How does the iPhone 4’s new retina display compare to the Active-Matrix Organic Light Emitting Diode (AM-OLED) screen used in the Google Nexus One or Samsung Galaxy S
Most smartphones have LCD displays and the new “cooler” smartphones are now shipping with AM-OLED screen. The iPhone 4 has a 3.5 LCD display with advanced In-Plane Swith (IPS) while the Nexus One has a 3.7 inch AM-OLED screen. You have better viewing angles and smaller pixels with the iPhone 4, while the AMOLED uses sublevel rendering for better edges. OLED have a larger color gamut, faster response time and are thinner and don’t require back-lighting. The iPhone 4 screen requires battery-draining LED back-lighting.
We’re talking very very small pixels per inch here which you may or may not see or need.
IPS supports a wider viewing angle and better picture quality in terms of presentation of color than a conventional LCD. In the case of Apple’s retina display, the resolution of the image is enhanced by the use of smaller-than-normal pixels. This increases the number of pixels on the screen to 326 Pixels Per Inch (PPI), compared to 160 PPI for the 3.5 half VGA resolution display in the iPhone 3G S. Because of this, the pixels on the retina display are so small that the human eye cannot distinguish between them.
Small pixels enable crisper and finer edges on the displayed content, especially text. Higher resolutions enabled by smaller pixels also help allow the display of a lot more content in the same size display.
Apple made its first use of IPS technology for the LCD display on the iPad.
In contrast, the high resolution on AM-OLEDs is currently achieved using sub-pixel rendering, which accentuates the edges on text at high resolutions. OLEDs hold several advantages over LCDs, including a larger color gamut, faster response time, a thinner form factor and no requirement for backlighting, which reduces power consumption and extends battery life. On the other hand, the iPhone’s retina display must make use of LED backlights to illuminate the display.
iSuppli believes the Nexus One serves as a technology showcase, blazing a trail for other smartphones using the Android operating system. Because of this, iSuppli expects to see the adoption of AM-OLED displays in Android smart phones by a number of brands in the future.
At the introduction of the iPhone 4 on Monday, Apple CEO Steve Jobs said that retina display would set the standard for displays in the next several years.
Recent demonstrations of small displays have delivered PPI of only 310, putting Apple in the lead—at least for now.
Samsung in the Korea Herald where a Samsung spokesperson said that the high-res retina display on the iPhone 4 offers only a 3 to 5 percent advantage in sharpness over the Samsung Galaxy S Super AM-OLED screen, but uses 30 percent more power. Samsung notes its screens offer better viewing angles and contrast, and “structurally, IPS LCD technology cannot catch up with AM-OLED display technology.”
What does it mean to you the consumer? You have a choice, you can look at both kinds of screen to see what you like best. Both are very impressive, but if all you are doing is making phone calls with your phone, it doesn’t matter that much unless you are reading a thousand page book or watching several hours of movies…
LCD technology dominates the market for displays used in mobile handsets, with worldwide shipments amounting to 1.6 billion units in 2009. In comparison, shipments of mobile handset AM-OLEDs are tiny in comparison, at 20.5 million units in 2009