Scientists Develop a Solution to OLED Burn-in

[trsttte]

Organic matter decays, it's a simple fact of life. For all we do to extend the life of OLED panels, like pixel wear levelling, we're pushing more decay into it. It's great that we're getting ideas on how to extend the life of OLED panels but for all the investment and progress we still can barely get a year without deeply changing user behaviour with hidden task bars and fixed elements, changing backgrounds, etc. but we're mass marketing the technology more and more. OLED seems to be going the way of the plasma tv, as soon as alternatives get a bit better and cheaper it will be dropped very fast.

the super duper 4K OLED gaming monitors that are comming out now for 1200 EUR will be obsolete pretty quickly?

Not obsolete but the warranty claims will probably be kind of amazing.

 

[Chomiq]

the solution: get IPS displays

IPS displays can also suffer from temporary image retention. Had that on 24" BenQ after 6 hours of doing split screen document work and had it on Acer 27" after playing arcade game in Judgement which had scanline effect on HUD:

That highlighted box would be clearly visible on PS dashboard after playing just few races in that game.

Granted, this is temporary and would go away after some time but still.

 

[Bwaze]

I was surprised at certain OLED drawback mentioned in the new OLED gaming monitor reviews that I really haven't heard about before - reflective panels that reduce the "infinite contrast" OLED displays have, as soon as there is abient light, depending on panel technology and coating. And in many cases they aren't really ant better than standard LCD monitors with leaky backlight!

The OLED Black Depth Lie – When Panel Type and Coating Matters

 

[FoulOnWhite]

I was surprised at certain OLED drawback mentioned in the new OLED gaming monitor reviews that I really haven't heard about before - reflective panels that reduce the "infinite contrast" OLED displays have, as soon as there is abient light, depending on panel technology and coating. And in many cases they aren't really ant better than standard LCD monitors with leaky backlight!

The OLED Black Depth Lie – When Panel Type and Coating Matters

really interesting link, VA did surprisingly well and is better for black than any IPS orTN.

 

[Wirko]

I was surprised at certain OLED drawback mentioned in the new OLED gaming monitor reviews that I really haven't heard about before - reflective panels that reduce the "infinite contrast" OLED displays have, as soon as there is abient light, depending on panel technology and coating. And in many cases they aren't really ant better than standard LCD monitors with leaky backlight!

The OLED Black Depth Lie – When Panel Type and Coating Matters

That's why the walls in man caves are painted black.

really interesting link, VA did surprisingly well and is better for black than any IPS orTN.

Watch them at and angle, and VA will be grey, IPS will be red, and TN will be useless.

 

[theouto]

I was surprised at certain OLED drawback mentioned in the new OLED gaming monitor reviews that I really haven't heard about before - reflective panels that reduce the "infinite contrast" OLED displays have, as soon as there is abient light, depending on panel technology and coating. And in many cases they aren't really ant better than standard LCD monitors with leaky backlight!

The OLED Black Depth Lie – When Panel Type and Coating Matters

Amazing article, highly worth the read.
Thanks for linking it!

 

[Chomiq]

I was surprised at certain OLED drawback mentioned in the new OLED gaming monitor reviews that I really haven't heard about before - reflective panels that reduce the "infinite contrast" OLED displays have, as soon as there is abient light, depending on panel technology and coating. And in many cases they aren't really ant better than standard LCD monitors with leaky backlight!

The OLED Black Depth Lie – When Panel Type and Coating Matters

And it doesn't stop Tftcentral (the guys behind that article) from recommending the same monitors.

 

[The Quim Reaper]

Exactly. A breakthrough being made does not mean it's going to be economically-viable to mass-produce.
Take nuclear fusion, for example. Breakthrough after breakthrough for the last 30 years, but we're still the same "20 years away" from it being scalable to a commercial fusion power station.

The point is its been shown that there is a solution to the problem. The rest is up to industry to make it happen.

...and Fusion is a lot closer than 20yrs away, progress is happening at an exponential rate now that there is a financial imperative to make it happen, which wasn't the case in the care free fossil fuel burning past.

 

[Readlight]

Where full HD, 2K TV, with cheaper repair parts? Backlight diodes, screen shield,

 

[Vayra86]

The industry is beginning turn away from OLEDs entirely it seems. MiniLED contrast with FALD looks spectactular, not as good as OLED yet but they can get much brighter than OLED. MicroLEDs when they get cheap enough will probably kill OLED off for good. The new industry standard is HDR Highlights mastered at 4000 nits, the best OLEDs can't come near that and probably never will.

Drank too much Samsung KoolAid, or what?

MiniLED is fantasy. Yields are worse, reliability is worse, its more expensive and if it lasts too long they can't keep selling panels with it.
Not happening anytime soon.

So, does that mean that all the super duper 4K OLED gaming monitors that are comming out now for 1200 EUR will be obsolete pretty quickly?

Yes, but that was happening anyway. QD OLED is simply vastly inferior.

really interesting link, VA did surprisingly well and is better for black than any IPS orTN.

VA's higher static contrast has always been its most defined plus.

IPS displays can also suffer from temporary image retention. Had that on 24" BenQ after 6 hours of doing split screen document work and had it on Acer 27" after playing arcade game in Judgement which had scanline effect on HUD:
View attachment 340799
That highlighted box would be clearly visible on PS dashboard after playing just few races in that game.

Granted, this is temporary and would go away after some time but still.

Yep, I've always got an outlook mailbox plastered on my IPS laptop at the end of a work day

 

[Chomiq]

VA's higher static contrast has always been its most defined plus.

Except when you want to improve viewing angles on them you're sacrificing that contrast. Case in point - Sony high end TVs.

 

[Vayra86]

Except when you want to improve viewing angles on them you're sacrificing that contrast. Case in point - Sony high end TVs.

Yeah I don't quite fancy VA in a TV tbh
But then again no LCD is great in a TV unless its FALD

 

[Bwaze]

VA on my old Dell had a really problematic black crush, overdrive problems and leaky backlight, , so it was really an improvement going to IPS.

 

[LazyGamer]

There is a solution. It's called micro LED. Works the same way basically. All advantages of OLED. No disadvantages. No danger of burn in. Longer life span. Idk why that technology isn't pushed more.

 

[BArms]

Drank too much Samsung KoolAid, or what?

MiniLED is fantasy. Yields are worse, reliability is worse, its more expensive and if it lasts too long they can't keep selling panels with it.
Not happening anytime soon.

No, more Sony KoolAid if anything, the motion picture industry has recently standardized 4000-nits for HDR Highlights going forward and right now the only technology with the pathway to reach that standard is LED, specifically MiniLED VA for which yields aren't that bad. microLED yields are trash though.

No hate on anyone's OLED they're awesome but the burn in is still a huge concern for many and will be until it's resolved.

 

[trsttte]

MiniLED is fantasy. Yields are worse, reliability is worse, its more expensive and if it lasts too long they can't keep selling panels with it.
Not happening anytime soon.

You mean micro LED right?

It's called micro LED. Works the same way basically. All advantages of OLED. No disadvantages.

There's plenty of disadvantages, for one it's stupid expensive. Then there's the power consumption of driving all those individual micro leds, space to package all the control circuitry, etc.

On the other hand mini LED bridges the gap perfectly well and imo is only not seen more because manufacturers have decided to focus on the disposable OLED pipe dream. Yes, you get blooming on very small objects, but with reasonably large number of zones that's a non issue.

 

[BorisDG]

No idea how they "discovered" this, since it's know for ages that exactly the blue diode degrades the fastest, because it's power hog.

 

[starfals]

Hardly a solution, as it means having to buy a display with worse contrast, colour reproduction, response times, possibly energy efficiency too. There will likely always be drawbacks, but no single silver bullet.

About the energy efficiency thing. I know if you put a black wallpaper or something, it should lower the energy draw etc. But most OLEDs seem to have a muuch higher W drain than an IPS/TN monitors and TVS. I have noticed that for a long time. Especially in the ratings. They all got the G rating in Europe, the absolute worst power saving rating, same one as 8K Tvs. IPS is usually much higher on the scales. Altho, if they do have these insane brightness levels, like 3000-4000 etc (even in HDR mode).. i dunno how much less energy they actually drain... lol. Oleds don't get as bright, but they seem to drain more energy even when black pixels are off? It just doesn't sound efficient to me. Again, i just talk about the things i have noticed from reviews and ratings (and my own TVs and monitors, they barely sip any power lol) it might be totally wrong. I also had a OLED phone with the exact same specs as an IPS phone (same battery size too) and i didn't notice any big difference between both. So yeah, without me actually googling it and reading more about it, ill just leave it at this.

These are my observations. The contrast and colors thing, yeah. Totally amazing on OLED. I do have burn issues on my OLED phone, tablet, air cleaner and washing machine display. I got 0 issues on my 10-20 and 25 year old displays. I still use them today too, cus they look the same they did when i got them. If they got lower brightness or worse colors, i can't really notice it over the huge amount of time. OLED burn? That's easy to notice and fast too. Even when you try to ignore it. This is why i ain't buying OLED, not before this kind of new thing is a reality, not just part of the daily news.

 

[AusWolf]

Hardly a solution, as it means having to buy a display with worse contrast, colour reproduction, response times, possibly energy efficiency too. There will likely always be drawbacks, but no single silver bullet.

Do you notice the worse contrast when you have nothing next to it to compare it to? Do you even care about your monitor's energy efficiency? These are things that call for a "first world problems" meme, imo.

When I showed my cheap IPS phone to a colleague of mine the other day, she said the screen has great colours. She's been using a Samsung OLED for the last couple of years.

 

[theouto]

Do you notice the worse contrast when you have nothing next to it to compare it to? Do you even care about your monitor's energy efficiency? These are things that call for a "first world problems" meme, imo.

When I showed my cheap IPS phone to a colleague of mine the other day, she said the screen has great colours. She's been using a Samsung OLED for the last couple of years.

I don't, and I happily use a VA panel and wouldn't bat an eye if I was looking at an IPS panel either, my phone is off, so I don't notice how superior OLED is while I use my desktop display.
But those drawbacks still exist, but most important of all: Pretty lights are pretty, tbh.

 

[mrnagant]

Oh no, my 5yr old OLED got burn in. Such a shame. Now I have to go out and buy the latest and greatest OLED. While I am at it, might as well get a bigger one too. Such a shame.

Sometimes the way a product can basically go EOL can benefit me. It is usually those products that I use everyday and actually see advancements. "Oh no! Honey! Come look at this! The TV is dead. This really blows. I'm going to be right back and pick us up a new one. Costco has XX Model on sale right now and the deal expires in 3 days."

 

[AusWolf]

I don't, and I happily use a VA panel and wouldn't bat an eye if I was looking at an IPS panel either, my phone is off, so I don't notice how superior OLED is while I use my desktop display.

Exactly.

But those drawbacks still exist, but most important of all: Pretty lights are pretty, tbh.

They surely exist. Whether they matter or not, is a different story. I'm also happy with VA, to be fair.

This kind of reminds me of the battle between TN and the early IPS panels. Some people swore with their lives for the superiority of the TN response time, while I always preferred colour accuracy (not at the cost of burn-in, though, as I find that unacceptable).

 

[evernessince]

Hardly a solution, as it means having to buy a display with worse contrast, colour reproduction, response times, possibly energy efficiency too. There will likely always be drawbacks, but no single silver bullet.

OLED are only more efficient when displaying mostly black images. 99% of the time an LCD will be more efficient.

In terms of color reproduction, OLED have better contrast but worse color accuracy. IPS is still used widely for color checking and photography (especially as static elements are common in those trades).

This whole article is pretty much worthless, just another "breakthrough" that will likely amount to no real world impact. Author was definitely baiting engagement by making the claims they did, particularly the one regarding energy efficiency.

This kind of reminds me of the battle between TN and the early IPS panels. Some people swore with their lives for the superiority of the TN response time, while I always preferred colour accuracy (not at the cost of burn-in, though, as I find that unacceptable).

Well TN was the only way to get lower response times aside from going back to an old CRT so makes senses. I assume at some point burn-in for OLED will be a non-issue and they'll improve the energy efficiency but it could be a few years.

 

[AusWolf]

Oh no, my 5yr old OLED got burn in. Such a shame. Now I have to go out and buy the latest and greatest OLED. While I am at it, might as well get a bigger one too. Such a shame.

Sometimes the way a product can basically go EOL can benefit me. It is usually those products that I use everyday and actually see advancements. "Oh no! Honey! Come look at this! The TV is dead. This really blows. I'm going to be right back and pick us up a new one. Costco has XX Model on sale right now and the deal expires in 3 days."

I'm not sure if that's what you actually do, or you're just being sarcastic. I, for one, like keeping my stuff as long as possible, and no, I don't feel the urge to go buy a new TV unless I absolutely have to.

Edit: Even if you disagree with my sentiment, I'm sure you agree that selling your old TV would be way better than just replacing it. Stuff going EOL prematurely benefits no one.

Well TN was the only way to get lower response times aside from going back to an old CRT so makes senses. I assume at some point burn-in for OLED will be a non-issue and they'll improve the energy efficiency but it could be a few years.

TN was the way for lower response times, but I didn't care because it came at the cost of worse colour accuracy. Just like I don't care about OLED because it comes at the hefty cost of burn-in.

 

[Noci]

This new technology is gonna be too late for my monitor, which already has a severe burn-in