crwulff writes
"The Rochester Democrat and Chronicle today is carrying a story about Kodak's newest OLED display venture. Unfortunately only a prototype to look at here but at least it is on the way in a couple years." It's worth it just for the photograph. Maybe best to hold off on a plasma TV ...
color (Score:5, Funny)
A coupla years? (Score:4, Informative)
That's kind of what they said last year [slashdot.org].
I wonder how this would work out for TVs (Score:2, Insightful)
Better pictures, more info (Score:5, Informative)
Re:Better pictures, more info (Score:3, Funny)
There's not that much more info. They just duplicated some paragraph ...
Re:Better pictures, more info (Score:5, Funny)
The iFire [ifire.com] technology is pretty cool too. Seems to be a lot less expensive than OLED, though it's not as bright so less useful for genreal purpose displays. Both techs have been in development for years with very little, commercially, to show.
Apparently TDK and Sanyo are both pursuing potential iFire solutions, though I'm sure all display manufacturers are currently investigating all of the alternatives. Way too soon to throw all one's eggs in one basket.
Re:Better pictures, more info (Score:3, Informative)
2 to 3 years off? (Score:3, Insightful)
Re:2 to 3 years off? (Score:2, Interesting)
Apparently, you don't switch resolutions much. If you get a LCD out of it's native resolution, it really starts to look blurry.
As a person doing web work (not to mention games, games, games!), I switch resolutions fairly often. IMHO, I've found that my "high-end" CRT, which costs LESS than even a basic LCD, displays much better, and is far more flexible.
Re:2 to 3 years off? (Score:4, Informative)
More flexible, yes... I'll give you that. You can't beat a CRT for quick refresh rates needed for serious gaming and a good picture in any supported resolution.
What a flat panel LCD monitor lacks in resolutions, it makes up for in display consistency. There is no pincushioning, no color seperation problems, the picture fills the entire screen perfectly, a horizontal or vertical line of pixels is perfectly straight and there is absolutely no flicker. Once you get used to looking at an LCD on a regular basis, the flaws in CRTs really start to become more apparant. I'll admit they're not for everyone, but for mostly browsing the web, wordprocessing, cropping and resizing images and the infrequent game or two, you can't beat an LCD.
Re:2 to 3 years off? (Score:2)
I used one at work for a few months, ever did like it all that much. The delay in switching colors on and off lead to nasty ghosting effects on the viewsonic we had. Everytime I used pageup/down on a page of high contrast (like say, text.. particularly white on black text) it would see some blurring for half a second. Not too bad most of the time, but enough to give me a headache if I read pure text for more than an hour or so.
Re:2 to 3 years off? (Score:2)
It is a crappy monitor though, and several years old.
2-3 years (Score:2, Insightful)
Organic? (Score:2, Troll)
Re:Organic? (Score:5, Informative)
Organic != biodegradable, it means containing carbon, like a diamond, which is about as far from biodegradable as you can get.
OLED's are are made in polymer sheets rather than in individual chips of silicon. Ultimately this will make them cheap, rugged, rollable and producable in almost arbitrary sizes, like wallpaper.
I feel a Ray Bradbury story coming on.
KFG
Re:Organic? (Score:3, Informative)
Organic != biodegradable, it means containing carbon, like a diamond
Organic does not mean containing carbon, and diamond and other puter-carbon compounts such as graphite or bucky balls are not organic. Organic means containing a hydrocarbon compount such as those found in oil, ie compounds with Hydrogen and Carbon (and also other elements).
The rest of the comment I agree with ;)
Re:Organic? (Score:2)
I understand that many (perhaps even the majority) now except the definition of organic that you use, but all definitions of organic have always been controversial and even arbitrary.
In 1846 William Gregory ( Professor of Chemistry at U. Edinburgh) defined it thus:
"Organic chemistry is so called because it treats of the substances which form the structure of organized beings, and of their products, whether animal or vegetable."
This is pretty much what the common conception of the word "organic" still means.
In my day ( as a student, I'm still here actually) it was taken to mean any compound containing carbon in a covalent bond, thus the polymer teflon ( whose monomer is C2F4) was considered organic.
I suppose your definition will prevail universally in time because it makes more practical ( as opposed to historical ) sense in this day and age for both commercial and biochemical purposes.
However, I would like to point out in my defense that the carbon containing compound I specifically mentioned ( the material used to make monitor cases) is, in fact, a hydrocarbon compound.
Oh, and by the way, IANAC, IAAP, so what the hell do I know anyway.
KFG
Re:Organic? (Score:2)
If the thing is organic then the fish will eat the monitor too.
Hmmm. I wonder if humans can eat it? Hey, there we go, editable monitor underwear. If you don't like the way your mate looks, then just download a new set of T & A images to replace the real ones. (Except in that case, you then would NOT want to eat it because it would expose the originals again.)
After all, the adult industry is what sparks most consumer product revolutions.
Will they be able to compete with lcd in 2 years? (Score:4, Interesting)
I wonder how cheap 15 inch lcd screens will be in 2 to 3 years. They're already falling pretty drastically already. And once these OLED monitors come to market, will kodak and sanyo be able to make a profit if these lcd screens continue to drop for 2 years? They could always make them bigger i guess.
Hmm... super-cheap wall-to-wall flat panel displays.
Yum!
Re:Will they be able to compete with lcd in 2 year (Score:4, Informative)
LCDs use about half the power as CRTs (Viewsonic [viewsonic.com]). Sanyo and Kodak already have a 5.5 active matrix OLED that runs on 2 watts at 10 volts. While the 15 inch model would presumably use 9 times this, that's still close to half the power consumption of a similar LCD.
Re:Will they be able to compete with lcd in 2 year (Score:2, Interesting)
I believe Cambridge Display Technologies as well as some other researchers are teaming up with the ink jet people to produce these kinds of displays by "printing" them on a substrate. If they can perfect that kind of technology, you could see a display nearly cheap enough to be disposable.
Animated cereal boxes, anyone?
My mistake (Score:2, Interesting)
Why does a 15" LCD TV cost 3x an LCD display? (Score:2)
What gives? I can't believe that speakers and a tuner add $800 to the retail cost. Viewsonic sell a box that let you put NTSC on a VGA display for $100, another $20 buys you a set of speakers.
I keep waiting for the price to come way down, but it never seems to. I'm wondering if maybe the whole "flat panel TV" mystique enables them to charge way more for what would sell like hotcakes at $450 or so. I'd put one in my kitchen straightaway.
Re:Why does a 15" LCD TV cost 3x an LCD display? (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Why does a 15" LCD TV cost 3x an LCD display? (Score:2)
Re:Why does a 15" LCD TV cost 3x an LCD display? (Score:3, Informative)
As far as image quality is concerned, some of the best CRTs and LCDs side by side are indistinguishable, so after having come to that realization it then boils down to how much space you have, and how much energy do you want to save.
Re:Why does a 15" LCD TV cost 3x an LCD display? (Score:3, Informative)
To me the quality of text on an LCD is so much better than a CRT there is no comparison. For the record I don't shop for low end displays: My old 19" Eizo CRT has just been replaced with a brand new Dell 2000FP and the difference in picture quality is absolutely astounding. The only snag is that for an LCD to shine it must be driven through the DVI input. For any LCD RGB~DVI==NIGHT~DAY
Re:Why does a 15" LCD TV cost 3x an LCD display? (Score:3, Informative)
Re:Will they be able to compete with lcd in 2 year (Score:2, Funny)
That made me think of plenty of cool things you could do...
a roof with moving stars on it
'fake' a window
have your wallpaper follow you through the house(the same way music follows you in the microsoft home of the future demohouse)
and best of all..
make your drunk roommates walls spin even faster!
Re:Will they be able to compete with lcd in 2 year (Score:3, Informative)
I'd give a link to a nice site and even news interview clip and video demonstrating the flexability and such for these displays.... but I forgot where I found it before
Re:Will they be able to compete with lcd in 2 year (Score:2)
> in plastic casing that can bend easliy to mold
> lots of curves... leading the way for HUDs
I don't think HUDs work the way you think they do.
More Info on OLED (Score:5, Informative)
Time for a new Tablet (Score:3, Interesting)
The real question is price (Score:2)
Organic? Can you eat it? (Score:3, Funny)
Re:Organic? Can you eat it? (Score:4, Funny)
Re:Organic? Can you eat it? (Score:2, Informative)
Re:Organic? Can you eat it? (Score:2, Funny)
Shit is organic -- do you eat that, too?
Re:Organic? Can you eat it? (Score:2)
Heck, I'd skip flushing the toilet just to show off my creations to my wife. I'm sure she'd love that!
Lifespan? (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:Lifespan? (Score:2, Informative)
If they can manage semi-affordable, disposable panels that drop into a frame, this could be a scam as good as HP's injket business.
Re:Lifespan? (Score:3, Informative)
probably... they still seem to have a major problem with blue... according to kodak.
http://www.kodak.com/US/en/corp/researchDevelopme
Picture? (Score:4, Funny)
Except that I rushed out to buy this fancy LCD flatscreen, so my rendering of the "brighter and more colorful display" is limited by my darker, lower-saturation display.
-"Zow"
Re:Picture? (Score:2)
A little off-topic, but that just reminds me of a friend who was going nuts on stereo components back in college. One day she calls me up and says, "I just bought a new speakers, don't they sound great!" and proceeded to hold the phone up next to the speakers. I didn't have the heart to tell her that with the frequency response of phones, her new speakers, that she paid way too much for, sounded like crap.
-"Zow"
Where's my video t-shirt? (Score:4, Funny)
The true geek dream realized (Score:3, Funny)
I predict the de-evolution of the human species in the next one hundered years due to this product as the smart people refuse to leave their homes and breed. The top inteligencia will die off and leave only the sub-humans behind. Repeat and Rinse until we decide to head back into the trees again.
Re:The true geek dream realized (Score:2)
<GENERAL BOY>In the past, this information has been surpressed - but now every man, woman, and mutant shall know the truth about de-evolution!</GENERAL BOY>
<BOOJI BOY>Oh, Dad! We're all Devo!</BOOJI BOY>
Like ninjas wailing on guitars! (Score:2)
gaming (Score:4, Insightful)
3-color or 4-color? (Score:4, Informative)
problem for printing. In printing its tough to get
true black by combining cyan, magenta and yellow, so
they do 4-color printing, CMYK (K for black).
With LEDs, they want to do RGBW (W for white) to
get true whites, but the article doesn't say whether
they're doing three or four colors. Here's an
article on organic white LED:
Nature [nature.com]
Re:3-color or 4-color? (Score:2, Interesting)
Re:3-color or 4-color? (Score:5, Insightful)
Frankly it sounds like BS to me.
Solid objects (like ink-printed paper) reflect light and therfore have subtractive coloring. The CMY inks don't absorb enough light to make black well, or at least they're hard to combine that way.
Lights, like these OLEDs, are additive color. I can't imagine them not being able to make white.
I've played with colored light bulbs in a darkroom before and you can make it perfectly white pretty easily. Mixing crayons to make black doesn't seem to work, though. Same concepts as far as I can see.
These things sound interesting. There is no constant backlight, so presumably you save a lot of enery buy using just enough to make the right color and brightness instead of powering a constant white and dimming it with LCDs in front.
Re:3-color or 4-color? (Score:5, Informative)
Re:3-color or 4-color? (Score:3, Informative)
White light does not exist. What we call "white" is just a color that seems to excite all your eye's receptors just about evenly. The fact that white light doesn't exist is the reason for the color "temperature" and "white points" you may have encountered if you calibrate your monitor.
In your post, you refer to a "true white" and I can assure you that there is no such thing. Our brains will actually filter any prevailing color out of what it sees and just call the result "white." If you've ever worn colored sunglasses you know that after a while, you just don't notice the color. Everything looks normal!
Our eyes, however, don't do the same to black. If light is coming off an object, then it's not black. This is why you need a K in CMYK: the C+M+Y just reflects far too much light to be called black.
This means that there is no need for a W in RGBW, since your eye will just accept any "white-ish" color to be "white" as long as it is present in enough of what you see.
I don't know if I explained myself clearly enough to make any sense, but I spent the past hour trying to get the wording right, and I'm not going to spend any more.
two to three years (Score:2)
You want to hold off two to three years for a 15 OLED screen when you can get a 60" plasma display now? [zenith.com] I don't think so, Timothy.
Re:two to three years (Score:2)
Cambridge Display Technology (Score:2, Interesting)
best application for this tech... (Score:2, Interesting)
imagine a gameboy with a bright screen that doesn't drain batteries *sweet*
Size and weight.... (Score:3, Informative)
Ambiguous: how thick is it? (Score:4, Interesting)
Note the lack of blues in the picture (Score:5, Interesting)
That said, the original polaroid and technicolor processes also lacked any blue - they came later. If your goal is to reproduce skin tones, you generall don't need much blue; the eye can do remarkable things in compensating for lack of blue illumination but still making you think you see full-color.
Whats the deal with blue? (Score:2)
Re:Whats the deal with blue? (Score:4, Informative)
Here's an article that describes some of the history and challenges of creating a semiconductor that emits blue light. [wired.com]
Re:Note the lack of blues in the picture (Score:3, Funny)
What about LEP displays? (Score:2, Interesting)
Is it just me, or doens't it seem like LEP technology
has more promise of ease-of-manufacturability and
longevity?
LEP's have been demonstrated for years... anyone
know why their development is either stalled or kept
secret?
(LEP = Light Emitting Polymer - a similar technology,
with a different, more stable source for the materials)
Use google for more info [google.com].
2 quarters thick (Score:2, Informative)
(I don't have any American change other than pennies handy so I can't check)
According to this, US quarters are pretty thick, at 1.75 mm:
http://mathforum.org/elempow/solutions/solution.e
Sloppy reporting.
Re:2 quarters thick (Score:2)
LEP's anyone? (Score:2)
OK, change of topic slightly...
What is the current progress on Light Emitting Polymer display tech? Now that will be a big kick up the visual ass when it finally comes out.
Cost, cost, cost (Score:3, Insightful)
If it looks like shit but is half as expensive as normal flat screens I am sure it will find a significant market. If it looks superb but is ten times as expensive to produce it will never happen.
Tor
How come... (Score:2)
I guess that's a rhetorical question. Likely because by the time they finally get here, they're so over-hyped and over-advertised that it would be impossible to still find them cool. Bleh.
wow - they made it?! (Score:3, Interesting)
One night over dinner at his house he shook his head and commented that he didn't think they would ever make it.
Wonder if he still is on the project. He seemed kinda jaded at that point (1995 or so).
will OLED replace LCD? (Score:5, Informative)
1. Color accuracy: Each colored dot on the screen will be composite of three LEDs. If their relative light output changes over time, you get color distortion. With LCDs, the transpanrency of each individual pixel controls color. Since this is known to be stabel for a long time (even before color LCDs came, this was known), this is not a problem.
2. Active matrix. OLEDs may be as hard to manufacture or even more than active matrix LCD.
3. Each pixel in OLED takes more current than in LCD. This makes OLED pixels more likely to fail.
It seems, the biggest advantage would only be in power comsumption and hence in portable devices likes laptop, PDA, cell phones etc. For others like home computer LCD screen, LCD TV, home appliances screen and other display, LCD would continue to be used for a long time.
Hmm... (Score:2)
Bulky LCD's?!? (Score:3, Interesting)
Never thought I'd hear LCD's referred to as "bulky". Then again, the 15" screen in the article is only 1.4mm thick. Very cool.
environmental impact (Score:3, Insightful)
narbey
Re:environmental impact (Score:2)
Re:environmental impact (Score:2)
CRT's are made using a very high quality optical glass that is up to 40% lead. This is extremely bad from an environmental point of view. CRT's also consume a LOT of energy.
LCDs are better from an energy point of view than CRTs, however they all use some form of backlighting that may include a mercury vapor lamp. Mercury is very bad news, way worse than lead on a per pound basis, however much less is used in a LCD than lead in a CRT.
OLED's don't require backlighting so they should be the lowest energy consumer of all, and the articles I have read don't list any metals used in their production that are an evironmental problem. So OLEDs look very promising from both a energy and disposal point of view. The only questions would be the toxicity of the organic layer, and the hazards of the manufacturing process. Since manufacturing is likely to be in a pretty high quality environment in a limited number of locations, it is unlikely to be anywhere as significant as disposal. Unfortunately we don't know what the organic layer is going to be if and when these devices reach mass production, however I think that the likelihood is pretty good that it isn't going to be as bad as lead or mercury.
Laptops? (Score:3, Interesting)
Totally changes the meaning of (Score:4, Funny)
Yes, the O stands for organic, which in this case (Score:5, Informative)
I've also got his hot news flash for you, you're covered in bacteria already.
KFG
Re:Yes, the O stands for organic, which in this ca (Score:2)
You are correct about *most* LED, although you might throw in a touch of phosphorus as well, but not all:
http://www.nature.com/nsu/nsu_pf/010308/010308-
KFG
Re:These things make me nervous (Score:5, Informative)
Yeah right, have a look at this this site [chipcenter.com]
Organic light emitting diodes (OLEDs) are optoelectronic devices based on small molecules or polymers that emit light when an electrical current flows through them. They are being developed for applications in flat panel displays. A simple OLED consists of a fluorescent organic layer sandwiched between two metal electrodes. Under application of an electric field, electrons and holes are injected from the two electrodes into the organic layer, where they meet and recombine to produce light.
Or have a look here [globaltechnoscan.com]
Polymers by such tongue twisting names as polythiopene (red), polyfluorene (blue) and polyphenylenvinylen (green) consist of aromatic benzene rings which are pearl strung via carbon double bonds. As in conventional light-emitting diodes, the benzene electrons are excited by an exterior voltage of 3 to 5 Volt. In returning to their original state they emit light in a colour specific to their material which is exceptionally brilliant and soft.
What about the microbes' working conditions? (Score:5, Funny)
Typically, nobody here on Slashdot has the slightest trace of awareness of the ethical implications of the technology they so blithely drool over.
Imagine being pent up in a microscopic prison cell for your life, bombarded incessantly with radiation until you glow in the dark. Imagine thirty thousand chest X-rays every day of your life. That's what these innocent, mindless little creatures are being exposed to. That's the gruesome reality of the brutal and ruthless experimental regime at the Kodak R&D facility.
Live animals are being tortured for their entire lives just to bring you those pretty pictures, and you don't even care. Their microscopic howls of anguish leave you utterly unmoved.
If you ask me, that's just plain sad.
Re:What about the microbes' working conditions? (Score:3, Informative)
They're not plants, either. Bacteria are a kingdom all their own, neither plant nor animal (nor fungus, nor archaea).
Besides, some bacteria like to be bombarded with radiation (see Deinococcus radiodurans, for example, also known as "Conan the Bacterium" [nasa.gov]).
Re:What about the microbes' working conditions? (Score:2)
Yor concerns were proven unfounded in 1828 (Score:3, Interesting)
Tor
Re:Yor concerns were proven unfounded in 1828 (Score:3, Interesting)
I was all about to come back with a snappy "Huh? Did Wohler have a fusion reactor to synthesize his own damn carbon?", and then I read this:
What is the difference detween an inorganic and organic compound? [madsci.org].
After eliminating the guidelines I'd typically used, (and two I hadn't though of!), it appears that the best definition is indeed that "An organic compound is whatever an organic chemist says it is; an inorganic compound is whatever an inorganic chemist says it is."
Thus endeth the lesson. I hope.
Re:These things make me nervous (Score:5, Funny)
Perhaps YOU dont worry about it. But you'll be sorry once the yoghurt gets you.
Re:The prototype still has issues (Score:2, Funny)
I just have to know: what kind of issues, exactly? A drug habit? Separation anxiety from its safe lab environment? Inappropriate attachement to the department head? Inability to form a close interpersonal relationship with its users? Inquiring minds want to know.
Re:The prototype still has issues (Score:5, Interesting)
Re:The prototype still has issues (Score:2, Funny)
Dear Kodak Lawyers,
Please be on the lookout for a beowulf cluster of naval officers with grammer deficiencies.
Re:The prototype still has issues (Score:4, Funny)
Re:The prototype still has issues (Score:2)
Read the parent user's posting history (Score:2)
Size limitations? (Score:2)
In the era when 17" displays are standard fare for consimers, and 19" are preffered for proffessionals, is there a reason that the prototype was only a 15" panel? It seems like they would have gone for a 17" were they able to achieve this. Is there anything inherent in the technology used that makes creating larger sized panels exceedingly difficult?
This guys 6 posts are a total load (Score:4, Interesting)
I've had the honor of helping out on this prototype [slashdot.org]
Being a former retail shop owner [slashdot.org]
Being a Marketing Director [slashdot.org]
I can assure you that VeriSign not only is 'still in it', but they plan on fighting to regain some control over
What I'd like to know is when he'll give gratitude to those of us that helped him early on. [slashdot.org]
From a Naval Officer... [slashdot.org]
fill factor issues (Score:3, Informative)
The organic LEDs have kinks to be worked out before they can gain wide acceptance, he said. "Whether it's polymer, large-molecule or small-molecule Fill-factor issues, which involve defects in which the surface area of a pixel is not completely covered with emissive material, can cause problems with display uniformity and crosstalk. Edge growth is a type of fill-factor defect. Single-pixel, and sometimes subpixel, defects are critical factors that determine display quality
Re:Sad news ... Stephen King dead at 54 (Score:2, Funny)
Re:Yes! (Score:3, Insightful)
I think these are a neat product, but I don't see it replacing my CRT anytime soon (even after its release) for various reasons. It is still so long until production and a lot can happen, it might as well be vaporware.
Re:May not be all it's cracked up to be (Score:2)
Were you talking English?