OLED Technology: an amazing technology that will render LCDs obsolete!
In a few years' time, you will probably be looking at LCDs and Plasma screens because there's a new technology that will out-perform them arriving on the horizon. The technology is called OLED. It stands for Organic Light Emitting Diode. Most of you probably know about the LED technology that is used in many electric and electronic devices. These are generally tiny red lamps that emit bright light. Well, OLED technology is an improvement on this technology, thanks to the usage of organic materials.
OLED displays have many advantages over LCDs and Plasma screens. They are very light and thin; is generally only a few millimetres. They can achieve very high resolutions and contrast ratios so that the image displayed seems very sharp. Unlike LCDs, they do not require backlighting, since they are self-illuminating devices.
This feature makes OLEDs energy-saving. Additionally, the light that is emitted by OLEDs is so bright that the image can be seen perfectly, even under bright sunshine. Furthermore, the short response time -that is the time elapsed for a pixel to change colour- of the OLED screens makes them effective displays for motion pictures. Response time is a problem for Plasma screens and LCDs, causing some image failures, especially in rapidly changing scenes. In fact, OLEDs are technically better than LCDs and Plasmas in every way; the problem with OLEDs is their price and durability. As the consumer electronics companies overcome these problems, we will be seeing more and more OLED products on the market. OLEDs will be used everywhere that LCDs are used today: Digital cameras, PDAs, Notebooks, Televisions and many more.
For now, there is only one product in the market in which OLED screen is used but many more releases are expected throughout this year. You will still need to wait a while for large screen OLED TVs to hit the market.

Eren Tezmen (MAN/III)