OLED Guide, review, news…

Vertegaal and Rooke were scheduled to present their research Monday at MIT’s Conference on Tangible, Embedded, and Embodied Interaction in Cambridge, Mass.

In the video below, the researchers demonstrate a sample application based on the multiplayer board game Settlers of Catan, in which players attempt to “settle” on the island of Catan by building cities, roads, and the like faster than other players. The game board is composed of hexagonal tiles of different land types that are laid out randomly at the beginning of each game.

At first glance, the cardboard tiles in the video look like typical white hexagons out of Settlers of Catan. But with the help of an overhead camera and projector, each piece becomes a mini-computer capable of displaying animated video images and even triggering events in adjacent tiles, such as queuing soldiers to attack.

In the video, you can also see what happens when players manipulate the tiles in various ways. When one part of the tile is lifted off the table’s flat surface, troops are offloaded onto shore by “pouring” them. Rotating the tiles can change the perspective on the animated building, tree, or person being displayed.

The animation makes for more immersive gameplay, Vertegaal and Rooke say, as does using physical tiles instead of the virtual ones used in so many modified board games today. The Queen’s team says board games are just one application for their hexagonal bezel-less screens, which should also be able to employ e-ink, e-paper, and OLED technology.

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Lighting designers and architects will be able to work with OLED lighting from several sources this year as more developers start shipping products and samples.

In February 2010 Lumiotec, an OLED lighting panel producer based in Yonezawa city, Yamagata, Japan, will start shipping sample OLED panels with commercial production to start later this year, joining Philips and Osram in the supply of OLED lamps for designer and architectural applications.

Lumiotec’s decision is a response to calls from many potential customers for OLED lighting. The company showed sample panels at the LED/OLED expo in Tokyo in April 2009 drawing hundreds of visitors to its stand.

Factoring in feedback from customers, Lumiotec plans to expand production capacity up to 40,000 panels annually from July, forming part of a strategy to start commercially producing panels before 2013.

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No OLED Screen

Rumors about Apple’s tablet employing a 10-inch OLED touchscreen panel seem to have hit a dead end, going by an Ars Technica report, which has been talking to Barry Young, managing director of the OLED Association. Although Apple was said to be responsible for depleting 10-inch OLED panel supplies, Young is not convinced that the inclusion of an OLED screen in Apple’s tablet is likely to occur, given the quantity of such screens available on the market, Ars reveals.

The tech-focused site asked Young about the state of OLED and the Apple tablet rumors, and obtained the following information from the Managing Director of the OLED Association:

“[...] 10.1-inch AMOLED displays are not ‘similar to 13.3-inch or 14-inch LCDs, which are available from multiple sources.’ Rather, ‘AMOLED displays in volume are only available from Samsung SMD.’” And Samsung, it seems, isn’t a plausible candidate for an iTablet AMOLED panel.

“On the Samsung configuration they could produce about fourteen 10.1-inch panels per substrate,” Young told Ars. “With a 70 percent yield, if all their capacity was dedicated to 10.1-inch, they could produce about 150,000 per month. Given that Samsung cannot meet its current order backlog, they are unlikely to build that many 10.1-inch displays,” he said.

SEOUL (Dow Jones)–South Korea’s LG Display Co. (LPL, 034220.SE) said it expects no supply glut in the flat-panel industry throughout this year due to unexpectedly strong demand, Chief Executive Kwon Young-soo told a group of reporters late Wednesday.

“We had previously expected an oversupply in the first quarter of this year, but it turned out to be a supply shortage instead because of unexpected demand [for panels],” Kwon said.

“If three-dimensional product successfully draws consumers’ attention, then more demand for TVs is likely.”

Kwon also said the flat-panel maker will focus on three-dimensional and light-emitting-diode technologies this year and it sees organic light-emitting diodes, or OLED, and solar power cells as the company’s future cash cows.

“Those [businesses] will likely start contributing to the company’s management performance from 2012,” Kwon added. “We may start to produce 30-inch OLED TV panels in 2012.”

OLEDs are widely used in handheld devices such as mobile phones and digital cameras for now, while solar cells are considered a new alternative to pricey crystalline solar cells using silicon wafers.

LG Display, the world’s second-largest liquid-crystal-display maker by revenue after Samsung Electronics Co. (005930.SE), also said it is currently seeking out customers, such as Japan’s Sony Corp. (SNE) and elsewhere, to provide its displays made for electronic book reader and e-paper. E-paper is an electronic display that gives the appearance of ink on paper.

Helped by a strong rebound in panel prices, the flat-panel maker Wednesday reported a net profit of 478 billion won (US$3.5 billion) for the three months ended Dec. 31, reversing from a net loss of KRW684 billion a year earlier. Sales rose 46% to KRW6.08 trillion from KRW4.16 trillion, while it posted an operating profit of KRW357 billion, compared with an operating loss of KRW288 billion a year earlier.

LAS VEGAS–This week at CES, Samsung unveiled what they’re calling the slimmest digital photo frame yet for displaying “high-quality” images, the Samsung 700Z Digital Photo Frame.

The frame has a foldable “L” stand design and an active matrix (AM) OLED panel. The device uses DLNA-licensed technology to sync with other home or mobile photo and video devices.

Samsung claims that at 9 inches long by 6 inches wide by 4.6 inches deep, the Samsung 700Z can also be used as a secondary home or office monitor by connecting it to a PC through a USB cable, up to a resolution of 1,024×60 pixels. According to Samsung, the frame can be viewed from a wide 180 degree angle, as well.

Bluetooth allows users to share multimedia content across devices wirelessly, including uploading mobile photos and sharing pictures across multiple 700Z frames.

The Samsung 700Z has a suggested retail price of $300 and will be available in stores March 2010.

Asus announced a ton of new laptops at CES 2010, but many were surprised to find things pretty quiet on the e-book reader front, especially with all the rumors of a multi-display touch enabled device that was expected in late 2009. Interestingly enough, those rumors were started by the Times Online UK, and the same publication is now claiming Asus has tipped them off with details of their new DR-570 planned for release later this year.

Assuming the Times Online has the straight goods this time, the DR-570 will sport a 6-inch OLED color display, along with Wi-Fi and 3G connections. Of course, a 6-inch OLED display would be wasted on books alone, so Asus is reportedly working on flash support, along with over 122 hours of battery life in “real world conditions”. Asus has a pretty solid reputation as a budget electronics maker, but it will still be very interesting to see how this unit will be priced. Sony charges as much as $2,000 for an 11″ OLED TV, so clearly the screen is going to be a pretty significant cost in the manufacturing of the device.

The DR-570 isn’t expected until later in the year, so perhaps Asus is hoping prices will drop between now and the end of 2010. If they do pull it off however, it could end up being as game changing to the e-book reader market as the EEE PC was to the netbook market. Would you buy an OLED color e-book reader? And more importantly, what would you be willing to pay?

Google’s Nexus One phone has gained kudos for its vivid OLED screen and slim design. But the lack of multitouch support for its gorgeous display has left some users frustrated.

Now there’s a hack for it. A developer has modified the Android 2.1 operating system running on the Nexus One to enable multitouch for the device. Though it enables the feature for the Nexus One browser, for now, it is likely to soon become a part of other applications, such as maps.

Earlier this month, Google launched Nexus One as the first smartphone that would be sold by the search company itself, rather than a manufacturing or carrier partner. The Nexus One is designed by HTC and is currently available on T-Mobile’s network for $180 with a two-year contract with T-Mobile. An unsubsidized version of the phone costs $530.

But the lack of multitouch on the Nexus One has left many users puzzled. Nexus One has a touchscreen but users can only tap on it with one finger. So none of the two-finger pinch-and-zoom gestures that are popular among iPhone users are available. Google has said it will consider adding the feature in future updates.

The Android community, though, isn’t holding its breath. Steve Kondik, a developer who goes under the nickname Cyanogen, has offered a few files and instructions on code to add multitouch to the device.

“You will initially lose your bookmarks and browser settings by doing this,” he warns.  Hacking the phone could also void its warranty.

But as this video shows, getting multitouch in the Nexus One browser could just be worth it.

Korea Times quotes unnamed, high-ranking executives at KT, Apple’s exclusive local partner in South Korea, as saying the iPhone 4G will have an OLED screen, support video chat and — perhaps most surprisingly — have a removable battery. It’ll also reportedly have a dual-core processor, more powerful graphics and an improved camera. The officials say that KT’s corporate clients will get the new phones in April as a “litmus test” before they’re provided to local distributors in June.

U.S. availability isn’t specified in the report, but an upgraded iPhone in June wouldn’t be surprising, as that falls in line with Apple’s previous annual updates to the popular smartphone, 2008’s iPhone 3G and 2009’s iPhone 3GS. But let’s take a closer look at some of those supposed new features:

An OLED screen seems likely. It was rumored for the iPhone 3GS and didn’t happen, but with Google’s Nexus One sporting an OLED screen, Apple may have more incentive to upgrade.

I’m somewhat skeptical about the removable battery because, if anything, Apple was moving away from that trend with its unibody MacBook, the latest in its laptop line to adopt a built-in battery. And I doubt Apple would want to mess with the iPhone’s sleek and solid design. However, last February, The Register dug up a few battery-related Apple patents, one of which describes a method for removing batteries from mobile devices and charging them in a host computer, so Apple might have a trick up its sleeve.

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As Google and China trade blows on the global stage Lenovo just keeps on truckin’ with its plans to launch the Android-powered LePhone in China and overseas. Samsung and Motorola you’ll recall, already bent under Google’s pressure and agreed to delay the launch of their respective handsets in China last week. Lenovo execs are planning for a hat-trick launch in May on China Unicom, China Mobile, and China Telecom with a rest of world launch expected later in the year. Lenovo shareholders also approved the company’s planned buy-back of its mobile handset division today, making them just the latest tier-1 PC maker to join the smartphone party. Picture of the LePhone with its optional keyboard accessory after the break.

The Diamond3 (previously known as HTC Obsession) is a Windows Mobile 7 phone, with a large multi-touch OLED,  1Ghz CPU, 4GB of internal storage (and a microSD slot), 5Mp camera (capable of HD video, 720p, 25fps).

HTC Diamond3

The Diamond3 will be launched by AT&T and T-Mobile USA later in 2010.