Power efficiency - Page 3

Pixel Qi is introducing new 10" touch-capable wideview display panels, which are 30% more power efficient than their previous models. These ones are aimed towards tablets. The company is demonstrating this on a number of tablets and netbooks.

Liquavista announced a new dynamic frame rate capability down to frequencies as low as 1Hz, resulting in ultra-low power electrowetting display driving.

“Our displays already had increased power efficiency over existing displays due the their remarkable optical efficiency,” said Guy Demuynck, Liquavista’s CEO, “but with the launch of these new dynamic drive schemes, we can enable future devices to improve even further on overall power consumption, without compromising optical performance in all modes from static images, to hi-fidelity video, fulfilling our promise of true mobility.”

Liquavista is based in Eindhoven, the Netherlands and was founded in 2006 (a spin-out from Philips Research Labs). They have developed a new type of display technology that can operate in transmissive, reflective or transflective modes, has a great optical performance and is very efficient. Liquavista's display are based on the principle of Electrowetting (when a voltage is used to modify the wetting properties of a solid material). With Electrowetting displays, a simple optical switch is obtained by contracting a colored oil film electrically.

Johan Feenstra, Liquavista's CTO, was kind enough to answer a few questions we had. Johan joined Philips Research Labs back in 1999, where he co-invented Electrowetting displays and co-founded Liquavista.

Q: Johan, can you explain Liquavista's three product families?

• LiquavistaBright: monochrome display with improved optical performance compared to existing readers, while providing a seemless UI (iPhone-like) or even videos.
• LiquavistaColor: full-color reflective version with video rate, so also seemless UI
• LiquavistaVivid: Hybrid version with a highly reflective, low power monochrome mode and a full-color mode with saturated colors. The color is made with so-called Field Sequential Color Mode, so no color filter, but a fast switching Red/Green/Blue backlight.

Freescale announced today a new processor called i.MX508 targeted for e-readers. The processor is based on an ARM A8 core and includes an E Ink controller. Freescale says that the chip is fast (800Mhz), efficient and cheap (less than $10 in large volumes). In fact they say that this chip can enable $150 e-readers.

The new chip is faster than Freescale's previous e-reader chips (used in the Amazon Kindle and Sony's Readers, for example) which can result in faster page refresh and can enable new features. As the chip includes an E Ink controller, USB and NAND memory it can help reduce the price of the final product.

Engadget has got some new information on Qualcomm's Mirasol display exhibited at CES:

• Qualcomm claims a 6X (!) power advantage over E Ink in a typical usage scenario, even with the color and video.
• Qualcomm expects that the first product that uses their display will indeed use the 5.7" XGA display that Qualcomm are showing.
• The display can be paired with a capactivie or resistive touchscreen (which impairs visibility a little, just like it does with any other display).
• Qualcomm has a method to light the display from the edges, which will provide even lighting across the display.

TI has collaborated with E Ink to create new chips for E Ink e-readers. The new chips integrate E Ink's e-paper displays with TI power management ICs and OMAP 3 processors - in the world's first power management integrated circuit for E Ink displays. TI has also developed a new software-based display controller.

The companies says that this will result in smaller silicon footprint and cheaper hardware that are more energy efficient than before.

Qualcomm is showing their new Mirasol displays, and they look good. It's a 5.7" XGA color screen, that is very power efficient, but faster (can play video), has color, and should be cheaper.

There are rumors that the new displays might be used in future Kindle devices. We'll have to wait and see. In any case, Qualcomm say that the displays will be ready by automn.

Qualcomm says that they are on-track to deliver their full-color Mirasol displays for e-readers late in 2010. These are 5.7" displays at XGA resolution. They have a fast refresh rates, can play videos, and are readable in direct sunlight. Qualcomm says that the battery consumption is good, too.

AUO says they will release a 6" flexible e-paper next year (samples, anyway, with volume production to start afterwards). They are also showing a 20" e-paper module, which they say is the world's largest e-paper which is "ready for production". 

The 6" flexible e-paper is using Sipix's (owned by AUO) Microcup technology. It is made on a plastic substrate, and can be repeatedly bended. The curved radius reaches 100mm, it features 16 gray levels, 9:1 high contrast ratio and a reflectance of 33%. It consumes power only when the image is updated.

The 20" panel is very power efficient, requiring less thatn 2W. It also have 16 levels of gray.

There's an interesting article over at Gizmodo saying basically that E Ink E-readers are dumb. He prefer reading on LCDs (E Ink is better on the eye, but it's not important to him), power saving is not interesting (he reads around the house), he wants video, and color.

Obviously this does not suit everyone - people who read on the go, and outside surely appreciate E Inks superior readability and battery life. But it's an interesting article in any case.