OLED TVs: Technology Advancements Thread - Page 183

The upcoming Samsung F8500 may do better than that and get even closer to OLED.

It's reasonable speculation. I suspect, however, they have to just eat a huge amount of bad panels / substrates to get the IGZO production up to snuff.

I found this to be an interesting article suggesting Samsung's delays in OLED manufacturing have hurt them. I am not going to post the whole article, but here's a bit . Source: ItVoice Online Magazine.

Samsung Sharp deal hints at worries

Samsung’s strategic shift to OLED technology was spurred in part by the roaring success of its Galaxy smartphones, which featured the bright, power-saving displays and propelled Samsung into the No. 1 spot last year in the world smartphone market.

Samsung now holds a near monopoly in the production of small, smartphone-sized OLED displays, which it produces at the rate of nearly half a million a day, garnering double-digit profit margins.

Samsung has struggled to produce televisions using OLED screens, however, as it stuck with the conventional RGB form of the technology that is difficult to scale to large glass sizes.

[...]

Samsung Display’s main LCD TV screen plants are seventh and eighth generation, suitable for 40 to-60 inch screens. It has held off on investing in larger panels given its strategic move into OLEDs, which are thin enough to bend or roll like paper, paving the way eventually for wearable computers and curved-screen TVs.

“I believe Samsung’s big push for OLED is the right decision, given all the benefits OLED has over LCD, but overpromise and underdelivery caused a bit of hiccup here,” said Lee Sun-tae, an analyst at NH Investment & Securities. He saw the Sharp deal as a way to help keep Samsung in the game until OLED is on board.

“This is definitely a good deal, as it allows Samsung to add large screen capacity at just a fraction of the cost of building a 10G plant. Samsung seized the right opportunity from Sharp’s financial difficulty.”

The part that bothers me is not the slow roll-out to other countries but the fact that they havent yet delivered the first 100 orders in South Korea. They have capacity for 50,000 displays a month so even if IGZO yields are abysmal, they should have little problem getting those out the door. It makes me wonder if we are they are seeing performance issues.

What makes you say that haven't delivered the models in Korea? I know there hasn't been an independent review out (probably need to see a US model for that) but I believe LG said several times they've been shipped in Korea.

From the UK press release:
Andrew Mackay, UK Commercial Director of Home Entertainment and Home Appliances added:
“Following the LG launch and supply to the Korean market earlier in the year, the UK is proud to be the next market to launch LG OLED TV"
I could be wrong but "and supply" sounds like British for shipped to me.

From the LG press release in Korean in February, translated (55EM9700 is the OLED model number though I'm sure Red is probably not the right translation):
LG Electronics 'All Red TV (Model: 55EM9700)' 'dream' quality of size 55 18, authentic shipped.

Come from last month to start selling reservations Red TV LG Electronics posted a total of 100 sales so far.

Red TV LG come LG's unique 'WRGB way' OLED (Organic Light Emitting Diode Organic Light-Emitting Diode) technology to apply the implementation of the best quality. WRGB-pixel RGB (Red, Green, Blue) approach has been applied to the existing for 'RGB' W (White) pixels to add, 4 color (Color) pixels color representation range is wide.


Following LG's press conference on Thursday, Feb. 14, there were a number of news sources that reported the LG OLED TV shipments of the pre orders were starting on the next Monday, Feb. 18 so not sure what could have happened over the weekend to change that. There are newer reports that they will begin showing up in some stores in Korea in the next few weeks. A portion of the 50,000/month capacity will probably always be used for R&D so I'm not sure I would count on all of that going for released production models even after the M2 line is complete but there won't be large shipments until after that is done.

I think the reason why he believes none have shipped in South Korea is, well, that there isn't a single independent report of a single display being delivered to a single customer anywhere on earth.

And even the material you quote from LG doesn't go anywhere near contradicting that.

As for the "50,000 capacity", that would be at 100% yield, so let's stop talking about that being any sort of real number. "A portion" of it might be producing displays, the line is not being run at anywhere near capacity, etc. etc.

I need clarification on two levels of this in order to understand it.

1. I always assumed that when anyone referred to production capabilities (using whatever term), they were talking post yield. Naive of me?
2. What do they mean that a portion will be used for R&D as if that impacts the 50,000/month number? How could internal R&D usage of any sized department amount to anything substantial?

"there isn't a single independent report of a single display being delivered to a single customer anywhere on earth."
Not one? I guess Harrod's, the one so far who has an incentive to show it being as its a retail store, isn't a customer? It will be exclusive to Harrods in Knightsbridge, London, where you can see a model on display.

While I'm sure Slacker can speak to his beliefs, I am a bit curious what "Following the LG launch and supply to the Korean market earlier in the year" means to you? Also not sure why it matters that much since as soon as we see it in stores that won't matter because it'll be too expensive and have no market share, etc etc.

I'm sure Rogo will reply but since I'm here at the moment.
1. LG gave the capacity of the equipment. They didn't at the time, and probably still don't, know what the ultimate yields will be so this stated capacity does not reflect yield losses.
2. This is LG's initial pilot production line. As an earlier poster mentioned and with any technology they will always be experimenting with new technologies, new materials, new processes and they need manufacturing equipment to try it out and see how it works at scale. I guess one could call it "manufacturing R&D". It won't be a significant size in terms of ultimate production capacity years from now but it may be a significant part of this pilot line.

Big whoop, another DEMO.

No, the capacity is based on the number of substrates they can run. It's not the post-yield number at all.


I think people are somewhat confused by how this works, but the fact is if the line can process 50,000 substrates per month with 6 panels per, the goal is 300,000 perfect panels per month. They will tweak each step of the process to get there, but it's not like some portion of the line is dedicated to failure and then they turn back on "make good panels" for some period of time.

No, Harrod's taking a demo unit doesn't constitute a customer, sorry. Delivering a single demo unit to the world's single-most famous department store proves nothing, actually. They had at least 10 working demo units at CES this year and nearly that many last year. In between those shows, they sold exactly zero units. The ability to hand one unit over a third-party in London who currently has no ability to deliver a single unit to a customer before summertime doesn't prove much of a darned thing.
I'm certainly not speaking for Slacker, but to me, this "launch" in Korea has yet to be proved to be more than a press release. Not even the OLED fanboy sites have a report of a customer taking delivery nor of an actual store in Korea where you can go buy one. Maybe you think that doesn't matter, but some of us think it does.

As to why, the part where regular people buy them comes after the part where it's sold for months of being too expensive with no yields, no market share, etc. Until that part starts, the second part can't be approaching. And there isn't evidence that part has started.

When there is, it gets more interesting.

Ah, ok.

We both follow the Korean newspapers as well as the Korean analysts. I very much doubt that LG has shipped the OLED television and we have yet to hear a single word from anybody that this has happened. In the past, I have been able to find reviews on random Korean message boards for low volume handsets or e-readers...but thus far there has been nothing on this television. While it is possible that the television has been released, I would very much wager against it.

As for why it matters, I want confirmation about the performance of the television. While I dont have high expectations for any first generation unit, but the modes of failure will matter. Are there any undisclosed drawbacks to a WRGB display? How soon before burn-in? I want to find out the performance "floor" for WRGB OLED televisions.

I'd, in fact, expect the OLED hype sites to post something when there is evidence someone, somewhere has taken delivery.
This is good stuff and totally reasonable to look out for. My sense is that the performance floor is "high" and the drawbacks are "minimal" but I, too, would like to see that confirmed.

Even if LG has shipped the one hundred units that they claimed were pre-ordered in South Korea, that would still be far too small a statistical sample for to project any meaningful performance results out of. Furthermore, I would expect LG to have put that small number through a lot of testing before shipping, which would be easy to do, but will not be possible to continue, once they ramp up production to the level that would be required to make the enterprise worthwhile.

I feel that we will not have sufficient meaningful product performance feedback for another two years or more.

Streetinsider (if you're not inside...you're outside ):
according Universal Display CFO Sidney Rosenblatt OLED technology is expected to take off in 2014 - Display Research sees OLED TV shipments to hit 4.8 million units in 2015 - Analists have been a little skeptical, Reuters noted. Some don't expected OLED TV sales to really ramp until 2015.

http://www.streetinsider.com/Insiders+Blog/Universal+Display+(PANL)+Expects+Strong+OLED+Growth,+Just+Not+Until+2014.../8158951.html

So ~2% of the total TV market in 2 years and ~20% of the market for 50% and up, perhaps a bit less. That already sounds impossible. If you looked at Samsung along, I doubt very much that the flagship line accounts for anywhere near 20% of their sales -- it's 150% more expensive than their least expensive sets. And to get 20% of the market with only 2 mfrs. selling at volume by then (introductory units from Panasonic and Sony are a maybe at that point only), with discounters selling below Samsung prices by quite a bit, etc. etc. strains credulity.

For this to happen, OLED pricing would have to fall to approximately $2500 by 2015.

This will not happen by 2015! maybe 2020 I will be so old :(

See this article:

Why Do Some OLED's Have Motion Blur?

Nice article, but I don't like the diagrams. They (you?) should have labeled the X axis as Time and the Y axis as distance traveled (from left to right, up to down, or anywhere). Or the reverse. The way they've got it drawn they've conflated the two concepts and make it look as if blur is dependent upon a slope greater than 0.

I understand what they (you?) were trying to draw, but the first glance at their diagram makes it look as if there would be no blur if tracking an object horizontally.
Edited by tgm1024 - 3/13/13 at 11:55am

The vertical axis is position along the motion vector and the the horizontal axis is time. This is a very old 2001 Microsoft Research paper. I'll see if I can add labels to these; or procure clearer diagrams.
Good. That's the important part. I also listed additional scientific references to better and newer papers than Microsoft Research, but are often more complex reading. "Plain English" explanations is what the Blur Busters Blog specialize in, so I have to strike a good balance.

Yeah, get rid of the "path of real object in scene". Thought: "Distance Traveled" for Y axis might be better than "Position along the motion vector" only because the arrow drawn might itself look like the motion vector in screen coordinates.

I don't like "Distance Travelled" because it doesn't signify absolute distance from starting position, or relative distance from last position. If it was relative, then that suggests acceleration. For now, until the original Microsoft images are edited, I've added a small note now:

Vertical axis represents position of moving object. Horizontal axis represent time.

Wednesday, March 13th, 2013
KOREA IT TIMES (INFO@KOREAITTIMES.COM)
SEOUL, KOREA - 27 of LG Electronics’ (LG) 2013 products were recognized by the red dot design awards for their excellence in the field of design. A panel of 37 independent judges considered over 4,662 products from 1,865 manufacturers, designers and architects from 54 countries. LG took top honors by receiving the coveted red dot: best of the best award for its new curved OLED TV. LG also received 24 other red dot design awards in addition to two honorable mentions.

http://www.koreaittimes.com/story/27224/lg-recognized-red-dot-and-if-design-awards

No? I'm not sure how it could otherwise. Any relative graphing would be very odd thing to see indeed. If you like, then "Distance from starting point", but I don't like that personally. Up to you though. If you use it however, be sure to get rid of the "path" reference. That's the worst part of it all, and really makes me wonder how an engineer came up with it.

I don't know if this is legit or what, but I've stumbled on someone who claims to own the LG OLED TV and says he's using it for gaming. I saw it in the xbox360achievements forum. In that forum he's userid EGGNOGGA.

You can check out his posts here. You might have to scroll around in that thread a little, I had trouble getting a link directly to his post.

He mentions there are 2 issues that concern him:
"there are 2 issues I have with my LG: 1) It has a good deal of glare if I'm gaming/watching TV during the daytime. 2) Most tv's will have what is known as 'backlight' on the edges. Mine has it, although it's not noticeable unless the entire screen is black."
Edited by Rich Peterson - 3/15/13 at 5:32am

The guy is full of @#$% (or just doesn't know what's in front of him), forget him, and move on. An emissive display does not have a light "behind" it, therefore nothing on the edges, unless there's something dramatically wrong and then it almost certainly wouldn't be localized to the edges.

He probably has a 55LA7400 in front of him, which has the same stupid dew-drop thing in the bottom middle bezel. Or perhaps someone sold him an LA7400 for $12,000. Aye yi yi....

He probably owns a OLED LCd

There is still life in OLED: New Samsung Galaxy IV has full HD 5" OLED display (pentile though). Since this mobile is expected to sell in many tens of millions there is enough volume to make the display production economical. However first reports indicate the display is bright and saturated, it has a blue tint, so not a big revelation comparing to LCD.

Occam's Razor. He most likely has an LED Edge-lit LCD TV set. He is describing backlight clouding issues.

It might be a special Irish product for St. Patrick's Day. O'LED!