Sony announced WhiteMagic today, a “next-generation”, 3-inch TFT LCD screen that boasts 1.23M-dot full VGA resolution. What’s special about the display is that it has two distinct modes: if switched to “low power mode”, power consumption of the backlight is pushed down by over 50% to 125mW, with Sony saying brightness in this mode is still comparable to that of conventional LCDs. → Read More
A new display technology called i2R e-paper is making the rounds today. It’s developed by ITRI, a Taiwanese research company that has produced flexible AMOLED and LCD displays in the past. i2R is essentially a plastic substrate with a heat-activated liquid crystal coating: you pass it through a thermal printer and a 300dpi monochrome image is impressed on its surface — until you want to rewrite it, which you can do up to 260 times by their calculations.
Putting aside the obvious comparisons to, say, using a pencil, I’m not sure this technology is the paper-killer ITRI and some sites think it is. → Read More
After Pioneer decided to shut down its TV business in 2009, Hitachi yesterday announced they are ready to stop producing and outsourcing all production of TVs to makers in Taiwan and other Asian countries. And even though Hitachi said they will continue selling TVs in the future, this sounds very much like a long goodbye. → Read More
Hitachi announced [JP] a new mobile 3D screen today: the IPS-based LCD is sized at a respectable 4.5 inches, doesn’t require glasses to view pictures in 3D and has 400 cd/m2 brightness in 2D mode and 470 cd/m2 brightness in 3D mode. But perhaps the biggest selling point is the fantastic resolution of 1,280×720. → Read More
While the nuances of this enormous, enormous business deal are certainly lost on this poor tech blogger, I thought it worthwhile to mention that three major Japanese tech companies are considering merging their LCD production divisions, presumably to compete more effectively against major rivals like Samsung, Panasonic, Sharp, and big Chinese OEMs. What would the result be? Probably even more price-fixing. But the Japanese government would be investing a lot, so maybe that would add a bit of trustworthiness to the new company. Maybe. → Read More
A Japanese company called Global Wave has developed a special film, which can be used to transform any given 2D LCD screen into a naked-eye 3D display – just applying it to the LCD is enough. Global Wave says the so-called Pic3D sheet is the first of its kind. → Read More
The most important hardware aspect of a tablet is arguably the screen, which is the main object you interact with, and the item through which you receive most of the tablet’s content. Therefore, the quality of that hardware is paramount. And it seems Apple has made sure that its screen is of the highest quality. Motorola? Not so much. → Read More
Do you remember the fvision, the amazing 3D tabletop display that we’ve shown you last year? Thanks to 96 projectors arranged in a circle, the device produces 3D images that multiple viewers can see from different angles – no glass case, 3D glasses or other extra equipment needed. And now the NICT, Japan’s National Institute of Information and Communications Technology, found a way to showcase their technology in a way that’s more appealing to the general public. → Read More
Face recognition, personalization, flexible screens: digital signage has come a long way. Now NEC is offering up its own digital signage solution, which has two distinct selling points: it’s pretty big (4.1m wide and 1.15m high), and it boasts multi-touch control. → Read More
Remember those cool flexible screens Samsung was showing off early this year? Well, they weren’t just for show and tell. Samsung plans to mass-produce these suckers in 2012, and plans to put them in everything that isn’t flat. → Read More
The consolidation process in Japan’s electronics industry continues: Toshiba and Sony are in talks to combine their OLED and small LCD businesses, various Japanese news sources are reporting. The plan is to find synergies in the production for small LCD panels for smartphones, tablets and other mobile devices in order to catch up with Sharp, which currently holds the biggest share in the world market in this segment. → Read More
The transparent display wars are yet to begin, since everyone is still prepping their devices, but that doesn’t stop the big guys like TDK and Samsung from throwing a little PR party every once in a while to let you know they’re still on the task. Today TDK released info on a new display, the UEL476, that’s a bit different from the rest. → Read More
This 6-inch screen displays black and white e-ink text and images at 800×600 pixels and can roll around a tube the circumference of a dime. If this isn’t the future of print, I don’t know what is.
Designed and manufactured by Polymer Vision, the screen can be rolled and unrolled 25,000 times. The question, obviously, is why would you need a rollable display? Well, as ereaders become ubiquitous the need for them to be almost indestructible. I could see a day when kids get their own ereaders for the nursery a la the Diamond Age. Interestingly, Polymer Vision isn’t the company of note when you think of e-ink displays so either they will license this technology or they could start taking more and more market shares from leaders like Eink. → Read More
Pioneer has been working on “Floating Vision” displays for quite a while, and now the company has shown the technology used in embedded systems. The naked-eye 3D display Pioneer recently showed at an exhibition in Tokyo lets users view images or videos “floating” in space – embedded in a prototype car navigation system. → Read More
Nissho Electronics in Japan announced [JP] the BDL5231-3D2R today, a 52-inch glasses-less 3D TV that boasts full HD resolution. Dutch electronics venture Dimenco Displays, founded by four former Phillips employees, has provided the 3D technology. → Read More
There’s no denying that the latest cool displays are making important advances. But that doesn’t mean they’re quite ready for prime time. Take the flexible, 13.3″ color e-paper being shown by Sony over at SID right now. Without a doubt it’s cool stuff, but be honest — would you buy something using it? Not just yet. → Read More
Can you imagine owning a TV with 16 times the resolution of HDTV (or, in other words, about the same resolution as IMAX)? That’s 7,680×4,320 pixels, and today Sharp (in cooperation with Japanese national TV broadcaster NHK) showed a 85-inch LCD TV boasting that spec, also known as Ultra HDTV or Super Hi-Vision. → Read More
Display conference SID is underway, and all the cool companies are showing off their new display tech. Yesterday we saw a sweet high-resolution bistable e-paper display from E-Ink and Epson, and today Engadget has found another cool screen, also bistable, but slightly more… clear. → Read More
It’s not the first flexible screen we have covered in recent years, but it’s the first one from Toshiba. The company has developed a 3-inch OLED panel that’s 0.1mm thin and weighs just 1g (pictured). Apart from the size and weight, the main selling point of the OLED is that it can retain picture quality over a long period of time, according to a recent report in The Nikkei (Japan’s biggest business daily). → Read More
Japan-based Ortus Technology has developed what it calls the world’s smallest 3D display with full HD resolution – after announcing the world’s smallest full HD display in 2D last October. Also sized at 4.8 inches, the new screen is basically the 3D version of that model. Unfortunately, users need to wear glasses to view pictures in 3D. → Read More
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