As far as the display goes, we’re extremely excited to see new Android phones taking higher resolution screens. With the added real estate the qHD provides, we were able to get a lot more utility out of Gmail, the browser, and a handful of other content-heavy applications, and text and images looked crystal clear on the display. There were some issues with Android applications that don’t properly take advantage of increased resolution, but they were few and far between — for the vast majority of software we used, the display worked beautifully. Touch response was also excellent, though we can’t say if that’s due to the screen technology at play here, or that super fast CPU. One item of note — the display is difficult to see in bright daylight, and the automatic brightness adjustment didn’t quite do the trick.
The Motorola Atrix 4G has a 4-inch TFT LCD with a pixel format of 960×540. I dislike meaningless jargon as much as the next guy so I’ll try to unpack this useless term: qHD. The q stands for quarter and HD refers to 1920×1080. Put two together and you get quarter HD. Halve the horizontal and halve vertical and you get a quarter: 960×540, exactly one quarter of HD. Now the funny thing is when anyone wants to refer to a pixel format of 1920×1080, they usually say Full HD and/or 1080p, not HD. So technically and more correctly it should be qFHD, another ugly jargon. Using the term qHD only makes things more complicated; I hope it goes away.
The 960×540 pixel format on the Atrix 4G translates into a resolution of 275PPI, which is lower than the class-leading iPhone 4 (326PPI), but still quite high. Using a looser definition of Retina Display would this qualify? I think so. Like Topolsky has already mentioned the text and images are crystal clear. I’m glad to see other brands besides Apple and Samsung put more emphasis on great displays. That’s great, but:
I’m not an Android app developer, but if I were one I’d be pulling my hair out! There are too many different pixel formats to support. I’m surprised that there aren’t more apps that don’t fully support the higher resolution LCD on the Atrix 4G. And it’s not like 480×270 was the default pixel format before and now all developers have to do is double the pixels vertically and horizontally. I think display pixel format fragmentation on the Android platform is going to get worse. And that’s one of the reasons why I don’t think Apple will be coming out with a smaller iPhone with a different pixel format. iOS developers want to develop and deploy apps as quickly as possible. Having to code for a different set of pixel formats not only make the development process more difficult, it takes longer to push it out, and adds a lot of burden on customer support.
The screen is 4.8 inches and 1024×480. Really now.
Yes, really. That’s a 21:9 aspect ratio, similar to the 21:9 TVs from Philips. This isn’t the first time a mobile phone brand has incorporated this particular ultra-wide aspect ratio. That honor would go to LG for its BL40 New Chocolate. Even Toyota has fitted a 21:9 display in its Sienna. So this isn’t anything new. Now, a 21:9 display has certain expectations that go with it. Foremost is the expectation that watching feature films will be most excellent, at least better than the regular 16:9 smartphones out there.
The 1024×480 pixel format leads to a resolution of almost 236PPI, so that’s a very good start. The high resolution will certainly lead to both sharp and smooth images in movies. Most movies that come in DVDs aren’t 16:9 but wider. You’ve most likely noticed that there are black horizontal bars while watching DVDs even on your 16:9 HDTV. That’s why. On the Acer Iconia Smart you should have no horizontal bars and that’s a major plus. You won’t have to double-tap on the display to fill the screen. On the flip side, there are a lot of TV content that is formatted 16:9. In this case the regular smartphones will look better with the Iconia Smart having vertical black bars!
The Acer Iconia Smart with its ultra-wide 21:9 4.8-inch LCD will be superb when watching feature films, but not so much when watching TV content in HD. I hope Acer saw it fit to use an IPS LCD to make the point clear that the Iconia Smart was designed for discerning on-the-go movie buffs. You guys do exist, right?
Coupled with the spectacular screen, a four-inch Super LED with a 800 x 480 resolution [...]
What the heck is a Super LED? I hope HTC isn’t trying to do a Samsung, who fooled a lot of people into thinking that a LED TV is something completely different than a LCD TV. There really is no such thing as a LED TV unless you want to call those huge LED billboards a TV. Same goes for Super LED: no such thing for use in a smartphone.
According to the press release by HTC that Engadget swiped in its entirety the Incredible S uses a Super LCD. I believe all LCD-based high-end smartphones have LED as a light source. So don’t let anyone fool you with a nonsensical term like LED TV. Or Super LED.
According to component suppliers and reported by DigiTimes, Apple has cornered 60% of global glass capacitive touch panel capacity resulting in a tight supply situation for competitors like HP, Motorola, and RIM. I don’t know the specifics but it wouldn’t be surprising if Apple is using its huge cash reserves to secure these touch panels ahead of new product announcements.
Apple just started selling its CDMA iPhone 4 on Verizon Wireless and will most likely announce the next-generation iPad 2 soon (and the iPad 3) and another updated iPhone (read Wait For The Next iPhone: iPhone 4S) in June or July. Both the iPhone and iPad require glass-based capacitive touch panels. Yields for touch panels were a problem in 2010, but by securing roughly 60% of global capacity Apple is maximizing its chances to meet what will be enormous demand for its new iPhones and iPads in 2011.
It all started on Valentine’s Day. Yukari Iwatani Kane and Ethan Smith at The Wall Street Journal reported a Smaller iPhone sighting:
One of the people, who saw a prototype of the phone late last year, said it is intended for sale alongside Apple’s existing line. The new device would be about half the size of the iPhone 4, which is the current model.
Then Miguel Helft and Nick Bilton at The New York Times weighed in:
But contrary to published reports, Apple is not currently developing a smaller iPhone, according to people briefed on Apple’s plans who requested anonymity because the plans are confidential.
But then here’s something that got my head scratching:
More important, a phone with a smaller screen would force many developers to rewrite their apps, which Apple wants to avoid, the person said.
And John Gruber at Daring Fireball agrees with the NYT:
Anyway, a smaller iPhone would be stupid, if by “smaller” you mean a screen that measures less than 3.5 or so inches. The physical size of the UI matters more than anything else.
Picture this: a kid in elementary school wielding an iPhone 4. Kinda big if you ask me. If Apple is building a smaller iPhone, it would be for guys and gals with smaller hands. The physical size matters, which is exactly the reason Apple would build a smaller iPhone. A smaller screen would force app rewrites? No. What if the smaller iPhone had a pixel format of 480×320? The same as the iPhone 3GS, 3G and the original? No rewriting required at all. And guess what? Apple would classify it as a Retina Display. Pure genius.
But is Apple really working on a smaller iPhone? Who knows.
DisplayBlog is written and produced by Jin Kim. Subscribe via RSS.