4 ms·

GM patents self-cleaning touchscreens that erase fingerprints overnight

29 points by clouddrover 4y ago

planede 4y ago
Why would it be a separate UV pixel?
- rkangel 4y ago
  Each LED (any LED) generates a single wavelength of light - this is a fundamental property as a result of the way that LEDs use semiconductors to make light. Normal screens use a Red, Green and a Blue and then mix them to make colours in the visible light spectrum. For this process they need a wavelength outside the visible light spectrum (UV), and so they need a completely separate LED as the normal R, G and B are all in the visible spectrum.
  - planede 4y ago
    Is this an OLED display? For non-OLED I would have expected just a separate UV backlight and making the pixels transparent to UV.
  - nicoburns 4y ago
    > Normal screens use a Red, Green and a Blue and then mix them to make colours in the visible light spectrum. I believe most screens use a white backlight and then each pixel filters this to red, green or blue. OLED and micro led screens use a separate set of leds per pixel.
hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
Ugh. Lately I've seen so much car tech become a case of "just because they could, doesn't mean they should". For example, the article states "So it slowly cleans and sterilizes the screen, and when the UV light is taken away, the surface goes back to being water-resistant, allowing the moisture to bead up and roll off the surface." Uhh, that seems like a pretty obvious problem in a car, all to save from the 5 seconds it takes to wipe a touchscreen. There is just such an annoying push towards high-tech "gadgetization" of cars even when they provide a worse user experience in every way. Case in point, I hate auto-windshield wipers. Where I live we get a lot of "misty" rain, so I often need to turn the wipers on manually anyway. Auto-wipers just solved a problem I never had (I mean does someone somehow forget to turn on their wipers when it's raining?) and they work worse than plain, intermittent normal wipers. Another ridiculous example. My car has the concept of different profiles for different drivers to remember different settings like seat position (that's good), but the copying of garage door signals is part of that profile. So I did the song and dance to record my garage door opener in my profile, only realizing it isn't available in my spouse's profile, and there is no way to transfer it over. So I have to do the same cumbersome recording procedure for each driver, which is nuts. As opposed to my old car where there was a simple physical button on the ceiling, it was one and done, and it was much easier to hit the physical button while pulling into my driveway than futzing on a touchscreen.
- mguerville 4y ago
  There's bound to be a market for cheap vehicles in the US. It's crazy to me that Europe has several models with MSRP below EUR 10k (Dacias at EUR 7k) and here there's just 2 or 3 below $20k. Every other material good I can think of is cheaper in the US (from new homes to electronics and apparel), but cars are 2x the price of their European counterparts?
  - jaclaz 4y ago
    Can you share where does a Dacia cost 7K? Here (Italy) the cheapest Dacia (the Sandero) is around 12,000 Euro. What was usually considered the cheapest car (the Fiat Panda) is around 16,000.
    - mguerville 4y ago
      I did a cursory search but now realize it's a bit dated (2018), nevertheless here is the original source that prompted my comment: https://drivemag.com/news/these-are-the-5-best-cheap-new-cars-on-sale-in-europe/ https://drivemag.com/news/these-are-the-5-best-cheap-new-car...
      - jaclaz 4y ago
        Yep, that is some 4 years + ago, cars have lately become relatively much more expensive (blame it on COVID, on inflation, on scarcity of components, whatever), I would say starting after 2020. A part of it may be due to the fact that those entry levels (I mean the setups with the least of accessories) are not anymore manufactured (and possibly never really existed or sold as they were too basic) in the sense that the new bare minimum has raised a bit.
  - duffyjp 4y ago
    In 2008 or so a friend of mine bought a Nissan Versa for $9990. That was the actual MSRP not a deal. It wasn't a great car, but what happened to that market? * https://www.autoblog.com/2008/10/31/nissan-versa-1-6-becomes-lowest-priced-car-in-u-s/ https://www.autoblog.com/2008/10/31/nissan-versa-1-6-becomes...
StrictDabbler 4y ago
Car side windows are currently transparent to UVA. This method depends on the screen not being exposed to UVA while the driver is touching the screen, so any car equipped with this would need to have the side windows tinted against UVA. This is something that should be required by the DOT anyway... 90 minutes of UVA exposure a day is a significant carcinogen, but since the glass blocks UVB you don't get a sunburn and don't realize you should be wearing sunscreen while you commute. UVA through car windows is such a significant factor that in the US melanoma is most common on the left side of the body where a driver is exposed to the sun.

29 points by clouddrover 4y ago

planede 4y ago

Why would it be a separate UV pixel?

rkangel 4y ago
Each LED (any LED) generates a single wavelength of light - this is a fundamental property as a result of the way that LEDs use semiconductors to make light. Normal screens use a Red, Green and a Blue and then mix them to make colours in the visible light spectrum. For this process they need a wavelength outside the visible light spectrum (UV), and so they need a completely separate LED as the normal R, G and B are all in the visible spectrum.
- planede 4y ago
  Is this an OLED display? For non-OLED I would have expected just a separate UV backlight and making the pixels transparent to UV.
- nicoburns 4y ago
  > Normal screens use a Red, Green and a Blue and then mix them to make colours in the visible light spectrum. I believe most screens use a white backlight and then each pixel filters this to red, green or blue. OLED and micro led screens use a separate set of leds per pixel.

hn_throwaway_99 4y ago

Ugh. Lately I've seen so much car tech become a case of "just because they could, doesn't mean they should". For example, the article states "So it slowly cleans and sterilizes the screen, and when the UV light is taken away, the surface goes back to being water-resistant, allowing the moisture to bead up and roll off the surface." Uhh, that seems like a pretty obvious problem in a car, all to save from the 5 seconds it takes to wipe a touchscreen. There is just such an annoying push towards high-tech "gadgetization" of cars even when they provide a worse user experience in every way. Case in point, I hate auto-windshield wipers. Where I live we get a lot of "misty" rain, so I often need to turn the wipers on manually anyway. Auto-wipers just solved a problem I never had (I mean does someone somehow forget to turn on their wipers when it's raining?) and they work worse than plain, intermittent normal wipers. Another ridiculous example. My car has the concept of different profiles for different drivers to remember different settings like seat position (that's good), but the copying of garage door signals is part of that profile. So I did the song and dance to record my garage door opener in my profile, only realizing it isn't available in my spouse's profile, and there is no way to transfer it over. So I have to do the same cumbersome recording procedure for each driver, which is nuts. As opposed to my old car where there was a simple physical button on the ceiling, it was one and done, and it was much easier to hit the physical button while pulling into my driveway than futzing on a touchscreen.

mguerville 4y ago
There's bound to be a market for cheap vehicles in the US. It's crazy to me that Europe has several models with MSRP below EUR 10k (Dacias at EUR 7k) and here there's just 2 or 3 below $20k. Every other material good I can think of is cheaper in the US (from new homes to electronics and apparel), but cars are 2x the price of their European counterparts?
- jaclaz 4y ago
  Can you share where does a Dacia cost 7K? Here (Italy) the cheapest Dacia (the Sandero) is around 12,000 Euro. What was usually considered the cheapest car (the Fiat Panda) is around 16,000.
  - mguerville 4y ago
    I did a cursory search but now realize it's a bit dated (2018), nevertheless here is the original source that prompted my comment: https://drivemag.com/news/these-are-the-5-best-cheap-new-cars-on-sale-in-europe/ https://drivemag.com/news/these-are-the-5-best-cheap-new-car...
    - jaclaz 4y ago
      Yep, that is some 4 years + ago, cars have lately become relatively much more expensive (blame it on COVID, on inflation, on scarcity of components, whatever), I would say starting after 2020. A part of it may be due to the fact that those entry levels (I mean the setups with the least of accessories) are not anymore manufactured (and possibly never really existed or sold as they were too basic) in the sense that the new bare minimum has raised a bit.
- duffyjp 4y ago
  In 2008 or so a friend of mine bought a Nissan Versa for $9990. That was the actual MSRP not a deal. It wasn't a great car, but what happened to that market? * https://www.autoblog.com/2008/10/31/nissan-versa-1-6-becomes-lowest-priced-car-in-u-s/ https://www.autoblog.com/2008/10/31/nissan-versa-1-6-becomes...

StrictDabbler 4y ago

Car side windows are currently transparent to UVA. This method depends on the screen not being exposed to UVA while the driver is touching the screen, so any car equipped with this would need to have the side windows tinted against UVA. This is something that should be required by the DOT anyway... 90 minutes of UVA exposure a day is a significant carcinogen, but since the glass blocks UVB you don't get a sunburn and don't realize you should be wearing sunscreen while you commute. UVA through car windows is such a significant factor that in the US melanoma is most common on the left side of the body where a driver is exposed to the sun.