Plasma replacement - to LED or not to LED

[Ferrum Master]

LinusTechTips made a video recently about that Pixel Cleaning feature.

It will not work forever, and it's basically sanding down an uneven wood floor, so you're wearing down good pixels to match the bad ones and this can't be undone.

Also not that simple. LED's are super non linear brightness wise. To match up the curve they use presets, and they know that usually the green one is the first one that kicks the bucket. They do shift the overall curve. It ain't burning down. The magic that makes OLED screens happen is rather complex actually.

I know that as I can calibrate out burn in for certain phone models too if the right conditions are met, so I can have a peek to the things that are sent and set into a OLED driver IC, where the calibration profiles are saved. Basically a screen from factory is an uneven mess anyways, they do calibrate it to make a even white balance, so there are cases when the pixels are already at whacky curves since start.

And they work totally fine afterwards. They stop deteriorating at the old places. I've seen devices I've calibrated like 3 years ago and were totally fine.

 

[R-T-B]

I will say I appreciate your insight. I learned a few things today.

 

[londiste]

Not any LED backed ones I've seen. It might be possible I guess but it takes an absurdly long time.

It is not backlight where burn-in happens. Whether backlight is CCFL or LED has very minor effect on that.

LinusTechTips made a video recently about that Pixel Cleaning feature.
It will not work forever, and it's basically sanding down an uneven wood floor, so you're wearing down good pixels to match the bad ones and this can't be undone.

They also had a number of technical inaccuracies. For example according to what we know about LG's W-OLED it does not have separate subpixels of different color.
I would consider the sanding wood explanation for the pixel cleaning a bit suspect as well. There is some truth to it and it is a nice simplified analogy but the technical explanation of how Pixel Refresh works is quite a bit more complex and includes other ways than "sanding down".

By the way, forums and impressions say OLED light setting is quite significant in terms of OLED burn-in and Linus was running his at 80(/100). Plus, since Pixel Refresh runs regularly when TV is turned off there is also reliance on the TV being turned off regularly and giving it some time do do its thing.

 

[lexluthermiester]

That is not true. LCDs can and do get burn-in. Granted, it usually takes quite a while.

While that was once true, the advent of LCD technology refinements have made it problem of the past. "Burn-in" on LCDs was generally limited to passive and active martix TFT types. Modern panels will not experience static image retention to any degree the user/observer with notice.

LinusTechTips made a video recently about that Pixel Cleaning feature.

It will not work forever, and it's basically sanding down an uneven wood floor, so you're wearing down good pixels to match the bad ones and this can't be undone.

Yup. I posted that very video on page 3 of this thread..

The point of that post was to give the OP, @andersun9 something to see and think about in consideration of replacing their existing plasma TV. OLED screens might be beautiful, but they do and will degrade, just like plasma screens. Modern IPS LCD screens may not measure up to the same absolute beauty of OLED, but they get close and without all of the potential problems. They're also less expensive. With an LCD TV, you get more bang for buck.

The PHYSICS that makes OLED screens happen is rather complex actually.

Fixed that for you. There is nothing "magic" about display technology.

They also had a number of technical inaccuracies.

No, I have some experience with OLED screens and for once Linus got the technical details right.

 

[londiste]

"Burn-in" on LCDs was generally limited to passive and active martix TFT types.

Practically all LCDs today are active matrix TFT

 

[R-T-B]

They're also less expensive.

Depends. Some of the real high end Quantom Dot LCDs actually can exceed the cost of OLED. They have real nice peak brightness the OLED can't even dream of though. Situational, really.

 

[lexluthermiester]

Practically all LCDs today are active matrix TFT

TN, IPS and VA panels are loosely related in functionality to the old matrix TFT panels but modern LCD panels have a large number of advances that set them apart from the panels from decades ago and the difference vary based on the technology in question. However, one thing is common among them all, they do not experience burn-in/image-retention.

Depends. Some of the real high end Quantom Dot LCDs actually can exceed the cost of OLED.

True, and...

They have real nice peak brightness the OLED can't even dream of though. Situational, really.

There we go.

The choice of what type of TV to buy has never been so vast. At the end of the day, personal preference is what matters most.

 

[eidairaman1]

Id keep the plasma in another Room and get the best possible LED based LCD for yourself bro

 

[P4-630]

I'd keep the plasma in the coldest room during winter...

 

[R-T-B]

I'd keep the plasma in the coldest room during winter...

This is the way.

 

[mama]

Well, the premise of the video is "hey, maybe OLEDs still aren't all that great for monitor use", so I don't quite see the problem with that? Large static white-background windows are a pretty significant portion of monitor usage for most people. If all you do is game? Go for it, as long as you're varied enough for UI elements to not burn in. Movies, TV? Same. He does mention that the GX in his living room is problem free after a much longer period of use than the CX desk "monitor" after all. And the conclusion is still that these are fantastic panels, just for those who can live with a shorter lifespan than you can expect from an LCD.

Well, it's good to know you didn't watch the video before criticizing it, I guess? 'Cause he details his setup quite explicitly. Please don't be that lazy. And while you're technically correct on the "pure white image" part (which, as I said above, is pretty much unavoidable for monitor usage unless it's a pure gaming monitor), you're still 1/3 overall. At least do your research, eh?

Well, Linus ran his at 80% brightness but otherwise with all mitigations on, and still got visible retention after three months of 8-10h/day usage (not quite 7 days a week, I expect - he's likely a workaholic, but hopefully not that bad). So clearly YMMV. No doubt it comes down a lot to the specifics of your use case, but him (and Wendell) getting clearly visible retention that quickly does show that it can happen quickly. The pixel refresher mostly removed it, but that comes with its own long-term tradeoffs. It's probably manageable, but at the very least it's a good idea to consider your actual workload and APL before going for an OLED TV as a monitor.

First generation? His monitor that the video covers is a 3-month old CX (or C1?) 48". Those are definitely not first-generation. 10th and 11th?

As for "normal" TV usage, the mitigations likely work well, but "normal" computer monitor usage? No amount of pixel shift or logo dimming is going to mitigate retention from text documents, excel spreadsheets, white/light background web pages, etc. And auto-dimming of static images makes for terrible UX for reading or working with mostly-static documents etc. The main takeaway is that OLEDs are best suited for high motion use cases, and not mostly static ones. So, if your monitor is >80% a gaming monitor? I'd say go for it. If not? I'd stay with a good LCD, even if you lose out on some things. Your priorities might be different than mine, but I know that my workload would cause retention very similar to what Linus showed in that video (after three months) - and to me, a monitor lasting less than five years is entirely unacceptable, and less than 10 is disappointing. So that rules out OLED, at least for now, even if I would no doubt love the image quality.

Well I'm all in. Had my CX since January this year. I do a mix of stuff each day from gaming to multi-media work, TV usage and browsing. I'm using all the mitigation techniques I know about so I'll see how I go... No burn in yet!