Apple rejected OLED screen for next iPhone, developed backup handset - Page 4

It just worked out that it's a new iPhone, plus my new tablet this year. Contracts come up when they do, and I'm not waiting another two years.

Anyway, it depends on both the cpu and the memory. If we're running several programs at once, and memory use is high, there are only so many cycles left. I'm not sure how Apple manages the leveling problem on the Flash though. It concerns me that it might get slower with time as it does on SSD's without Trim, which for some reason, OS X doesn't have as yet. This hasn't been a problem for iPods, where files aren't moved around as often. But it's more of a problem with the phone, Touch, and esp. with the iPad.

Use two fingers to scroll inside text boxes. This has been around since iPhone OS 1.0. Multitouch is your friend.

The trouble is, you obviously haven't seen or used a Samsung device with a super AMOLED screen, other wise you wouldn't be spouting such a complete load of tosh.

Direct comparisons of Nexus Ones to Samsung phones with Super AMOLED screens would suggest the Nexus One does not have such a screen, or of it does, it is a woeful implementation.

You need to take a look at the comparison photos here:

http://www.unwiredview.com/2010/02/1...samsung-s8000/



Samsung Wave Super AMOLED at top, Nexus One below.

That's funny. I never needed to do that on my iPhone because I never bothered to answer long posts there. But it does work here. Thanks.

Very interesting, but it's really hard to see from those pictures. Some had greater contrast, but that in itself isn't always good. I think we have to see it in "person" to tell. My iPhone looks better than anything I saw there, but that's to be expected, as the video camera contributes its own problems, and then there's compression for the internet, etc..

Just slow down a little bit. I never said that Melgross was right or that apple was wrong. Sorry if I didn't make that clear enough.

What I was trying to say is that apple might have played it safely, as they do often first gen products, and did not put in everything that could have been done and would have been good from a consumer point of view. In general the more RAM there is, the better for the user, especially when multitasking is right around the corner. Instead I think they kept costs down to have some flexibility on the price if the product doesn't sell right. I guess they have learned from the Newton that things can go wrong.

I have no iPad, so I have no idea if 256MB is enough for the normal user or not, but if you read about all those issues with Safari, something is wrong. Melgross also pointed out, IIRC, a limited size for the images he was able to work on in a given program, which might point to RAM limitations.

So, yes I believe they have considered putting in 512MB of RAM, and yes they have made the chose not to go into production with it. Again, they made the right chose from their point of view, and limited the timespan those first gen iPads will be useful for as they have limited RAM. And I think this might not be the best compromise for the consumer, but I certainly don't think I'm right or that apple is wrong. I just saying that there seem to be some issues, maybe with the Safari application itself, but given Melgross' example, RAM limitation could be an issue. Only time will tell, and we will se what happens when multitasking comes to the iPad.

As other phones are coming out with 512 MB of RAM in their SoC's, I think that Melgross is right and that the same amount of memory could have been a viable option in the iPad, at least from a technology POV, however I don't have enough facts to say that technical issues were not the reason Apple went with 256MB.

BTW do you have any facts to justify/explain apple's decision?

I never knew this was an option. I've always done the slow method I described earlier in this thread.

Have no axe to grind here - I'm an engineer who has chosen and integrated display within OEMs for a decade or so. I also have lots of phones so can compare them

That picture actually shows the true nature of Samsung's "Super AMOLED": basically, it's about 10% brighter and has slightly less surface reflectance, so the contrast ratio's a bit better too. All good but no game changer, sorry. That picture was taken in very controlled lighting conditions in Samsung's show booth.

Arrived at this thread late; lots of points to make.

1) "Super" AMOLED has the touch sensor integrated, rather than needing a separate layer. There's nothing really super about that - LCD TFTs can also integrate that and get the same boost of performance, which is about 10-15% more brightness for the same power.

2) Nexus One and HTC Desire use the last generation Samsung AMOLED. They have to overlay a separate touch sensor on top. Nexus uses a cheaper model which only supports dual touch; HTC have a multitouch version but they're the same AMOLED underneath.

3) "Super" AMOLEDs are still about half as bright as an equivalent TFT LCD so, while not quite as unusable than the older AMOLEDs, are still much less than half as easy to read in sunlight as a good TFT.

4) The iPhone doesn't actually use a very good LCD so don't base your assumptions of performance on that. The black brightness level is shocking, which means it has a very poor contrast ratio indoors; I find it quite painful to use in the dark on anything with a dark background. It also color shifts big time as you change the viewing angle. Motorola use a much better screen in the Droid so it's not like the LCDs aren't available - Apple have got some serious work to do here but, for the next few years at least, LCD is still the way to go and the iPad has shown that they do get what it takes to make a great screen.

5) I have an HTC Desire and a Nexus one and the Pentile pixel layout really bugs me - you see jagged edges on all the text and straight lines. Sure, it's high resolution so you need good eyesight but, once you've seen it, you can't unsee it. Also I don't like being cheated out of 1/3rd of the pixels I paid for (Pentile only gives you either a blue or red subpixel per white pixel, not both. You're guaranteed a green.)

6) Even the best AMOLED displays still use about 2-3 times as much power as equivalent TFT LCDs when displaying web content. It's insane how bad the battery life is and, helpfully, Android has a power meter that tells you what was to blame. Even on the Nexus running Flash in a web page, the display is still the main factor destroying the battery, by a mile.

7) The color reproduction on my HTC is awful (as proven by displaymate). It is so oversaturated that it hurts my eyes. Yes, that's a factor of the way that the pixels are driven, but that isn't up to the phone maker - it's up to Samsung who designed the integrated driver chip on the display module, aiming to exaggerate the colours to make you think the display is more vivid when, in fact, it's just fake. Side note: gamut is nothing to do with bits per pixel.

8) The eye strain you get from reading an AMOLED display seems much higher as the light is 100% artificial; on a mobile TFT LCD, part of the natural ambient light is reflected and that reduces the strain. (The least eye strain comes from 100% reflective displays like e-ink)

9) Real world AMOLED screens still have poor lifetimes and degrade inelegantly. You get screen burn and the blue fades much faster than the other colours. I did a side by side comparison of the HTC with a few other phones and it was clear that Samsung overdrive the blue pixels to try to prolong the display's usable lifetime. It really looks hideously blue to start with and, after a year, will look yellow and dim.

10) As others have pointed out, there's just no way Apple could use an AMOLED display as there aren't enough people making them. Only Samsung have invested heavily in them as others have spotted all the flaws. They have a lot tied up in this tech and are desperate to see it succeed - hence they are exaggerating all the benefits like mad and relying on marketing tricks like the whole "super" thing to try to put down the inherent weaknesses in the approach: relying on emitted light is a really bad plan.

So, ask yourself this: which company has the most money tied up in making AMOLED screens? Why did every other company stop or reduce their investment? Which company is producing all the hype and is telling you that "Super" AMOLED solves all the problems? Which company is trying to transition to using AMOLED across all its phones as soon as possible?

Which company relies on nasty tricks like dynamic contrast ratio to inflate all its headline figures on the TVs it sells? Which company has been sued for bribery, corruption and fraud across the management? I'm not saying they don't produce some great products, but is that a company whose word you should take as gospel?

Thanks for sharing your thoughts and knowledge on the topic, I really enjoyed reading your post!

GSM arena did a Youtube vid comparing the Wave and iPhone 3G: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lRkb75gjVD0

I also found this hands-on comparison:


http://www.electricpig.co.uk/2010/05...ds-on-preview/

Cnet compared the Wave to the iPhone and Nexus one and said the Wave definately had the better screen: http://cnettv.cnet.com/samsung-wave/...-50083771.html

I think Samsung should allow the user to adjust the contrast as it can be a bit over the top at Samsungs standard setting, but that doesn't mean the screen is infereior, just that Samsung should stop showing off so much with it.

fnuky,

Thanks for the very informative post. Didn't know many of the issues behind Super AMOLED vs. AMOLED vs. TFT LCD that you put out. Now I can see what Apple's decision makes sense.

Super AMOLED seems to be the way to go, but I'm sure a quick glimpse at availability would have revealed insufficient production capacity to sustain a new iPhone model launch. My bet is that the capabilities of Super AMOLED are being finely examined and tested even as we speak.

This is like Plasma vs LCD all over again, and we still haven't totally resolved that one.

Don't forget too that you can overdo contrast as well. Our eyes aren't the only factor that determines how we see things. If you can display much darker darks & contrast sometimes that takes too much guess work away from the brain, which fills in guess work based on other times we have seen & observed objects and colors.

Early plasma used to suffer from a pixelated appearance because the plasma was too good at displaying subtle color differences. It would make plasma appear to have a slight background snow under the image. HD can also suffer from this sometimes, grainy film shots can be an eye sore because your eye isn't used to seeing pixelation.

Well, we have really. The Pioneer KURO plasma still beats any LCD hands down, and you can check pretty much any professional review anywhere for confirmation. It's just too bad Pioneer couldn't afford to keep making them.

LCD is only winning in sales because it's cheap and in available in tiny sizes.

Having been in the commercial side of color production, I can say that something that looks better to the general public is often, objectively, worse. Right now, AMOLED panels have terrible color. Whether this new panel has better color, or just more dramatic color, I don't know. That's why I have to see it. It's too bad we can't adjust the color and such on these screens. AMOLEDS might actually have very good color if we were allowed to adjust them to a standard, as I do with my monitors.

Well, actually, plasma Tv prices had dropped to even, or even below LCD Tv prices. There are very expensive models in both lines, but people are simply moving to LCD.