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Google offers at least $880M to LG display for OLED investment
- jtl999 10y agoI hope future OLED displays don't have PWM flickering. Such a negative crippling an otherwise great technology.
- sturp 10y agoPWM is the only sensible way to drive an LED, so you're out of luck on that score. Of course the period can be in the kilohertz range were you'll never see it.
- microcolonel 10y agoHow slow do these oscillators run? It seems like that would be masked by persistence of vision prettymuch anywhere above 90Hz.
- kuschku 10y agoAfter testing with (larger, but still OLED) LEDs I've got here, it seems to be far higher. In my projects, for any frequency above 800Hz flickering wasn't observable, but still created nausea and headaches. Above 8000Hz nausea and headaches were gone.
- cc439 10y agoThat's interesting because I have an Oculus DK2 with an OLED panel (Galaxy Note 3 panel) and I've experienced 0 issues in what many consider the most sensitive display environment.
- WhitneyLand 10y ago800Hz PWM can cause nausea? Is there any objective research supporting this? I haven't heard of anyone doing simple blind testing or controlling for other factors.
- TeMPOraL 10y agoWouldn't that make one unable to basically function in our world, given that a lot of things, even most basic LEDs, are PWM-driven, and not necessarily at very high frequencies?
- Godel_unicode 10y agoI believe you're thinking of the pixel refresh rate, where 144hz is about the best you'll get and 60hz is normal, whereas PWM is used in the backlight and the frequency is indeed in the khz.
- boose_e 10y agoYou can get at least 240hz if you're willing to pay. http://www.benq.us/product/gaminggears/xl2540 http://www.benq.us/product/gaminggears/xl2540
- dahauns 10y agoI'm afraid he does indeed talk about PWM. Sadly, lots of LED fixtures and displays (especially in laptops) still have atrociously low PWM frequencies...
- kuschku 10y ago60Hz PWM wouldn't even work in laptops – you’d have, at 60Hz refresh rate, only the following colors available: black, red, green, blue, yellow, magenta, cyan, white. As, for each frame, you could turn each pixel only either on or off. 8 colors isn’t exactly 16 million colors. To get 8-bit colors, with PWM, you need far higher refresh rates. For OLED, that’s 15.3 kHz minimum to get sRGB colors with PWM. If you only need to dim backlight, 4kHz is usually enough.
- dahauns 10y agoHuh? I'm talking LED backlights and lamps that regulate brightness with PWM. No color generation involved here. And these can get really ugly: https://www.notebookcheck.com/Test-Lenovo-Ideapad-310-15ISK-Notebook.173278.0.html https://www.notebookcheck.com/Test-Lenovo-Ideapad-310-15ISK-...
- bsder 10y agoPlease specify what you are measuring, because the frequencies you are quoting are far outside human perception limits. These also don't match the numbers being quoted by the VR guys. I'm extremely sensitive to refresh rates. I used to have two gigantic ViewSonic CRT monitors on my desk along with special Matrox video cards so that I could have high refresh rates. 60Hz gave me whacking migraines. 72Hz was fatiguing but didn't give me migraines. 80Hz+ and I was just fine. I haven't had a migraine due to refresh rates on digital displays ever. Not even for incredibly slow displays.
- jfim 10y agoKeep in mind that LEDs and CRTs are two completely different things. CRTs have "phosphor decay," where a pixel hit by the electron beam will gradually turn on and fade out over time until being refreshed again. For LEDs, they're normally operated using a PWM; turn them off (0% brightness) and back on (100% brightness) fast enough and people don't really notice that instead of 50% constant brightness, they're getting 0%, 100%, 0%, 100% ... with a duty cycle of 50%. You can see that even with LCD monitors. LCD monitors with a LED backlight will have a display refresh (ie. how often the pixels can change color) of, say, 60 Hz but the LED backlight might be run at 4 to 8 KHz (ie. how often the whole backlight turns on and off to give different brightness levels).
- kuschku 10y agoRemember, these are PWM frequencies, not refresh frequencies. A 60Hz LED display is usually driven by a 4 or 8kHz refresh crystal.
- wlesieutre 10y agoMay not be visible if your phone is still, but you can see faster flickers if it moves or your eyes do. I don't have an OLED phone, but the backlight flicker on my Pebble Time is visible as I raise my arm up. Not actually a problem for watch usability, but looks funny and takes away from the image of the pebble screen as a constant object. Can't vouch for how it affects phone usage.
- ClassyJacket 10y agoI had an S6 and never noticed any flickering. Nor on my Apple Watch, which uses an LG OLED if memory serves. Is it really an issue in practice?
- zitterbewegung 10y agoHow long until Apple buys a panel maker so that they can vertically integrate every part ? This investment by google seems poised to if it goes well for google to work closer so that they might acquire a piece .
- xbmcuser 10y agoGoogle are planning to go big with pixel devices current generation they had a lot of supply constraints and have been unable to meet the demand.
- dba7dba 10y agoWhat other part does Apple make?
- zitterbewegung 10y agoApple has a bunch of internal SOC designs https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_mobile_application_processors https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Apple_mobile_application_proce... (currently at least 16).
- tedd4u 10y agoGreat question. You may already know that Apple has a long history of locking up LCD production capacity. 'After Apple's Q1 earnings call in January, Apple COO Tim Cook told the press and analysts that the company had entered a $3.9 billion component supply deal in a key area that was "an absolutely fantastic use of Apple’s cash". Many speculated that, after flash storage supply deals and agreements, Apple identified high-resolution LCD displays as a key factor to iOS' devices manufacturing process. Back then, speculation and Tim Cook's own words suggested that Apple had entered a deal with three manufacturers, including Toshiba and Sharp. A month before the the Q1 financial results, Apple was indeed rumored to be discussing with Toshiba an investment in a new $1.19 billion factory -- the same that Nikkan Kogyo Shimbun is mentioning today. But at the same time, several reports suggested that Apple was also considering a second investment in a $1.2 billion facility from Sharp -- with over $60 billion in cash, a double investment in LCD manufacturing wouldn't have surprised anyone. But today's report seems to confirm that the deal with Sharp hasn't gone through, implying that Toshiba has been chosen as the only Japanese manufacturer of iPhone LCD screens.' From: https://www.macstories.net/news/apple-investing-in-toshibas-new-plant-for-iphone-displays/ https://www.macstories.net/news/apple-investing-in-toshibas-...
- linuxkerneldev 10y agoI can understand why they chose OLED to invest in. But I think longer term, due to the low power characteristic electrophoretic or interferometric would be much more exciting for mobile displays. I'm still waiting on the roll-able E-Ink display we were promised in 2013. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94Ifhuc2bbQ https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=94Ifhuc2bbQ
- itchyjunk 10y ago$880M is a huge number, isn't it? Can this number suggest how many phones Google is aiming for? Or is this number too big for just phones and suggest google has some other product up its sleeve?
- megablast 10y agoIt looks like Google is really going out with the Pixel line. There has been so much advertising for this product. And they seem to be selling, with some people having trouble getting out. Of course, numbers out suggest they might have sold around 2 million, which isn't that many, but still a step above Nexus, probably.
- fahadkhan 10y agoAnd the margins on Pixel must be huge.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- Sephr 10y agoI'm not sure that this is the best move in the long term. Mass produced phone-sized MicroLED screens should be ready by 2019, and MicroLED can be up to twice as efficient per lumen compared to OLED. A large purchase of Samsung OLED displays would be a much more sensible move than an investment in manufacturing for a display tech which may not be around for long. One explanation could be of necessity. Perhaps Google initially wanted to make a large purchase of Samsung or LG OLEDs, but neither may have the production capacity to fulfill the order. Samsung is already making 70-92 million OLED displays for a recent Apple order, and LG probably doesn't have the needed production capacity that Samsung already has at scale.
- dba7dba 10y agoI agree. I feel this is just a sign Google is playing a bit of catch-up (maybe even a tiny bit of desperation) in getting curved OLED displays. There's only so much capacity available, with Samsung and Apple eating up most of what's coming out. Even if a billion dollar check was cashed today, that will only bring online one plant, which won't be ready to ship products for a few months at best...
- r00fus 10y agoIf your reasoning (necessity) is on mark, I wonder if this is evidence of the monopsonistic jiu-jitsu that Apple is famous for. Supply-chain dominance wielded as a weapon.
- deleted 10y ago[deleted]
- std_throwaway 10y ago> MicroLED can be up to twice as efficient per lumen compared to OLED Do you have sources for that? To my knowledge, inorganic LEDs have the advantage now, but both technologies approach the same limits which means that in the long term both should deliver the same efficiency. In the long run I don't see a deciding difference here. One major complication for OLEDs is processing and sealing because they tend to have a short lifetime for various reasons. This sounds simple but in practice it makes everything much more complicated.
- thought_alarm 10y agoCurvy OLED displays are neat, but it ultimately doesn't mean anything, It's crazy that Google isn't investing that money in software. Unless it's a hedge.
- nathan_f77 10y agoFor the last 10 years or so, whenever I wander around a store and see all the latest stereos and TVs, I'm never very impressed by anything. TVs got thinner and flatter, and then they were curved, which I just think is just a gimmick. But recently I saw a 4K OLED TV from Samsung, and it stopped me in my tracks. Actually on two different occasions. I've never seen colors or pure black like that, and the clarity is just stunning. Anyway, this is just the first time I've ever felt the desire to save up and buy a new TV. It would be nice if Apple started using OLED displays in iPhones, but I don't care so much about that. My iPhone 6S screen looks fine to me, and I don't feel any need to upgrade.
- davnn 10y ago> It would be nice if Apple started using OLED displays in iPhones, but I don't care so much about that. My iPhone 6S screen looks fine to me, and I don't feel any need to upgrade. It's a shame. My iPhones still feel like a downgrade from my years old Note 3 (display-wise).
- B1FF_PSUVM 10y agoOne of the reasons I'm hanging on to a Lumia that barely got past a 2 digit price. (Microsoft quit giving things away to consumers, is now pulling harder on enterprise teats.)
- runeks 10y agoI've only tried the OLED display on a Samsung Galaxy S3, and while the colors were nice it was almost unusable in direct sunlight, due to the low brightness of the display. I was happy to upgrade to an iPhone 6, and regain the ability to use my phone in the sun.
- andoon 10y agoNot only that, but OLED screens have perceptible low response times and burn-in (my old S3 screen has the Candy Crush UI burned in, and is also yellowish because blue LEDs burn in faster than green/red ones). That said I suppose newer OLED screens do not have as many problems, but for a long time OLED screens were inferior to LCD screens, and were used only because they were capable of higher contrast ratios which made them much more appealing to the eye.
- taf2 10y agoWe should finally start to see OLED become mass market - the last patent is set to expire this year . https://www.thestreet.com/story/13398746/1/universal-display-oled-stock-declined-on-patent-expiration-warning.html https://www.thestreet.com/story/13398746/1/universal-display...