LG made an 18-inch display you can roll up like a newspaper
theverge.com
theverge.com
I wonder why Amazon hasn't updated their bigger Kindle DX for 6 years? Color e-ink displays that can play small videos at a good enough framerate exist for 3+ years, though no reader devices I know of make use of them.
It didn't sell people didn't want it, it was way to big for most users, and way way too expensive (~400$ for the 3G version). People aren't going to pay iPad prices for an ereader of the same size, weight and these days almost the same battery life....
I love my kindle voyage but given the choice between a Kindle DX and an iPad air which costs almost the same most people would get an iPad and so would I.
Browsing is needed for manuals and similar, those are also where you need a larger screen for PDF files.
(Literature is totally ok on a small screen with slower refresh.)
The Kindle battery last for 1-2 months (book reading, it only consumes energy if you turn the page -> e-ink display!).
The iPad battery last for 1-7 days, depening what you do with it and how bright you set the IPS display.
Many own both an iPad as well as a Kindle - both have their advantages.
(edit: I meant WiFi-only Kindle)
my partner's dx, on the other hand, had no problems whatsoever.
Further, if you're wearing a massive, expensive pair of goggles that simultaneously broadcast your wealth and block your vision, you're gonna get mugged. It's just a matter of time.
As someone whose eyes get tired quickly from LCD I'd be in the market for a color e-reader as well, but it looks like this is the only commercially available option for now http://www.laptopmag.com/reviews/ereaders/ectaco-jetbook-col...
Big screen TV's require quite a bit of processing power especially for all those neat 4K 3D 120hz 1000hz "image processing" uber smart interwebs TV's people insist on buying ;)
So while I don't doubt that LG can make a 55" flexible display I don't see them being able to make a 55" flexible 1mm TV in the next decade, the hardware package which is required to drive those things is quite insane and with Samsung/Sony one uping each other with 8K and 12K TV's all the time that's only going to get bigger. A 1080 non smart TV with maybe basic DLNA support could possibly be doable, but 4K with all the smart TV features people expect no way...
>I've always wondered whether there is a market for just a panel with a single HDMI input.
Checkout the Korean white label TV's and monitors Ebay they use LG and Samsung panels usually come with the most basic features (the vast majority of them don't have a tuner cheaper, and avoids hideous import taxes for most the world) but then again you get a 65" 4K TV for less than 2000$.... e.g. http://stores.ebay.com/Dream-Seller/UHD-3840-x-2160-/_i.html...
How is that cheating? Display technology goes through a bunch of stages before being ready for mass consumption and the first stage after getting 'off the drawing board' would be to feed it data and to see what it looks like with stills. Still images are much harder to get right than motion in display technology because you have just about forever to determine what it looks like. With moving images the eye is much more forgiving.
Display calibration is always done with stills.
Really, this is a huge step for display tech and it seems a bit much to demand systems integration at that same level right away as well. This is not a product, it's a technology demo.
If you make it like a roll up projector screen then you could fit the electronics in the top 'bar' that the screen rolls into. You could also add the speakers into the same bar, making for a fairly compact package.
Today 10 years ago we didn't yet have Twitter, for example. BlueRay was only a year old. I imagine many folks were still looking at CRT televisions as something to buy for their family.
Philips had a roller display demoing in 2005 https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rollable_display But we are still not close to it being a product.
- put on a screensaver of art that you like
- close the doors of a cabinet around it
- roll down a screen in front of it
- roll it into a closet
That's a great idea, although I wonder what the typical power consumption is of a big screen TV and how much it would cost to leave it on 16 hrs/day.
A Tesla model S can get 240 wh/km, so the energy use of the display would power an electric car for 10 km. so for a year then it would be the equivalent of moving an electric car 3650 km. I don't drive that much, but it is actually about half of my yearly driving averaged over the last 10 years. Personally I rather turn that screen off and power my next car with it.
Edit: just saw you said 16 hours. Well you can do the math. :)
[1] http://www.lg.com/uk/commercial-display/lg-55XF2B
[2] https://my.teslamotors.com/forum/forums/tracking-lowest-kwhk...
The intermediary steps are not so financially rewarding or even interesting, but the end game is significant.
Durable, flexible screens allow a whole series of new technology.
Off the top of my head:
Imagine a laptop with a screen that seamlessly folds in four. For travelling work you use a quadrant, for office work or presentations you fold it out to full size.
Imagine a screen that folds around your arm like a cuff - perfect for leisure activities like cycling or diving, or work that requires both hands (an alternative to google glass style displays).
If you can make something durable and flexible, there are a lot of new things you can do that you currently can't.
Flexibility isn't folding, you can't fold these displays that's one of the main issues with them they'll crease and then break.
>Imagine a screen that folds around your arm like a cuff - perfect for leisure activities like cycling or diving, or work that requires both hands (an alternative to google glass style displays).
A screen also fits in a pocket, there is no reason to put it on a cuff I like that Nokia demo like the next guy but come on... why would you replace your 4-6" display with a much smaller one? not to mention that a smart watch/wristband would work just as well. And if you want to curve a display around something that would fit your wrist you don't need a "flexible" display you can mold traditional TFT's also.
P.S. If I'm doing something with both hands the last thing i need is a display on my wrist distracting me ;)
>If you can make something durable and flexible, there are a lot of new things you can do that you currently can't.
Not really sure you can do quite a few neat things in a different way but hardly new things.
In another life I was a mailman using a bike.
To do that efficiently you steer the bike with one hand, keep the mail on a tray in front of the bike and deliver it with the other hand as you keep biking.
When I was doing a new area I needed to bring a map to know what way to go.
Having that map be interactive and visual would have been a real benefit to me - it was an A4 sheet that I needed to stop the bike to read. Audio wouldnt have been as good, as I was veering, slowing down and accelerating a lot so the directions would have been confusing. It's a situation where something strapped to my arm would have been a lot more effective - a paper map was too small to strap to the arm, but an interactive map would have been perfect.
Google glass, or a flexible screen would have both solved that situation for me.
I'm imagining an ad for LG where Alex Rodriguez hits a big screen with a bat and it just flexes...
Plus you would have to think that LG has examined your very same issue. They may have reached the point to where they have that handled or mitigated sufficiently to give a good lifetime.