Hitach & Sony working with Apple on 4-inch iOS device, iPad 4 to see new display technology - Page 3

Originally Posted by Flaneur

Clearly [only some sarcasm] they're referring to an autostereoscopic, glasses-free 3D display for the iPad 4. That means we don't have to rush into making 3D movies for the iPad just now. But people interested in stereo movie making should be getting ready for the big event, when Apple shows how it should be done on the display end, only one year and a few months from now.

Originally Posted by Galbi

Why go "almost OLED" when you can go OLED?

Originally Posted by MacTel

You lost me on the iPad bit. The iPad was refreshed last March with the iPad 2 which was ahead of when it was expected to be refreshed. The iPad 3 can realistically be refreshed in the 1st calendar quarter of 2012. ...

Originally Posted by Prof. Peabody

Except this will never happen.

Apple is far too deliberate in their moves. They don't introduce a new screen size because "the market demands it," they don't actually care what people want in that sense at all.

To put it in an English way ... Apple decides first what is the "proper" size for the screen and then makes it, and sells it irrespective of what people tell them they want.

If they end up moving to a 4" screen size it will be because they decided for very valid, logical reasons that this is the "proper" size now and that 3.5 screens are no longer the proper size for a hand held screen. They will never make some 3.5, and some 4 inch screens on the idea that some people like them smaller or bigger. If they were going to do that, they would make iPads and iPhones in multiple sizes from the start as it's fairly clear that different people have different sized hands. They don't do that, they almost never have with any of their products.

The only product they make where screen size really varies at all is laptops and that might be more out of convention than anything else since *everyone* in the business does that and has since the beginning. Even with desktops which they originally offered in multiple sizes, they now offer in two only. ACD's used to be in three sizes and now they only offer one.

Apple *may* move to a 4" screen size based on whatever unknown calculation they do on what's best, but it's really very very unlikely they will ever offer more than one single screen size for the iPhone and since they've best that one size to be 3.5" for the life of the product so far, odds are it will remain so.

Originally Posted by McDark


Apple have settled on 3:2 for all their iDevices. Everyone else has settled on 'widescreen' 16:9.
[/LIST]Of course this all assumes Apple are intent on sticking with 3:2. But if suddenly they started doing 16:9, that would introduce an element of fragmentation that currently they don't have to deal with. Looks like they may have shackled themselves to 3:2 whether they like it or not.

Originally Posted by McDark

It's okay talking about which diagonal screen size is ideal and how it compares to the big Android phones out there, but there's one big difference; the aspect ratio.

Apple have settled on 3:2 for all their iDevices. Everyone else has settled on 'widescreen' 16:9.

The vertical screen dimension is the important one because that defines the width of the phone overall. With any given vertical screen dimension, an iPhone's diagonal dimension will always be smaller. To increase an iPhone screen to a diagonal size of a top end Android phone for instance, would make it comparatively much more unwieldy.

<snip>

Of course this all assumes Apple are intent on sticking with 3:2. But if suddenly they started doing 16:9, that would introduce an element of fragmentation that currently they don't have to deal with. Looks like they may have shackled themselves to 3:2 whether they like it or not.

Originally Posted by Tallest Skil

They just don't even give a flying frick that they're blatantly stealing, do they?

Originally Posted by umrk_lab

This will create a big challenge for Apple at public presentation time : how will they manage to show 3D capability on he meeting room screen ?

Originally Posted by mstone

They look at it as inspired by, not stealing. That is the way the world has worked from the beginning of civilization. The idea of intellectual property is a relatively new concept.

Originally Posted by Apple ][

Well it is almost 2012 now. We are not in the stone age anymore.

People bathing daily is also a relatively new concept, yet we expect most civilized people to be on board with that concept.

Originally Posted by mstone

Did you run that by the rest of the world? Most people do not have indoor plumbing. That is the Android is better because there are more of them argument

Originally Posted by Apple ][

I wasn't thinking about the rest of the world, only the civilized world. Much of the world can still be considered primitive and a great many people still live in non free societies.

Originally Posted by mstone

Apple is not opposed to using non-free people to manufacture the goods that they sell to the civilized world.

Originally Posted by nicolbolas

I believe if Apple DOES change the screen rez, it will go to the iPads 4:3 ratio.

but yes, black bars are bad and Apple probably will stick 3:2.

Originally Posted by McDark

No, going 4:3 aspect ratio would be even worse than 3:2. It's okay for the iPad, but for an iPhone, it would mean even less screen real estate at any given vertical size.

For illustration, assuming you want to retain a reasonably manageable vertical screen size of 2.1 inch, screen sizes for each aspect ratio would be:

• 4:3 - 3.5 inch at 5.9 sq inch
• 3:2 - 3.8 inch at 6.6 sq inch
• 16:9 - 4.3 inch at 7.8 sq inch

Originally Posted by mstone

The definition of 'civilized' is somewhat controversial. Apple is not opposed to using non-free people to manufacture the goods that they sell to the civilized world.

Originally Posted by Suddenly Newton

You're not opposed to buying oil from companies that use non-free people to drill and pump that oil out of the ground.

Originally Posted by McDark

Looks like they may have shackled themselves to 3:2 whether they like it or not.

Originally Posted by 11thIndian

I think they're fine with it. The ONLY feature which benefits from 16:9 directly is movie watching, and that assumes the content you're watching isn't 4:3 or 2.35:1. For every other task- web browsing, books, magazines, etc. 4:3 has always felt better to me.

If the iPad was a video device FIRST, then 16:9 would be the preferred aspect ratio. But it's only ONE of it's tasks, so it doesn't make sense to favour video to the detriment of all the others.

Originally Posted by irnchriz

bullshit stock manipulating rumours, nothing more.

Originally Posted by 11thIndian

I think they're fine with it. The ONLY feature which benefits from 16:9 directly is movie watching, and that assumes the content you're watching isn't 4:3 or 2.35:1. For every other task- web browsing, books, magazines, etc. 4:3 has always felt better to me.

If the iPad was a video device FIRST, then 16:9 would be the preferred aspect ratio. But it's only ONE of it's tasks, so it doesn't make sense to favour video to the detriment of all the others.

Originally Posted by McDark

I understand why they chose 3:2, and I understand all the benefits of sticking with past decisions, but I still think it's a legacy issue that's always going to make the iPhone look a bit behind the curve compared to the Android phones. And that's why I still think 'shackled' is an entirely appropriate word to use. Although I think 'dogmatic' might be a good word to use as well.

Originally Posted by Flaneur

For 16:9, I would use the words awkward, ugly, graceless, juvenile and certainly dogmatic, because the only reason it exists is because of cinema. So you shape something you hold in your hands to fit what Hollywood and later the TV industry decided was the desired shape for big screens? In a handheld device, 16:9 is a tactile nightmare. Android people of course don't see it that way, but they are not known as arbiters of taste.