The entire article titled “Motorola Droid X: Thoroughly Reviewed” is a must-read if you want to know the ins and outs of the Droid X in great detail. Here I will focus on what Brian Klug and Anand Lal Shimpi found out about the display.
The Droid X makes use of a rather large 4.3-inch TFT LCD with a 854×480 pixel format. The aspect ratio is 16:9 and the same pixel format is used on the original Droid and the Motoroi.
White display brightness in nits (cd/m2):
iPhone 4: 571
iPhone 3GS: 469
Motorola Droid X: 440
Motorola Droid: 427
HTC EVO 4G: 357
Nokia N900: 257
Nexus One: 234
HTC Droid Incredible: 204
Higher is better and the Droid X in this bunch comes at #3. High brightness helps when looking at the display out in the sun.
Black display brightness in nits (cd/m2):
iPhone 3GS: 2.5
Nokia N900: 0.74
HTC EVO 4G: 0.64
iPhone 4: 0.6
Motorola Droid X: 0.5
Motorola Droid: 0.3
Nexus One: 0
HTC Droid Incredible: 0
Lower is better. Both the Nexus One and HTC Droid Incredible is 0 because they use an OLED panel, which is an emissive display technology. When it is black there is zero light coming out. Both the Droid X and the original Droid do extremely well for a LCD.
Display contrast:
Motorola Droid: 1418
iPhone 4: 952
Motorola Droid X: 873
HTC EVO 4G: 557
Nokia N900: 349
iPhone 3GS: 188
Higher is better. I am not sure why there is such a big difference between the Droid X and the original Droid, but it may have something to do with a bit more light leaking out (black display brightness) on the Droid X compared to the Droid. A higher screen reflectance on the Droid X, which wasn’t measured, might be a potential answer to the big difference.
Contrast can be enhanced two ways. Assuming black levels stay the same the display brightness can be improved. There are a few ways to accomplish higher brightness including better light transparency or simply a more powerful backlight. The other method of improving overall contrast is to minimize light leakage and lowering black brightness levels.