5 ms·

What's so great about OLEDs? They consume much more energy and don't produce the most accurate colors.

by acchow 10y ago

vardump 10y ago
Properly calibrated OLEDs look at least a lot better to my eye than any LCDs. Much deeper blacks and more pure colors that go past what an LCD can reproduce.
Inconel 10y ago
I'm fairly sure the new OLED displays from Samsung can produce extremely accurate colors. I don't remember exactly where I read so, perhaps AnandTech, but I believe the Samsung displays were considered some of the most accurate smartphone displays prior to the new iPhones. I should note that for some reason it seems like most smartphone manufacturers, basically everyone aside from Apple, way oversaturate their displays, this is especially true in the case of Samsung. Even the Nexus 6P display looked horrendous to me out of the box. Fortunately there is a setting in the developer options to enable sRGB mode which makes a huge difference. Regarding power consumption, I think OLED mostly loses out on efficiency when generating white backgrounds, but I'm not sure how much of a battery hit this causes in normal use scenarios. As to what's so great about OLED, for me, as someone who frequently uses their phone in relatively low light situations, I absolutely love the deep blacks and the fact that when I have the phone on low brightness using a dark theme it barely produces any ambient light. On that note, Google seriously needs to introduce a system wide dark theme. I don't have an iPhone but I'm really interested to see if/when Apple adopts OLED whether they redesign iOS to take advantage of it. I know many people dislike the bright white UI of iOS and Android.
- CountSessine 10y ago
  I absolutely love the deep blacks and the fact that when I have the phone on low brightness using a dark theme it barely produces any ambient light Yup - completely agree. When I got my Tab S, I knew that the exynos 5420 was grossly inferior to the a8x in the Air 2, but I wanted my tablet for watching videos in bed at night. I was right; the 5420 is execrable and makes web browsing very painful compared to the Air 2 (my kids have Air 2's). But the display is so much better than the Air 2's in every way you'd care to mention or measure. It's unbeatable for its intended purpose. <sigh>
  - Inconel 10y ago
    Bedtime browsing is indeed a huge advantage. I can finally browse HN in bed without pissing off the person trying to sleep next to me. Now Google just needs to get serious about system wide dark themes, as well as dark themes for stock apps, and I'll be happy. I'm sure with the large screen on a tablet this is even more of a benefit.
    - fakename123 10y ago
      I found the app Twilight (similar to f.lux on the desktop) to be very useful. And it doesn't require root.
CountSessine 10y ago
They only consume more energy when displaying white. They consume very little energy when displaying black. OLED displays have a very wide color gamut. If you have source material that was tuned to it, there's really nothing like it. To get a similar gamut with LCD you need a quantum dot backlight. Samsung devices all have a screen mode where they constrain their gamut to sRGB for more accurate colors, though. In terms of color accuracy, they've consistently been the best around, when set to limit their gamut to sRGB. This (http://www.displaymate.com/Galaxy_Note7_ShootOut_1.htm http://www.displaymate.com/Galaxy_Note7_ShootOut_1.htm) site has test results for most recentish smartphones and tablets and declared the Note 7's display to be "the best performing Smartphone Display that we have ever tested." Every Samsung device with an OLED display released in the last few years has achieved this. And of course the contrast ratio is much better than LCD. In terms of display quality, provided the phone can be set to sRGB mode, OLED is as good or better than LCD in every metric. And this doesn't even touch on all of the novel uses a display that uses no power when displaying black can be put to - for example, Samsung devices can typically display the time or notifications in white-on-black on the display persistently when the screen is otherwise 'off'. With OLED, only the pixels that are active are drawing power. The only problem with OLED has been blue pixel decay. I have an OLED display in both my tablet and my phone and I'm a heavy user, and I haven't noticed any change in the 2 years I've owned them though. Really, it's just a better technology. It's shameful that everyone has allowed Samsung to maintain a lock on it. I really wish I didn't have to buy Samsung devices to get this fantastic technology.
- vamur 10y ago
  One issue with Samsung AMOLEDs I've noticed is the PWM effect - you can see it in any review of a Samsung phone where the phone is not on max brightness. The PWM effect can cause headache for people who are susceptible to the flicker.
  - CountSessine 10y ago
    Wow - I didn't know that. This is probably the same group of people who had problems with MEMS displays.
- 10y ago

What's so great about OLEDs? They consume much more energy and don't produce the most accurate colors.

by acchow 10y ago

What's so great about OLEDs? They consume much more energy and don't produce the most accurate colors.

Properly calibrated OLEDs look at least a lot better to my eye than any LCDs. Much deeper blacks and more pure colors that go past what an LCD can reproduce.

Inconel 10y ago

I'm fairly sure the new OLED displays from Samsung can produce extremely accurate colors. I don't remember exactly where I read so, perhaps AnandTech, but I believe the Samsung displays were considered some of the most accurate smartphone displays prior to the new iPhones. I should note that for some reason it seems like most smartphone manufacturers, basically everyone aside from Apple, way oversaturate their displays, this is especially true in the case of Samsung. Even the Nexus 6P display looked horrendous to me out of the box. Fortunately there is a setting in the developer options to enable sRGB mode which makes a huge difference. Regarding power consumption, I think OLED mostly loses out on efficiency when generating white backgrounds, but I'm not sure how much of a battery hit this causes in normal use scenarios. As to what's so great about OLED, for me, as someone who frequently uses their phone in relatively low light situations, I absolutely love the deep blacks and the fact that when I have the phone on low brightness using a dark theme it barely produces any ambient light. On that note, Google seriously needs to introduce a system wide dark theme. I don't have an iPhone but I'm really interested to see if/when Apple adopts OLED whether they redesign iOS to take advantage of it. I know many people dislike the bright white UI of iOS and Android.

CountSessine 10y ago
I absolutely love the deep blacks and the fact that when I have the phone on low brightness using a dark theme it barely produces any ambient light Yup - completely agree. When I got my Tab S, I knew that the exynos 5420 was grossly inferior to the a8x in the Air 2, but I wanted my tablet for watching videos in bed at night. I was right; the 5420 is execrable and makes web browsing very painful compared to the Air 2 (my kids have Air 2's). But the display is so much better than the Air 2's in every way you'd care to mention or measure. It's unbeatable for its intended purpose. <sigh>
- Inconel 10y ago
  Bedtime browsing is indeed a huge advantage. I can finally browse HN in bed without pissing off the person trying to sleep next to me. Now Google just needs to get serious about system wide dark themes, as well as dark themes for stock apps, and I'll be happy. I'm sure with the large screen on a tablet this is even more of a benefit.
  - fakename123 10y ago
    I found the app Twilight (similar to f.lux on the desktop) to be very useful. And it doesn't require root.

CountSessine 10y ago

They only consume more energy when displaying white. They consume very little energy when displaying black. OLED displays have a very wide color gamut. If you have source material that was tuned to it, there's really nothing like it. To get a similar gamut with LCD you need a quantum dot backlight. Samsung devices all have a screen mode where they constrain their gamut to sRGB for more accurate colors, though. In terms of color accuracy, they've consistently been the best around, when set to limit their gamut to sRGB. This (http://www.displaymate.com/Galaxy_Note7_ShootOut_1.htm http://www.displaymate.com/Galaxy_Note7_ShootOut_1.htm) site has test results for most recentish smartphones and tablets and declared the Note 7's display to be "the best performing Smartphone Display that we have ever tested." Every Samsung device with an OLED display released in the last few years has achieved this. And of course the contrast ratio is much better than LCD. In terms of display quality, provided the phone can be set to sRGB mode, OLED is as good or better than LCD in every metric. And this doesn't even touch on all of the novel uses a display that uses no power when displaying black can be put to - for example, Samsung devices can typically display the time or notifications in white-on-black on the display persistently when the screen is otherwise 'off'. With OLED, only the pixels that are active are drawing power. The only problem with OLED has been blue pixel decay. I have an OLED display in both my tablet and my phone and I'm a heavy user, and I haven't noticed any change in the 2 years I've owned them though. Really, it's just a better technology. It's shameful that everyone has allowed Samsung to maintain a lock on it. I really wish I didn't have to buy Samsung devices to get this fantastic technology.

vamur 10y ago
One issue with Samsung AMOLEDs I've noticed is the PWM effect - you can see it in any review of a Samsung phone where the phone is not on max brightness. The PWM effect can cause headache for people who are susceptible to the flicker.
- CountSessine 10y ago
  Wow - I didn't know that. This is probably the same group of people who had problems with MEMS displays.
10y ago