It means BRIGHTER displays :-). Don't be under the delusion that you'll ever get better battery life. The energy efficiency gains are always offset by vendors somehow, just like Intel's processors were always offset by yet another version of Windows bogging things down.

      I have to say I'm not impressed with the idea that anyone is "innovating" in the LCD space. Given that Apple gets their panels manufactured by others I don't understand why they wouldn't just switch straight to AMOLED. But I guess time will tell.

    6. Re:And Apple doesn't have it by UnknowingFool · · Score: 1

      Apple's problem is that it is a premium company who doesn't have access to AMOLED panels (I guess Samsung Displays would probably sell to them, but then they end up dependent on them for a key component again).

      Doesn't have access or doesn't want the technology? I think that one does not mean the other. Considering the lengths that Apple would go through to acquire technology like loaning suppliers capital for business expansions, I think that if Apple wanted AMOLED panels, they could get them.

      --
      Well, there's spam egg sausage and spam, that's not got much spam in it.
    7. Re:And Apple doesn't have it by macs4all · · Score: 1

      Apple's problem is that it is a premium company who doesn't have access to AMOLED panels (I guess Samsung Displays would probably sell to them, but then they end up dependent on them for a key component again).

      I would imagine a couple of the biggest problems for Samsung in selling to Apple is getting past their approval process and sufficient yield. When a new Samsung phone comes out, there aren't generally lines around the block waiting for it. The distribution channel has time to get filled-up. But when a new Apple phone comes out, the raw-materials suppliers have to be ready to supply a BURST of product (and this product ALL has to meet specs), or everybody is in trouble, pronto!

      I don't think that AMOLED still has the production yield to meet that kind of "initial burst" demand.

      Plus, Samsung is kind of (understandably) proud of their proprietary advances in AMOLED technology, and I wouldn't be at ALL surprised to find that they simply priced their AMOLED quote to Apple out of the running, intentionally; knowing full-well that no one else could even come close to supplying enough "glass" to fulfill Apple's blanket-order requirements.

  10. Transflective? by squiggleslash · · Score: 2

    Are AMOLED displays available in transflective form? Because I thought that was an LCD-only technology, and to be honest, I'd rather see phones go transflective than a supposedly superior technology that doesn't display anything when unlit, even if the latter has superficial benefits when the screen is "lit".

    --
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    1. Re:Transflective? by Nemyst · · Score: 2

      AMOLED fundamentally works by emitting light from the individual subpixel elements, it's not an LCD and therefore it does not require backlighting to work. That also means it cannot be transflective.

  11. It's not cheaper for long by SmaryJerry · · Score: 1

    Once the LCD Cabal takes notice, they will jointly decide to lower their agreed prices. ;)

  12. So... by Locke2005 · · Score: 3, Interesting

    Will AMOLED customizable jewelry be a thing by this Christmas, or next Christmas?

    --
    I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
  13. Race to the bottom by WaffleMonster · · Score: 2

    I want reliable displays that will last for at least a decade without problems. Having suffered thru CRT style burn-in I have no desire to purchase a device prone to the same problems.

    1. Re:Race to the bottom by iggymanz · · Score: 1

      these AMOLED have much shorter life because the organics used decompose, great for forced obsolescence. maybe they'll be used in big monitors so everyone has to refresh every three years.

  14. Re:Arguably WORSE colors by jandrese · · Score: 1

    Seems like the solution might be to turn down the color saturation on the display, and then slowly ramp it back up as the elements start to degrade.

    --

    I read the internet for the articles.
  15. Cheaper in more ways than one by frovingslosh · · Score: 2

    Another important thing about OLEDs is that they have a far lower life expectancy. While that might be fine for a cell phone that you intend to replace every two years, it is not so good when buying that huge wide screen TV for the living room. Assuming that you don't like seeing lots of dead pixels or that you are willing to replace your TV every couple of years. Personally I have avoided OLED TVs for this reason (even more so than because of the previous higher price).

    --
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    1. Re:Cheaper in more ways than one by macs4all · · Score: 1

      Another important thing about OLEDs is that they have a far lower life expectancy. While that might be fine for a cell phone that you intend to replace every two years, it is not so good when buying that huge wide screen TV for the living room. Assuming that you don't like seeing lots of dead pixels or that you are willing to replace your TV every couple of years. Personally I have avoided OLED TVs for this reason (even more so than because of the previous higher price).

      Is that still true? When I last spec'ed an OLED display into an industrial product I was designing (around 2008), there were some monochrome OLEDs that had around 50k hours of lifetime, but the color ones (particularly the Blue pixels, IIRC) had a little over 15k hour lifespans.

      But even at that time, Samsung and (IIRC) Sharp were on the verge of some breakthroughs.

  16. Re:It took more than 2 years by valinor89 · · Score: 1

    Or planed obsolescence...

  17. Comment removed by account_deleted · · Score: 1

    Comment removed based on user account deletion

  18. Very bad design by dbIII · · Score: 1

    I have a phone designed in 2008 that turns the screen off a few minutes after a user has interacted with it for everything other than GPS mapping and playing videos. If it is playing music files or streaming audio the design is sane enough to keep the sound going while turning the screen off.
    There is no excuse for having an inferior design to that in 2016.

  19. Re:Arguably WORSE colors by jaa101 · · Score: 1

    So you're complaining that the colour saturation is too great? Really? This is a major feature of AMOLED displays. You should be able to turn the saturation down in software. If you're looking at TVs in a retailer, of course the saturation, contrast and brightness will all be set off the charts so the sets stand out from the competition. Almost always they have a much more natural picture mode you can choose via the setup menu to see realistic results.