tft display mean pricelist

If you are in the market of color TFT LCD displays and you haven’t already been affected by the recent changes in the global market, then it’s just a matter of time. If you have recently asked, ‘What is going on with TFT-LCD panel prices lately?’, you are not alone. Here at Phoenix Display we have had a lot of questions regarding the TFT-LCD panel price increase that the market is seeing. We want to help explain what is happening, why it’s happening, and what to expect in the near future so that you can be aware of the effects and adjust accordingly.

In recent months there has developed a fair amount of uncertainty in regards to manufacturing conditions for TFT panels at the TFT glass fab level. This has caused a lot of fluctuation and volatility in both the supply and price of TFT panels. We are seeing that the price of TFTs has increased from 25% to 70% on average, and have seen some instances of a 2.5 times increase for the less common configurations. Combined with the fact that lead time is now only confirmed upon placing an actual order with payment in advance, in makes planning and producing around your color display product even more challenging.

One of the important things to realize with regards to TFT market conditions is that flat TFT panels in almost every size are currently in short supply. This is the first time this has happened in almost 20 years.

Some of the larger panel manufactures are exiting TN TFT manufacturing to focus on newer, more profitable technologies. The market has seen a trend towards low-temperature polysilicon (LTPS) TFT LCD panels, which provide customers lower power consumption along with higher resolution, along with a big shift into OLED to support wearables, the latest smart phone designs, and even the flat panel Television market as well.

In 2016 there has been a rise in the proportion of LTPS/Oxide TFT smartphone panel shipment production, rising to 34.6% market share compared to 29.8% in 2015. In the coming year we expect to see a variety of panel makers including CSOT, Taiwanese AUO, Chinese Tianma, and Japanese JDI, roll out new LTPS capacities eclipsing and impacting conventional TFT manufacturing. In May the industry had a shortage of television panels which was followed by a similar supply-demand dynamic for notebook and smartphone small panels. This was largely due to JDI, LG Display Co. and Samsung Display Inc., shutting down their production lines in these verticals.

In the last 5 months the TFT cell glass cost has been rapidly increasing, largely due to the influence of upstream LCD panel maker’s supply. As a result of these market fluctuations almost all TFT mother glass suppliers have increased their pricing across the board. Due to these new market impacts, we highly doubt that any of the major TFT mother glass manufacturers will reopen lines that have previously been closed. In fact, current trends lend us to believe that if these lines were ever reopened, they would be used for OLED production rather than TFT. We believe that the capacities problems the market is seeing is not a short-term problem, and will likely not ease until the second quarter of 2017, at the earliest. This leaves the current state of the market in a fair amount of turmoil as the suppliers battle the glass shortage and while offloading the increased cost to manufacturers.

While there is a trend at the manufacturing level to diversify away from traditional color TN TFT LCD display, the positive is there is still be a strong market for this product for years to come due to TN TFTs lower cost advantage and availability. In short, we don’t see TFT displays going away any time soon, but we will be impacted by higher costs and longer lead times for the near future.

You’ve already taken the first step by educating yourself on the issue. By preparing your business and supply chain for the increase in price and decrease in supply which lead to longer lead-times, you can mitigate potential delays and issues in your production. If you have any additional questions about TFT panels or any other standard or custom display needs, please

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TFT LCD display is the general category that includes TFT display panels, MCU TFT displays, Arduino TFT displays, Raspberry Pi TFT displays, HDMI TFT displays, IPS TFT displays, VGA TFT displays, and embedded TFT displays.

TFT LCD panel means TFT LCD glass with LCD controller or LCD driver and backlight, with or without touch panel. Orient Display provides broad range products with the most competitive TFT LCD Panel Price by working with the most renowned TFT panel glass manufacturers, like AUO, Innolux, BOE, LG, Sharp etc.

Orient Display offers a range of small to mid to large size TFT LCDs. Our standard products for TFT screens start at 1” in diagonal size and up to 7 inches and to 32 inches. Orient Display TFT displays meet the needs for applications such as automotive, white goods, smart homes, telecommunications industrial, medical, and consumer devices.

Orient Display not only provides many standard small size OLEDs, TN or IPS Arduino TFT displays, but also custom made solutions with larger size displays or even with capacitive touch panels.

If you have any questions about Orient Display TFT LCD displays or if you can’t find a suitable product on our website. Please feel free to contact our engineers for details.

TFT is a Thin Film Transistor, TFT refers to each LCD liquid crystal display pixels that are driven by integration in the behind of the Thin Film Transistor. Therefore, the TFT-type display has the advantages of high responsiveness, high brightness, and high contrast, and its display effect is close to that of CRT display, TFT-LCD is one of the most liquid crystal displays.TFT display is also a kind of active-matrix liquid crystal display equipment. TFT-LCD is one of the best LCD color displays, TFT-LCD has the advantages of fine and vivid image, lightweight, low power consumption, and good environmental protection performance, widely used in TV, laptop, mobile phone, monitor, medical beauty, and other equipment.

Unlike TN, TFT displays are “backlit” – the imaginary light path is not from top to bottom, as in TN, but from bottom to top. In this way, a special light tube is set on the back of the liquid crystal, and the light source shines upward through the lower polarizer. Since the upper and lower interlayer electrodes are changed into FET electrodes and common electrodes, the performance of liquid crystal molecules will also change when the FET electrode is switched on. The display purpose can be achieved through shading and light transmission, and the response time is greatly improved to about 80ms.TFT is commonly known as “true color” because it has higher contrast and richer colors than TN-LCD, and the screen updates faster.

The main feature of TFT-LCD, as opposed to TN, is one semiconductor switch per pixel. Because each pixel can be directly controlled by point pulses. Therefore, each node is relatively independent and can be controlled continuously. Such a design method not only improves the response speed of the display screen but also can accurately control the display grayscale, which is why TFT color is more realistic than DSTN.

The TFT panel is cut from a larger substrate. LCD products also have a large array of transistors to control the three primary colors, and current manufacturing technology is difficult to ensure that tens or even hundreds of millions of transistors on a large substrate are without a single problem. If there is a problem with one of the transistors, then the corresponding color of the corresponding point of the transistor will go wrong (only a certain fixed color can be displayed), and this point is commonly called “bad point”. The probability of bad spots is not fixed in position, so a substrate is likely to be wasted a lot. Generally, LCD requires that the bad point is less than 5, and some large manufacturers have narrowed the standard to 3, or even 0, which will reduce the yield rate. Some smaller manufacturers expand the bad points, which naturally reduces costs and quality, which is one reason why some manufacturers have been able to slash prices.

Although there are many manufacturers capable of producing LCDs, there are only a handful of manufacturers capable of producing TFT panels.ACER, as a well-known enterprise in the IT industry, is quite powerful. Although IT does not have the ability to produce TFT panels by itself,

The display sets the electron, the communication and the information processing technology in one body, is considered as the electron industry after the 20th-century microelectronics, the computer another important development opportunity.

With the rapid development of science and technology, a revolution is taking place in display technology. After more than 20 years of research, competition, and development, the flat-panel display has entered the role and become the mainstream of display products in the new century. There are four types of flat-panel displays with the most fierce competition:

The principle of field emission flat display is similar to that of CRT, which only has one to three electron guns and up to six. The field emission display adopts an electron gun array (electron emission micro tip array, such as diamond film tip cone), and the display with a resolution of VGA (640×480×3) needs 921,600 electron emission micro tips with uniform performance.

Glow plasma display are through small vacuum plasma discharge excitation discharge cavity light-emitting materials, luminous effect, and low power consumption is its shortcomings (only 1.2 lm/W, and lamp luminous efficiency more than 80 lm/W, 6 watts per square inch display area), but in 102 ~ 152 cm diagonal field of the large-screen display has a strong competitive advantage.

The semiconductor light-emitting diode (LED) display scheme, due to the successful development of GaN blue light-emitting diode, has won absolute control over the market of the video display with very large screens, but this kind of display is only suitable for large outdoor displays, and video display with a small and medium screen does not have its market.

Special TFT – LCD, LCD flat panel display, is the only one in the brightness, contrast, such as power, life, volume and weight of integrated performance to catch up with and surpass that of the CRT display device, it features good performance, large-scale production, a high degree of automation, low cost of raw materials, the vast development space, will quickly become the mainstream product of the new century, is one of the highlights of the 21st-century global economic growth.

TFT-LCD, which USES liquid crystal as the excellent characteristic of the light valve, divides the luminous display device into two parts, namely the light source and the control of the light source. As a light source, no matter from luminous efficiency, full color, or life, has achieved brilliant results, but also in continuous deepening. Since the invention of the LCD, the backlight has been continuously improved, from monochrome to color, from thick to thin, from side fluorescent lamps to flat fluorescent lamps. The latest achievements in light sources will provide a new backlight for LCD. With the progress of light source technology, there will be newer and better light sources and LCD applications. Is the control of the light source, the rest of the large scale integrated circuit technology and semiconductor technology transplanted, successfully developed the thin film transistor (TFT) production technology, implements the matrix addressing the control of the liquid crystal light valve, solved the LCD light valve and the controller, so that the advantages of liquid crystal display (LCD).

The TFT thin-film transistor (matrix) — which “actively” controls individual pixels on the screen — is the origin of the so-called active matrix TFT.So how exactly do images come about? The basic principle is simple: a display screen consists of a number of pixels that can emit light of any color, and controlling each pixel to display a corresponding color does the trick. In TFT LCD, backlight technology is generally adopted. In order to accurately control the color and brightness of each pixel, a switch similar to a shutter needs to be installed after each pixel. When the “shutter” is opened, light can come through, but when the “shutter” is closed, light cannot come through.

Of course, it’s not as simple technically as that. Liquid Crystal Display USES the properties of Liquid crystals (Liquid when heated and solid when cooled)

Liquid crystal displays (LCDs) are filamentous, and their molecular structure changes as the environment change, giving them different physical properties — allowing light to pass through or block it — in the case of louvers.

You know the three primary colors, so each pixel on the display needs to be made up of three similar basic components described above, which control the red, green, and blue colors respectively.

TFT color filter is divided into red, green, and blue according to the color, which is successively arranged on the glass substrate to form a group (dot pitch) corresponding to a pixel. Each monochrome filter is called a sub-pixel. That said, if a TFT display supports a maximum resolution of 1280×1024, it needs at least 1280×3×1024 sub-pixels and transistors. For a 15-inch TFT display (1024 x 768), a pixel is about 0.0188 inches.

As you know, pixels are critical to a display, and the smaller each pixel, the larger the maximum possible resolution of the display. But because of the physical limitations of transistors, the TFT is roughly 0.0117 inches (0.297mm) per pixel, so the maximum resolution for a 15-inch display is 1,280 by 1,024.[1]

TFT technology is the basis of liquid crystal (LC), inorganic and organic thin-film electroluminescence (EL and OEL) flat panel displays.TFT is a kind of film necessary for manufacturing circuits formed by sputtering and chemical deposition process on the non-single wafers such as glass or plastic substrate, and large-scale semiconductor integrated circuit (LSIC) is produced by processing of the film. Using non-single-crystal substrate can greatly reduce the cost, which is the extension of traditional LSI to large-area, multi-function, and low-cost direction.

The first generation of large-area glass substrate (300mm×400mm) TFT-LCD production line was put into production in the early 1990s. By the first half of 2000, the area of glass substrate has been expanded to 680mm×880mm), and the recent 950mm×1200mm glass substrate will also be put into operation. In principle, there is no area limit.

The 1.3-inch TFT chip used for liquid crystal projection has a resolution of one million pixels in XGA.The resolution of the SXGA (1280×1024) 16.1-inch TFT array amorphous silicon film thickness is only 50nm, and the TAB ON GLASS and SYSTEM ON GLASS technology, its IC integration, requirements for equipment and supply technology, technical difficulty than the traditional LSI.

TFT was first used as a matrix location circuit to improve the optical valve characteristics of liquid crystals. For high-resolution displays, the accurate control of object elements is realized through voltage adjustment in the range of 0-6v (its typical value is 0.2 to 4V), thus making it possible for LCD to achieve a high-quality high-resolution display.TFT-LCD is the first flat panel display in human history to surpass CRT in display quality. Now people are starting to integrate the drive IC into the glass substrate, and the whole TFT will be more powerful than traditional large-scale semiconductor integrated circuits.

Low voltage applications, low drive voltage, solid use safety, and reliability improvement; Flat, light, and thin, saving a lot of raw materials and space; Low power consumption, its power consumption is about one-tenth of the CRT display, reflective TFT-LCD is only about one percent of the CRT, saving a lot of energy; TFT-LCD products also have specifications, models, size series, variety, convenient and flexible use, maintenance, update, upgrade easy, long service life and many other characteristics. The display range covers the application range of all monitors from 1 inch to 40 inches and the large projection plane, which is a full-size display terminal; Display quality from the simplest monochrome character graphics to high resolution, high color fidelity, high brightness, high contrast, the high response speed of various specifications of video display; Display mode has direct vision type, projection type, perspective type, and reflection type.

No radiation, no flicker, no harm to the user’s health. In particular, the appearance of TFT-LCD electronic books and periodicals will bring mankind into the era of a paperless office and paperless printing, and trigger the revolution of human learning, communication, and recording civilization.

The temperature range from -20℃ to +50℃ can be used normally, and the low temperature working temperature of TFT-LCD after temperature reinforcement can reach -80 ℃. It can be used as a mobile terminal display, desktop terminal display, and large screen projection TV. It is a full-size video display terminal with excellent performance.

A lot of consumers wonder how manufacturers determine the LCD display panel prices. After all, display solutions such as TFT LCDs and HMI touch screens do not always come cheap. And sometimes, a few products that can indeed be purchased for lower prices may come with several quality issues.

Hence, we’ve rounded up a list of factors that influence how to display modules such as TFTs, LCD, and touch screens are priced. You can also use these factors to evaluate to whom you should place your next orders for your display solutions.

LCD fluids are used in altering the light orientation passing through glass substrates. Hence, this causes the panel’s active pixels to darken. Different kinds of LCD panel fluids provide unique characteristics and change a panel’s viewing angle, temperature range, and display clarity.

TN fluid contains liquid crystal substances that allow light to pass through by twisting and untwisting at a 90-degree angle. This display technology is available in monochrome; that is, black characters against a gray background.

The viewing angle is limited in a panel containing TN fluid. This means that the text or image display becomes harder to read if you rotate the device away from its center. The display is also not that sharp compared to displays using other technologies.

TN fluid is considered the cheapest LCD fluid type. However, this doesn’t mean that TN isn’t widely used. The display technology is greatly utilized in digital clocks, pagers, and gas pumps.

LCD modules with STN fluid enjoy a wider display angle, greater multiplexing, higher image contrast, and sharper response than devices using TN fluids. However, modules with STN fluids may have slower response times when used in lower temperatures due to the fluid freezing inside the device.

The CSTN fluid technology takes away the monochrome finish of the typical STN fluid devices. Red, green, and blue filters are added to the fluid module to allow a colored display. New versions of CSTN often feature a viewing angle of 140 degrees and 100ms response times.

CSTN is a bit pricier than TN and STN fluids. But it’s a good choice if you need to display color images on your LCD device. In fact, a lot of color feature phones use CSTN as an alternative to the TFT displays, saving almost half the manufacturing costs.

A device using FSTN fluid has better viewing angles and can produce a sharp black-and-white coloration. It is a good choice for devices that need to display small yet easy-to-read images.

In terms of cost, the LCD display module price of a unit with FSTN is higher compared to TN and STN. But this is concerning the better visual quality that FSTN offers.

To cap off this part, the fluids used in a screen is a big factor in determining the overall LCD screen display panel price. As you can see, the four fluid types often used in LCD screens rise in costs with respect to the visual quality produced by each technology.

The temperature range in which LCD screen displays may work varies intensely. Some displays continue to work at optimal performance even when used in cold or hot outdoor temperatures. Lower-quality LCD panels may start having glitches at the slightest change of temperature and humidity. Hence, the temperature range may have a huge impact on the LCD display panel price as well.

In hot environments– The liquid crystals may begin to deteriorate, while the electrical components will start overheating and cause damage to the display screen performance.

Now, most LCD screen panels don’t experience such temperature extremes. In fact, a typical LCD TV can operate properly between approximately o°C and 32°C (32° – 90° F). Meanwhile, other screen modules (usually the industrial-grade ones) have unique capabilities to work in even more extreme ends of the temperature scale.

Generally, the LCD module price goes up if the entire display unit can withstand higher temperature ranges. Those who can operate under normal temperature ranges only are usually cheaper.

Hence, you must consider the places where you’ll be installing your LCD display devices. You can’t just use cheaper LCD modules for an industrial-grade display machine. Treat your LCD panel as an investment and select a panel that will yield better screen performance that’ll last several years for you and your business.

It’s an unspoken rule, but monochrome modules are generally cheaper than color-capable ones. However, color-capable display modules may also have cost variations depending on their display capabilities.

Now, when you combine 256 shades of both red, blue, and green subpixels, color LCDs can display a color palette of up to 16.8 million colors. And all these are made possible by millions of transistors etched onto the glass modules.

Display size also plays a large role in an LCD device’s color capability. Smaller screens need fewer pixels and transistors since they have smaller display sizes. These screens are also less costly to make. Now, larger screens with high color resolution and huge display sizes require more transistors and pixels, justifying the higher prices of such monitors.

A touch screen display module is more costly than a non-touch monitor module. Touch capability is integrated into Human Machine Interface (HMI) modules and is generally used in kiosks, bank ATMs, hospital equipment, and similar devices in other industries.

Capacitive touch screens are the most common in the display industry today. This technology uses transparent conductors, insulators, and glass to create the panel. An electrostatic field change in the screen’s module happens when a human finger touches the screen surface. This ultimately creates signals that are sent to the touch screen controller for processing.

We’ve explained the following factors at length for both public consumers and business clients to understand the variations in TFT, LCD, and HMI touch screen prices.

Cheap doesn’t necessarily mean low-quality. Also, expensive options aren’t always a wise choice, either. You can maximize your buying or manufacturing options if you know how to compare LCD modules and panels depending on the specifications you truly need for your display machines and devices.

In this guide we’re going to show you how you can use the 1.8 TFT display with the Arduino. You’ll learn how to wire the display, write text, draw shapes and display images on the screen.

The 1.8 TFT is a colorful display with 128 x 160 color pixels. The display can load images from an SD card – it has an SD card slot at the back. The following figure shows the screen front and back view.

This module uses SPI communication – see the wiring below . To control the display we’ll use the TFT library, which is already included with Arduino IDE 1.0.5 and later.

The TFT display communicates with the Arduino via SPI communication, so you need to include the SPI library on your code. We also use the TFT library to write and draw on the display.

In which “Hello, World!” is the text you want to display and the (x, y) coordinate is the location where you want to start display text on the screen.

The 1.8 TFT display can load images from the SD card. To read from the SD card you use the SD library, already included in the Arduino IDE software. Follow the next steps to display an image on the display:

Note: some people find issues with this display when trying to read from the SD card. We don’t know why that happens. In fact, we tested a couple of times and it worked well, and then, when we were about to record to show you the final result, the display didn’t recognized the SD card anymore – we’re not sure if it’s a problem with the SD card holder that doesn’t establish a proper connection with the SD card. However, we are sure these instructions work, because we’ve tested them.

In this guide we’ve shown you how to use the 1.8 TFT display with the Arduino: display text, draw shapes and display images. You can easily add a nice visual interface to your projects using this display.

In-Plane Switching (IPS) is a technology that overcomes the viewing limitations of conventional TFT-LCDs. It is also known as Super TFT.IPS derives its name from the fact that the liquid-crystal molecules are aligned in parallel with the glass plates, whereas the TN principle adopted in conventional TFT displays is based on perpendicular alignment of the molecules.

Users of industrial display devices are wanting the same experience they have come to expect from a consumer device. Switching to an IPS display has become very cost effective as production increases and unit prices decrease. Benefits include:

With more and more consumer products such as smart phones and tablets using IPS displays, the production yield and cost has come down significantly in recent years. This is great news for manufacturers wanting to upgrade their design.

Pricing for small size IPS displays, particularly2.4 and 2.8", is comparable, if not favourable to TN-TFTs, meaning that you can upgrade from a monochrome display to a superior colour display without breaking the budget..

Our IPS-TFT displays are available from 1" to 23" and ideal for outdoor applications. To further enhance the displays where environmental challenges including sunlight, extreme temperatures, water or salt, or vandalism, can be an issue we have a number of

Here at Anders we don"t just strive to design a best in class display solution for your product, but we also want to make sure the display is driven with the right embedded system. We can help achieve a hardware solution that ensures your display works perfectly within your application. Hardware solutions include:

Marine user interface systems have a lot of challenges: for both safety and user experience, the displays need to have outstanding clarity, be easy to read in any conditions and and from any angle, whilst withstanding rain and seawater, all whilst delivering clear, concise information and reliable connectivity for a seamless user experience. We can help you design a display and embedded system truly fit for purpose.

The medical environment is quite rightly rigorous and demanding, requiring display and embedded solutions that are accessible and safe to use.Understanding where and how a medical product will be used and by whom is important for us to help you design a solution truly fit for purpose.

With ever increasing pressure in all of our lives, having easy to use and reliable home appliances plays a key role in easing thosestresses.We can help you achieve an innovative display and embedded design fit for those demanding user expectations.

Putting your own stamp on your product is more than a logo on the start-up screen. Discover how we can help you design a unique display solution with our customisation services:

We aim to offer reliable and long-term solutions to our B2B customers. If you would like to discuss your display and/or embedded system requirements please contact us below.

Are colour OLED displays ready to offer a better alternative to TFT-LCDs, and where do today’s state-of-the-art TFT-LCDs remain strong?We all know that colour graphical display can seriously enhance the user experience your application will deliver. So let"s re-cap on the advantages both TFT and OLED technology offer.

TFT-LCDmaturity means competitive prices, good quality and reliability and available in a wide range of sizes - typically 1-21" for industrial embedded applications.

Operating principle: in similar ways to a monochrome STN, twisted liquid-crystal columns create waveguides to direct light from the display backlight through polarising filters. An electric field applied across ITO electrodes changes the crystal alignment to prevent the light passing and make specific locations appear dark. Unlike STN, however, the TFT-LCD contains red, green and blue filters; a thin-film transistor embedded in every sub-pixel modulates the light intensity to mix the desired colour. TFT-LCDs can display millions of colours, and response times can be fast enough to support full-frame-rate video or smooth animations.

Performance: Standard TFT-LCDs do have some limitations, however. Contrast can be limited, and colour-inversion can be perceived at extreme viewing angles. Typical contrast ratio is about 400:1 with viewing angles of L70/R70/T70/B60.

Improvements: IPS (In-Plane Switching), aka Super-TFT, displays arrived to overcome these drawbacks. In IPS, changes in crystal orientation happen in the same plane as the glass sheets that constitute the display. Pixels are dark in the off state instead of in the on state, which enables the display to appear true back when powered down. Contrast and colour fidelity are improved, and also more consistent, even at wider viewing angles than a standard TFT-LCD can manage. What’s more, there are no distracting bright-pixel defects, which can occur when a transistor fails in a conventional TFT-LCD.

Sleek, Efficient Design: A Organic LED (OLED) displays can be made lighter and thinner than conventional or Super TFT, partly because no backlight is required. No backlight means they also consume less power, which has been the key to their success in the premium smartphone sector and is also driving adoption in mobile industrial and medical applications - such as wearable medical monitors, tele-health equipment, cordless industrial panels, and mobile robotics.

Because equipment designers don’t have to be so parsimonious with power, the display can remain active for longer instead of having to be powered down as quickly as possible to conserve battery energy. Hence, they can be ready to use immediately without needing time for the display to wake up.

Bright and Beautiful: Their light weight and low profile allow OLED displays to be fixed to the surface of an enclosure, even if the surface is curved. This is easier and more economical than designing an aperture and making provision for mounting a TFT-LCD. The wider temperature range of OLEDs also makes them a robust choice for industrial applications or use outdoors.

Passive-Matrix OLED (PMOLED) displays can be monochrome or – with the inclusion of RGB sub-pixels -colour. On the other hand, PMOLEDs can suffer from limited frame rates at larger displays sizes, so Active-Matrix (AMOLED) technologyintroduces a thin-film transistor per pixel that allows each to remain turned on for as long as needed. An AMOLED display can be the best choice if a large, bright colour display is required.

Going the TFT-LCD route, especially given the flexibility to choose standard or IPS/Super-TFT, provides a wide choice of displays that are cost-effective, readily available in numerous sizes, and easily capable of displaying full-frame-rate video and smooth animations.

On the other hand, AMOLED displays can deliver superior optical performance and wider viewing angles, with lower power consumption, reduced weight, and the engineering and aesthetic advantages of the extremely thin and flexible substrate.

The new line of 3.5” TFT displays with IPS technology is now available! Three touchscreen options are available: capacitive, resistive, or without a touchscreen.

For over 20 years Newhaven Display has been one of the most trusted suppliers in the digital display industry. We’ve earned this reputation by providing top quality products, services, and custom design solutions to customers worldwide.

Reports suggest that Apple is getting closer to implementing MicroLED in its future product releases, including the Apple Watch, with the display technology potentially offering a number of benefits compared to other methods. AppleInsider explains how the current TFT and OLED display technologies work, and how MicroLED differs.

MicroLED shows promise as a display technology, potentially offering power savings and a reduced screen thickness when put beside current-generation display panels. Apple has recognized the potential, and has invested heavily into developing the technology over the last few years, with a view to using it in the company"s future products.

To understand fully how MicroLED can benefit Apple, it is worth understanding how the commonly-used display technologies work in the first place, before examining how different MicroLED really is in a comparison.

The most common display technology used by consumer products today, and the oldest of the technologies examined in this article, TFT"s full name of TFT LCD stands for Thin-film-transistor liquid-crystal display. This technology is extensively used by Apple in its products, found in iPads, iPhones, MacBooks, and iMac lines.

The LCD part relates to the concept of defining small translucent or transparent areas in a thin and flexible liquid crystal-filled panel, like the displays used in calculators. Passing current through the segment changes the molecular properties of the defined segment area, allowing it to switch between being see-through or opaque.

TFT takes this a stage further, by effectively covering an entire panel with a grid of isolated liquid crystal segments, which again can vary between opaque and transparent based on the level of electrical current. In this case, there are far more segments needed to make up the display than with a normal calculator.

Polarizing filters on either side of the TFT display sandwich are used to prevent light from passing through directly, with the liquid crystal reaction of each segment affecting polarized light passing through the first filter to go through the second.

Sometimes these types of display are known as "LED," but this somewhat of a misnomer, as this actually refers to the use of Light Emitting Diodes as a light source. The LED backlight shines light through the various layers making up the TFT LCD.

Displays that use collections of LEDs as individual pixels do exist, but it isn"t usually found in consumer products. LED screens are commonly used for billboards, in attractions, and as a large-scale display for events.

TFT LCD screens continue to be widely used in production for a number of reasons. Manufacturers have spent a long time perfecting the production of the display panels to make it as cheap as possible, while its high usage allows it to benefit from economies of scale.

Used in consumer devices in a similar way to TFT LCD, OLED (Organic Light-Emitting Diode) is a display technology that is similar in the basic concept, but differs considerably in its execution. Again, the idea is for a thin panel to be divided up into segments, with charge applied to each section to alter its molecular properties, but that"s where the techniques diverge.

These self-emitting pixels gives OLED a considerable advantage over LCD-based systems in a number of areas. Most obviously, by not needing a backlight, OLED panels can be made far thinner than an equivalent LCD-based display, allowing for the production of thinner devices or more internal area for other components, like a larger battery.

The power efficiency of OLED panels can be far greater, as while a TFT screen requires an always-on backlight, the brightness of OLED pixels themselves determine power usage, with a black pixel consuming no power at all. OLED screens are also faster to respond than LCD displays, making them more useful for VR displays, where response time needs to be as rapid as possible.

This also allows OLED to provide superior contrast ratios compared to TFT, as the lack of backlight bleed-through that occurs in TFT simply doesn"t happen in OLED.

OLED also can be produced on plastic substrates instead of glass, allowing it to be used to create flexible displays. While this is currently embodied in curved and other non-flat screens in some devices, it has the potential to be employed in foldable smartphones or rolled up for storage, an area Apple is also allegedly examining.

Despite the advantages, OLED is still lagging behind TFT in terms of adoption. The cost of production is far higher, in part due to the need for extremely clean environments, as a single speck of dust can potentially ruining a display during fabrication.

OLED panels are also affected by the presence of water, both in production and in use. Small amounts of water contacting the organic substrate can cause immediate damage to the display, rendering parts of the screen useless.

Thought to be the next big thing in display technology, MicroLED basically takes the idea of using LEDs for pixels in a large stadium-style screen and miniaturizes it all.

Using extremely small LEDs, three MicroLEDs are put together to create each pixel, with each subpixel emitting a different color from the usual red, blue, and green selection. As each LED emits light, there is no need for a backlight as used in TFT screens.

MicroLED doesn"t use an organic compound to produce light, making it less susceptible to failure compared to OLED. Just like OLED, it can be applied onto a flexible material, allowing it to be used for curved displays or non-stationary components, like a watch strap, and can result in an extremely thin display panel.

MicroLED offers the same lower power consumption and high contrast ratio benefits as OLED when compared to TFT. However, MicroLED is also capable of producing a far brighter image than OLED, up to 30 times brighter, and is in theory more efficient in converting electricity into light.

As a relatively new and in-development technology, the cost of MicroLED production is extremely high in comparison to the more established OLED and TFT mass production lines, in part due to lower than required yields. Manufacturing equipment vendors have produced hardware for MicroLED production that cuts defects in half and reduces deposition deviance from 3 nanometers down to 1 nanometer, but it is unclear if this is enough to help mass production move forward.

While MicroLED is an attractive proposition for Apple, it is not the only technology under development by the company"s engineers. Apple has previously filed patent applications for a technology described as "Quantum Dot LED and OLED Integration for High Efficiency Displays."

Quantum Dots are photoluminescent particles included in an LED-backed TFT display that can produce brighter and more vibrant colors, with the colors produced depending on their size. While available in current QLED televisions, the technology is only really being used to enhance the backlight, rather than being used to illuminate individual pixels.

The technology in theory can create an even thinner display than OLED, along with a more streamlined manufacturing process. True QD displays are also capable of high pixel densities of up to 1,000ppi, multiple times the density required to be called a Retina-quality display, and based on Apple"s hybrid invention, will also boast the response times of OLED technology.

The QD patent application certainly shows Apple is thinking about display technology in multiple ways, and how it can be applied to future devices, but short of getting firm supply chain information or an official announcement from Apple directly, it is difficult to confirm which direction it will be heading.

Apple has been interested in using the technology for some time now, with the first notable sign being its acquisition of LuxVue in May 2014, alongside assorted related patents. A MicroLED specialist, LuxVue was rumored to have been the display producer for the ill-fated Google Glass headset, but was also the holder of assorted patents in the LED display field, including MicroLED.

At the time, the acquisition was thought to be an attempt by Apple to bring part of its display technology development in-house, with suggestions the MicroLED technology would be used in another rumored-at-the-time device, the Apple Watch. A more recent report suggests Apple is working with TSMC to make small panels for a future premium Apple Watch, potentially starting mass production by the end of the year.

The facility is also claimed to be sufficient in size to perform small scale manufacturing of display panels, allowing the company to keep development and testing in-house without involving third-parties. Considering Apple"s previous history in developing technologies before issuing information to manufacturing partners, it is possible that Apple is trying to work out the kinks in production before suppliers even attempt to make MicroLED panels.

The rumored small screen production may be for the Apple Watch now, but it may also benefit another often-rumored device, namely the VR or AR headset. This type of hardware relies on light components to keep the weight off the user"s head and neck, as well as displays with a high refresh rate and as close to perfect color reproduction as possible.

Apple is also apparently planning to use the technology in larger displays, said to be bigger in size than those in the MacBook Pro lines. This could be an iMac or iMac Pro, or even an external display, but ultimately there"s no real indication of Apple"s plans at this point, regardless of the scale of the screen.

Reports from last year also suggest Apple"s investment in MicroLED was a cause for concern for Samsung, LG, and other South Korean suppliers who provide display panels for the company"s products. Owning the process for MicroLED manufacturing could allow Apple to migrate away from its existing display suppliers in the coming years, reducing revenues and profits.

Aside from Apple"s development, there has been little in the way of announcements from other firms for products using the technology that could be bought by consumers in the coming months. The exception is Samsung, Apple"s main rival in the mobile marketplace and a major supplier of display panels, but its usage of MicroLED is not aimed at producing smaller screens.

At CES 2018, Samsung introduced The Wall, a 148-inch TV claimed to be the "world"s first consumer modular MicroLED" television. According to the South Korean electronics giant, The Wall"s modularity meant consumers would be able to customize their television"s size and shape to suit their needs.

The impending use of the technology in a high-priced consumer product could be considered proof that MicroLED display technology is maturing enough for use in devices. If the reports claiming Apple is getting close to mass producing panels is true, the inclusion of MicroLED in the Apple Watch could end up being the first mainstream usage of the technology.