Currently, Samsung Mobile Display is jointly owned by Samsung Electroncs, with 64.4-percent, and Samsung SDI, holding the minority 35.6-percent. The joint-venture is unlisted on the stock exchange, but operates semi-independently, supplying not only Samsung Electronics but other companies with AMOLED displays.

That could change, at least partly, if Samsung Electronics decides to bring the display business in-house. Such a move with give the company even more choice for the first-pick of new panel technologies, and allow it to better control the access of rivals to the screens.

As the smartphone and tablet markets heat up, that advantage could see Samsung extend its lead in the Android segment, as well as better challenge high-profile rivals like the iPhone. Apple has already shown how tight control over the supply-chain can work to a firm’s advantage; now Samsung looks to be following in those footsteps.

[via OLED-Info]

This device is the next generation of Pantech devices in a smartphone, it coming in titanium or a lovely maroon/red, and is set to be released on the 22nd of January, 2012. This device is part of two deals: one is the price point by itself, that being $49.99 by itself on a two-year contract or FREE if you buy it with the tablet. Both colors look fabulous, the metal feels excellent, and Pantech’s own custom user interface is in full effect.

We’ve been told that both the Element and the Burst are fully capable of being upgraded to Ice Cream Sandwich and both upgrades are on the roadmap for Pantech and AT&T, but no dates have been given thus far. This smartphone is meant to work with the mid to upper range of devices what with its high quality build and value offer. This is a device that’s made to beat up the mid-range, if I do say so myself, LTE and a lovely little machine like this are just begging to be picked up by a whole new generation of smartphone users.

A 100,000:1 contrast ratio and broader color gamut than similarly sized LCD panels add to a response time in excess of 1,000x faster than LCD, along with reduced power consumption from more intelligent backlighting. There’s also what LG is calling “White OLED (WOLED)” which vertically stacks red, green and blue diodes on a white diode base.

Where LG Display has been particularly clever is in the backplane, using an Oxide TFT tech rather than Low Temperature Poly Silicon (LTPS) as is currently common in OLED, for identical picture quality and performance but “significantly reduced investment levels.”

Those cheaper manufacturing costs will be essential if large-scale OLED is to take on LCD and plasma in the living room. Existing OLED TVs commercially released have generally been both small and expensive; LG has shown it can go big, but there’s no word on whether this particular OLED HDTV will see a retail launch or simply be used as a tech demo for WOLED and Oxide TFT processes.

[via Engadget]

Of course, we’re a long way from an actual production version of what Samsung is speculating about – for a start, all the non-display tech has to go somewhere – but the Korean company is expected to launch its first flexible-display AMOLED products in 2012. Tipped to be used in both phones and tablets, the most likely implementation is perhaps a hybrid of the both, such as the seamless folding screen MID/phone prototype the company revealed earlier this year.

Samsung isn’t the only company to be considering flexible displays as a possible way to improve mobile device usability; Nokia has gone on record claiming that a flexible phone bearing its logo – such as the functioning Kinetic concept it showed at Nokia World 2011 – could be around three years away. Still, the Korean’s manufacturing heft leaves it in a solid position to beat rivals to the market, even if they won’t be able to replicate quite the same experience as you see in the video below.

[via OLED-Info]

Remember that the last we heard from DoCoMo, the device would be released inside November – in fact what’s actually going on is that pre-orders have already begun while the actual device will be shipped on the 2nd of December (that being this Friday). The specifications on this device are essentially the same as we’ve seen on the international edition of the device with a 4.65-inch HD Super AMOLED display (1280×720), a 1.2GHz dual-core OMAP4460 processor under the hood, and a 5MP main and 1.3MP front-facing camera. You’ll be connecting with FOMA support (14Mbps down / 5.7Mbps up) for DoCoMo though, so feel free to grab all the downloads and upload all the videos you like.

As for us poor Americans, we’ve still got to walk around in shame using our undeniably amazing Galaxy S II devices with a hacked version of Ice Cream Sandwich. What a horrible way to live! On the other hand, there’s no doubt that we’ll be seeing the LTE version of the Galaxy Nexus before too long, no matter what anyone says, so until then have a look at our review of the operating system Android 4.0 Ice Cream Sandwich and our review of the international version of the device: Samsung Galaxy Nexus!

While not just one whole heck of a lot of information exists on the 65-inch display at the moment, AUO was also showing off a 6-inch transparent display they appear to have been much more liberal with as far as details. The 6-inch transparent display (which you can see at the bottom of this post) has a 400 x 300 pixel display (not too high, but heck, it’s transparent,) and a dual-emission structure. This 6-inch display is also entire touch-sensitive, and the the brightness is sitting at 400 (Top) cd/m2.

Check this vending machine out:

While it appears that only black is functional here on this fully interactive display, the elephant, the brushing of the tree branches, and the bats that carry your drink from its home to your hand are all more than impressive. And what’s best? The monkeys can be tapped until they fall of their branch and can even walk on your hand if you hold it to the display. I can’t imagine many people will have the ability to grab a drink from these machines – kids will be swarming!

[via Wrech.CC]

Samsung’s intention to use flexible screens in 2012 was first revealed back in June, when the company confirmed that it would begin mass production of the OLED panels next year. The actual displays themselves have been floating around in prototype form since 2010, with Samsung showing off a variety of concepts that could potentially benefit from the technology. More recently, the company revealed a foldable phone/MID prototype that squeezed an AMOLED panel into a clamshell casing.

It’s unclear, at this stage, what format Samsung’s devices will take. Clamshells are perhaps the most likely candidates, given that it would allow the Korean firm to pack a larger display into a smaller form-factor. Kyocera attempted to maximize Android screen real-estate with its dual-display Echo, but that was forced to use two solid panels: Samsung’s approach could mean a single, seamless screen ideal for video and browsing.

Nokia, meanwhile, demonstrated a flexible prototype phone of its own at Nokia World earlier this week. The concept, shown in our video below, pairs a twistable display with a rubberized case, allowing navigation by physically bending the handset. However, flexible battery, circuitboard and other components will have to come up to speed before the prototype could spawn a commercial design.

[via OLED-Info]

Hardware

Even the harshest Symbian critics have struggled to criticise Nokia’s hardware, and with good reason: the company has consistently pushed out slickly-designed phones and smartphones. If we had a dollar for every semi-recent Nokia handset review we’ve seen that concludes “If this phone were running Android” or similar, well, we’d probably have enough to buy ourselves an N9 outright.

Nokia has certainly excelled itself with the N9. The chassis – a pillowy 116.45 x 61.2 x 7.6-12.1 mm and 135g – is a CNC’d chip of pure polycarbonate, shaped like a swollen battery with tapering ends, and nestling into the hand with a feel that falls somewhere between plastic and anodized metal. Three color choices, of cyan, magenta and black, are the pure, unpainted hues of the plastic itself: scratch the N9 and you’ll find more of the same underneath, rather than ugly white.

Up front is a 3.9-inch AMOLED capacitive touchscreen running at 854 x 480 resolution, the highest of any Nokia smartphone to-date, and using the company’s ClearBlack polarizing system for improved contrast. Nokia is particularly proud of the way the AMOLED and the glass have been constructed, with no air gap in-between. That makes for a picture that seems to float just under the fingertip, or even look as though it’s been painted on the glass.

Colors are rich and Nokia’s UI scheme – the black background blending in with the black Gorilla Glass, which itself curves smoothly to fuse with the body – uses this to its advantage, bright icons standing out like colorful shards. Viewing angles, too, are impressive, in both portrait and landscape orientation, though perhaps not quite up to the standard of some of Samsung’s recent Super AMOLED panels. Still, it’s a beautiful, highly usable display with great touchscreen response.

Physical controls are limited to just a volume rocker and power/lock button on the right side. On the top edge there’s a 3.5mm headphones socket – you also get Bluetooth 2.1+EDR for using headsets – and, under a hinged cover, a microUSB port for charging and syncing. Next to that is a small caddy for a microSIM, the same size as you’d find in an iPhone 4. Our one design complaint would be this arrangement of pop-up and sliding doors, the microUSB cover sometimes proving reluctant to flap back down.

Nokia has given the N9 two cameras, an 8-megapixel autofocus unit on the back with a dual-LED flash and Carl Zeiss optics, and a front-facing camera. Unusually, this front-facer is in the bottom right corner of the display, rather than somewhere at the top, likely for reasons of internal construction rather than anything else. Doubly-odd, there’s no actual way to access it, at least using the camera app Nokia preloads. On the bottom edge is a speaker with a surprising amount of volume and body to it.

Inside things are a curious mixture of technologies, some at the cutting edge of the segment and others dawdling behind. At its heart, the N9 runs a 1GHz Texas Instruments OMAP3630 processor paired with PowerVR SGX530 graphics and 1GB of RAM, an ARM Cortex A8 combination that was only really bleeding-edge back when Motorola’s DROID X launched in mid-2010. That’s paired with a pentaband UMTS/HSPA+ radio with support for up to 14.4Mbps downloads and 5.7Mbps uploads. As with other recent Nokia handsets, the N9′s 3G will work happily on both AT&T and T-Mobile USA’s networks, something that can hardly be said for most other smartphones on the market.

Then there are the various sensors, the accelerometer and digital compass, a proximity sensor, ambient light sensor and GPS/A-GPS. No FM radio, nor an FM transmitter, but you do get NFC: Nokia uses that with its newest accessory line-up of speakers, headsets and cordless headphones, bypassing the traditional Bluetooth PIN-pairing system and instead allowing you to tap the N9 to the peripheral and, after a second or two, have them connect automatically. A second tap disconnects. It’s a system that works surprisingly well, with music playback automatically re-routed while in-progress calls are handed over instantly between the phone’s speaker dual microphone array and your Bluetooth headset. Of course there’s WiFi a/b/g/n too.

Nokia N9 NFC demo:

There have been some compromises made to achieve Nokia’s aesthetic. Most obvious are the absence of a user-accessible battery, the N9′s 1,450 mAh Li-Ion power pack being sealed inside the casing, and the reliance entirely on internal storage rather than offering a microSD card slot. Nokia has opted for two extremes in memory, either 16GB at the entry-level or, for those with capacious multimedia collections, a 64GB version.

MeeGo

MeeGo has had a rocky road to market, and it’s not out of the woods quite yet. The combination of Nokia’s own Maemo platform, most memorably implemented on the N900, and Intel’s Moblin platform, most memorably for its, well, amnesiac impact on the PC market, MeeGo was to be the cross-platform best of both worlds. To make things more complex, however, the software build for the N9 was already underway in the midst of Nokia and Intel’s partnership agreement, and so developed partially independently as MeeGo/Harmattan.

Unfortunately, Nokia’s own work on MeeGo proved insufficiently rapid for newly-crowned CEO Stephen Elop, who balked at the company’s sluggardly roadmap and decided to throw in with Microsoft on Windows Phone. MeeGo, it was announced at the time, would be sent back to the labs, a test-bed for future “game changer” technologies but with no concrete commercial future. Soon, it will spar off on another path, as part of the recently announced Tizen, yet another platform with open-source aspirations and ambitions to be on your phone, your tablet, your netbook and your notebook.

There’s the troubled birth, but is the N9 a wallowing nugget of misery or a shining beacon of what could’ve been?

Curiously, endearingly, frustratingly, it’s broadly the latter. Like iOS, there are no widgets, but MeeGo feels like it has been designed with multitasking and social integration from the outset. The homescreen is a triptych of panes: a vertically scrolling app menu, with icons for all your software, then a task-switcher pane showing thumbnails of recently used apps in the order you last accessed them, and then finally a notifications pane, with weather, a section of email/calendar/etc alerts, and a long feed of recent updates from Facebook and Twitter. Swiping left and right slides between each pane.

Nokia N9 MeeGo demo:

The whole interface is awash with neat little animations and usability tidbits, all with touch at their heart. Lists spring and bounce when scrolled to their end, and there’s no lag to be encountered in swiping. Tap the title bar, with its icons for battery, network status, time and activity, and up pops a simple pane showing the current profile – silent, beep or ringing, with the ringing bar extending to show ringer volume – volume and current connections or downloads, including WiFi status and your availability on Facebook chat, Skype and Google Talk, all of which are supported natively.

Navigating between apps is all swipe-based: swipe across the screen in any direction to exit the current app and return to the homescreen. Optionally, swiping down can close the app rather than leave it running in the background. Otherwise, manual task management is done from the multitasking pane, which by default shows four large thumbnails on-screen at a time, but with a pinch-zoom gesture can flip to showing nine, complete with a neat zooming animation. Tapping any app re-opens it; holding down on the thumbnail pulls up red “X” buttons for each app, allowing you to close it completely. A “Close All” option at the bottom takes you back to square one. It’s a button we seldom felt the need to tap, however; even with 25+ apps in the list, the N9′s 1GHz single-core handled things well, though occasionally we’d see a little sluggishness as apps loaded.

Considering how touch integration was so uncomfortably bolted onto Symbian back in the S60 v.5 (aka Symbian^1) days, a clumsy afterthought, it’s great to see that Nokia’s software engineers do actually know what they’re doing with touchscreen technology. It took mere minutes to get used to the swipe multitasking, helped by the fact that MeeGo drops you back exactly where you were in the homescreen triptych, even if you were scrolled partway down the app launcher list. Apps introduce themselves with a sentence explaining the functionality: suggesting you sync music across from your computer, for instance, or inviting you to create your first note.

Then there are the less obvious elements, which help add to MeeGo’s sense of depth. When locked, the N9 shows a dim white clock – the low-power benefits of AMOLED allowing it to stay active for this all the time, without draining the battery – and some notification icons, such as “@” when you have new emails. You can reach the regular lock screen by pressing the physical button on the side, but alternatively a brisk double-tap on the touchscreen takes you there too. From there you can see just how many emails you have, along with a preview of the latest; a swipe in any direction unlocks the phone.

Alternatively, though, you can swipe up halfway, pause for a second, and then get a row of four shortcuts along the bottom of the screen: phone, messages, camera and browser. Press the volume buttons while on the homescreen, and you can switch between profile modes without having to fully unlock the N9. Head into the settings pages, meanwhile, and you can find not only a percentage of what juice remains, but an estimate of talktime and standby time in days, hours and minutes. It even tells you the condition of the battery. Then there are data limit options, both for cellular data use on your home network and when roaming.

Software

Nokia doesn’t stint on preloaded applications with MeeGo: the N9 comes out of the box with just about everything you’d expect from a recent smartphone. Email supports Exchange, Gmail (though not with push), and any IMAP/POP account you might have, served up in a universal inbox. There’s no conversational view, unlike on Android, though you can pinch-zoom to get in close to attached photos and text. Begin scrolling and a shadow scrollbar appears down the right hand side: drag it, and you can easily jump down the list by date. Up to a week’s worth of messages are synchronized, and the dedicated Search app includes those – though not what’s still on the email server – among its queries.

The on-screen keyboard is particularly good, offering both portrait and landscape variants and supporting a sharp haptic buzz that does a great job of feeling localized to your fingertip. Audio feedback is another option. Word correction and auto-complete are each supported, and while the N9 doesn’t have as large a screen as, say, some of the more recent Android devices, we still had no issues with accurate text-entry on it.

The N9′s browser supports pinch-zooming, text-reflow and HTML5, though oddly not Flash, despite that being offered on Symbian phones. Still, it’s a neat little app: bookmarks are – either conveniently or overwhelmingly, depending on how addicted to creating favorites you are – saved as icons in the app pane, and each open window is served up individually in the task switcher.

Calendar and Contacts work as you’d expect, combining your Google, Exchange, Facebook and other sources into a single location. MeeGo pulls in profile photos from your Facebook friends, and creates monogram “squircles” for those it can’t find. The dedicated Facebook and Twitter apps – which each feed their recent updates into the notifications homescreen pane – are basic but serviceable. Oddly, while you can upload photos directly to Facebook, you can’t do the same with Twitter, and you’re also limited to just one of each account. Those hoping to manage their work and personal tweets from the N9 will be disappointed.

As with Symbian Nokia devices, the company doesn’t assume you’ll be satisfied with solely cellular voice calls. A Skype client – which also supports chat and contacts sync – is preloaded, plus those with their own SIP accounts can register them and access VoIP as another option in the dialer. Both WiFi and 3G VoIP is supported, though your carrier may not like the latter.

Multimedia on the N9 consists of the gallery, the music app and the video player, plus a link to the mobile YouTube site. Images can be tagged and viewed by tag group, as well as marked as a favorite for quicker subsequent access. Both photos and video from the N9′s camera are mixed together in the gallery timeline, though you can pull out video clips separately. Images can be shared via NFC, if you have another device that supports the standard.

The music app is straightforward and somewhat reminiscent of an iPod in its UI. Album art thumbnails cluster at the top of the screen, with links to Artist, Album, Song and Playlists below. There’s also access to the Ovi Music store, offering MP3 song and album downloads directly to the N9. Audio quality from the integrated speaker was loud and clear, with the phone doing a decent job of cranking up volume without suffering too much distortion. Finally there’s the video app, which seems intended for side-loaded clips rather than those you shoot yourself with the N9′s camera. H.263, MPEG4-SP & ASP, H.264 BP/MP, WMV9 / VC-1 and Mkv (Matroska) formats are supported. There’s no apparent way to access your own footage from the app; instead you have to play it back through the gallery.

Nokia Maps and the Drive app are two of the jewels in the company’s software and services crown. Offering a solid alternative to Google Maps Navigation on Android. As well as comprehensive NAVTEQ mapping data – which can be downloaded on a country-by-country basis directly to the phone’s own storage, useful if you’re going abroad and want to navigate while avoiding data roaming fees – there are turn-by-turn directions and points of interest with reviews from Qype and other sources. Directions can be tailored for those driving and those on foot, with the former getting the dedicated Drive app that presents an oversized, finger-friendly interface for when you’re behind the wheel, and the latter usefully flipping the map so that your next turn is always shown ahead of how you’re facing.

All the basics are covered, with a calculator, documents viewer, RSS feed viewer and notes app, plus a WiFI Hotspot app that allows you to share your 3G connection with multiple WiFi-connected devices, such as notebooks and tablets. There are also four games – Angry Birds, GOF2, NFS Shift and Real Golf 2011 – none of which exactly burn a hole in the current line-up of mobile titles, but which play well on the N9 and look great on the ClearBlack display.

Nokia’s comprehensive selection is a good strategy for the company to take: it keeps users away from the Ovi Store and potential disappointment. There are certainly apps for the N9 in there – MeeGo support Qt development, just like Symbian – but simply not as much choice as on an Android handset or an iPhone. Whether that’s likely to change much is questionable: Nokia’s public change of direction, away from Symbian, MeeGo and Qt and toward Windows Phone, telegraphs a pretty clear message to developers deciding where to invest their time and efforts.

Camera

Although the N9 has two cameras, MeeGo only comes set up to to use one of them: thankfully it’s the rear-facing f2.2 8-megapixel snapper with the Carl Zeiss optics. The camera app itself is straightforward to use, though there’s no dedicated shortcut key; the volume rocker acts as a control for the 4x digital zoom. Touch-to-focus is supported, and the autofocus system in general is quick, though we found it could be a little less accurate during macro photography.

The end result, though, is excellent. Colors are accurate and on the pleasing side of saturated, while exposure is only frustrated by particularly over-illuminated scenes. There’s a huge amount of detail in each shot, too, though some noise can creep in there as well. The dual-LED flash is bright and often overwhelming, and we found low-light shots could sometimes do better leaving things to the f2.2 aperture lens.

Once you’ve taken a shot, you can do red-eye removal, straighten the frame and automatically fix the colors and exposure with the onboard editing tools, all the while leaving a copy of the original frame untouched for later experimentation.

The single-core processor, among other things, keeps video recording to 720p HD at most, rather than 1080p. Nonetheless, you get 30fps support in 16:9 aspect, with some control over white balance and exposure. There’s also continuous autofocus along with stereo sound recording thanks to the twin microphones.

The eventual clips are solid, if not outstanding. The N9 shows a tendency to over-expose, leaving brighter areas of the shot washed out. There’s also noticeable noise and some blurring with faster-moving objects. Still, the autofocus shows admirably little hunting, and the sound pickup is good.

Phone and Battery

Nokia’s reputation for solid handsets isn’t just limited to build quality: radio performance is also something the company consistently gets right. The N9′s pentaband UTMS/HSPA and quadband GSM/EDGE leaves it content on pretty much any GSM network you can mention, in fact the trickiest part might be finding a microSIM to use. We saw no problems with call performance, and the dual-microphone noise cancellation system worked well without leaving speech too artificial.

As for the battery, Nokia says to expect up to 11hrs GSM talktime (6.5hrs WCDMA) or up to 340hrs GSM standby (420hrs WCDMA) from a full charge, or alternatively 6.5hrs of WiFi browsing, 5hrs of HSPA browsing, 5hrs of 720p HD video playback or 50hrs of audio playback. In practice, with mixed use including some Nokia Maps navigation, browsing over both WiFi and 3G, some photography and multimedia playback, and push email turned on, we reached the end of the day with juice to spare. In fact, the N9 made it through a fair chunk of the next day, too.

Wrap-Up

It’s not often we review what’s effectively a dead product. Usually, if a manufacturer decides to cancel a project, or if the company itself folds, that happens well before the doomed devices reach the SlashGear test bench. Even in the case of the HP TouchPad, the company was still full-steam-ahead at review time, only axing the poorly-selling slate when it became clear how much it was struggling.

Our frustration is that the N9 doesn’t deserve to die. In fact, Nokia has delivered a double-punch of compelling software and beautiful hardware: a device that earned curious, envious glances while we played with it in public, and a platform that was both instantly usable and consistently slick. We try not to play “What could’ve been” because, frankly, there’s usually interest and intrigue enough in the directions manufacturers do eventually take, but forgive us if we stare wistfully off for a while, imagine a whole range of MeeGo smartphones helping Nokia reclaim its crown.

Rationally, though, it’s tough to recommend the N9 to the general smartphone audience. Scarcity is one big element of that: the number of locations Nokia will actually sell the smartphone is severely limited, the focus very much being on Windows Phone. Meanwhile, the ominous future of applications for the MeeGo platform is our other big concern. There’s enough pre-loaded to certainly best any feature-phone, but smartphone owners expect apps; that leaves the N9 too expensive to rival a cheap feature-phone and with too shaky a future to take on Android or iOS.

Nonetheless, it’s hard to escape the polish of the N9′s hardware/software combination. Seldom are we so reluctant to part with a review unit as we are over sending the N9 back to Nokia. It may not be the fastest, or the most whiz-bang of the smartphones, but it’s holistically beautiful and an example in many ways of why Nokia once led the mobile field. The saving grace is that we know Nokia is carrying forward the design and build of the N9 to at least one of its Windows Phone 7 handsets: they may not have MeeGo, but they’ll have a future, and we’ve always had a soft-spot for Microsoft’s platform too. We can’t blame Nokia for the direction the company has chosen – there’s more to it than mere software; Windows Phone gives them a platform, a developer ecosystem, and the might of Microsoft among other things – but we can be more than wistful that the N9 and MeeGo came that little bit too late to have their true worth recognized.

Hardware

Nokia’s now-legendary build quality is one of the things we’re most looking forward to in the company’s upcoming Windows Phone range, but solid construction is certainly evident on the 700, too. It’s a surprisingly small phone in a world dominated by oversized touchscreens: Apple may have been criticized for sticking with 3.5-inches on the iPhone 4S, but the 700′s AMOLED is an even smaller 3.2-inches. It runs at nHD 640 x 360 resolution, low in comparison to rival devices but still sufficient for smooth graphics on such a compact panel.

It’s also impressively color-rich and bright, thanks to Nokia’s ClearBlack technology. Colors are saturated and vivid, and the viewing angles are broad. A sheet of toughened Gorilla Glass sits on top of the 110 x 50 x 9.7 mm, 96g chassis, with physical call, menu and end/power buttons underneath. On the right side are slim – but easily pressed – volume, lock and camera keys. The whole thing is creak-free and sturdy.

Nokia hasn’t stinted on connectivity over the past couple of years, and the 700 – although billed as an entry-level smartphone – is no different. As well as pentaband UMTS/WCDMA, making 3G usable on both AT&T and T-Mobile in the US – there’s quadband GSM/EDGE, WiFi b/g/n, Bluetooth 3.0, USB 2.0, NFC, a 3.5mm headphone socket that doubles as a TV output, an FM radio and A-GPS. Up to 14.4Mbps downloads and 5.76Mbps uploads are supported, network allowing. Frankly, rivals could still learn a lot from what Nokia manages to squeeze inside a low-cost, low-bulk handset.

On the back is a 5-megapixel full-focus camera with 720p HD video recording support, but unlike most other Nokias the 700 lacks a front-facing camera for video calls. That’s unlikely to make a huge difference to most buyers, however. Inside is 2GB of storage, augmented via a microSD card slot, plus a SIM slot and a 1080 mAh battery.

Software

Symbian Belle is by turns familiar and new. Nokia is keen to point out that there are many changes behind the scenes, making the aging OS more spritely and spec-compliant, but it’s the reworked UI that leaves the biggest impression.

Nowhere is that more evident than the homescreen. Symbian previously supported a single desktop widget size – a rectangular block wide enough for four icon shortcuts, three emails, etc. – with each of three panes having space for six such boxes. Belle ups the panes to a possible six and offers developers a choice of six widget sizes, ranging from individual icons to huge blocks. There’s more flexibility in how you can place them, too.

Then there’s the notification menu, Symbian borrowing Android’s pull-down status bar complete with shortcuts to quickly toggle mobile data, WiFi, Bluetooth and silent mode. New messages and other alerts are flagged up here, along with music player controls if there’s media on the go.

Iconography has been switched wholesale to Nokia’s “squircle” design language, which leaves things feeling a little like the N9, and there are some discrete animations as you move around the system. Menus swipe and slide away, and the whole thing feels fresher and newer than versions of Symbian before it.

The apps and services on offer are much as we’ve seen on other recent Symbian phones. The QWERTY keyboard for portrait orientation is present, though the epitome of fiddly on the compact 3.2-inch display. You also get the impressive Nokia Maps, supporting offline mapping – a boon if you travel and don’t want to rack up sky-high data fees – along with turn-by-turn directions for driving and walking, and various integrated POI services. It remains one of the best mobile mapping solutions around, and we’re very much looking forward to it kicking Bing Maps out of Windows Phone.

Nokia doesn’t include any NFC accessories in the box with the 700, only a wired stereo headset, which is a shame as the short-range wireless technology is neatly integrated into Belle. We’ve tested the 700 with several of Nokia’s NFC-enabled gadgets – where it’s used as a shortcut to pairing and activating Bluetooth connections – and it certainly beats punching in the default “0000″ code and routing calls and music through the Bluetooth connection each time. Instead, simply hold the 700 against the NFC logo on the Play 360 speaker, for instance, for a few seconds, and the two automatically make friends and start playing music. A second tap disconnects.

The Symbian browser has been supercharged, Nokia says, running at 3x the speed of that of the N8. In practice we were hamstrung predominantly by the diminutive screen size, though pages loaded reasonably quickly over WiFi and 3G. Flash Lite 4 is supported and didn’t seem to have a huge speed impact on page navigation lag. There’s no webpage tabbing, a sensible decision given the real-estate on offer, so the 700 uses a separate UI to switch between concurrently open pages that’s similar to the preview thumbnails used in the app switcher.

Nokia’s social integration looks a little better in this iteration of Symbian, with Facebook and Twitter being pulled to the homescreen courtesy of the Social app and its widget, but it still feels a less cohesive implementation than, say, Android or iOS 5. Third-party apps like Gravity do the Twitter job better, and are available through the Nokia Store. Otherwise the app download scene can be somewhat hit & miss, with some gems to be discovered but otherwise a less impressive array than the fast-growing App Store and Android Market.

Camera

Nokia argues that its “full focus” cameras make for just as good photography as those equipped with auto-focus. In some circumstances that’s true (there are other benefits, such as minimal delay between hitting the button and the frame being captured) but we still know the main reasons are cost and bulk.

Unfortunately, full focus cameras struggle with close-up and macro shots – they simply can’t focus in on nearby objects – and as you can see from the samples in the gallery, that means fuzzy images. More standard photos fare better, with realistic colors and decent contrast outdoors. Indoors however, where good light can be in shorter supply, shots quickly become grainy with noise. It’s not helped when the 700 is so lightweight that it’s easy to shake when you’re trying to press the button.

Video can be captured at up to 720p HD 30fps resolution, with digital image stabilization to try to help cut out some of the phone shudder. The resulting clips are average, with somewhat muted colors and a tendency for darker areas of the picture to become murky and lose detail. Even with the digital processing we struggled to overcome camera shake, too.

Phone and Battery

Nokia is often the brand of choice for those still demanding solid calling performance from their handsets, and the 700 doesn’t disappoint. In-call audio could be cranked loud with minimal distortion, and the front-facing speaker meant impromptu conference calls were clearer too.

The 1080 mAh battery is tipped as good for over 7hrs of GSM talktime (up to 4.5hrs WCDMA) or up to 403hrs of GSM standby (up to 416hrs WCDMA); alternatively Nokia says it’s good for almost 7hrs of video playback or 47hrs of audio playback (using wired rather than wireless headphones). In reality, we easily managed a couple of days use with push-email turned on, some browsing, multimedia and navigation use. The compact display is likely to have helped in more than one way with that: AMOLED is general more power efficient than LCD anyway, but its compact size often left us reaching for bigger devices when we wanted to do all but the briefest of web browsing.

Wrap-Up

We admit it, we were ready to move on from Symbian. The platform still has its fans, but underwhelming usability in comparison to Android and iOS saw otherwise impressive devices like the N8 and E7 fail to meet the mark. With Symbian Belle, though, it seems Nokia’s latest round of CPR has actually resulted in a smartphone platform that we could recommend using.

Price and positioning would play a huge part in that recommendation, of course. Nokia is aiming to have the 700 on sale at around the same point as an HTC Wildfire S, a budge Android device; SIM-free and unlocked, it’s available for £299.99 in the UK ($472). That’s mighty affordable when you consider the spec list. Belle could well be more approachable than Android to first-time smartphone users, too, and we can imagine plenty of people preferring solid preloaded apps over the somewhat wild hit-and-miss of the Android Market.

In short, the Nokia 700 occupies a spot in-between featurephone and smartphone, both in Nokia’s own line-up and the market as a whole. If your priorities are staying connected without staying tethered to a mains socket, making occasional forays onto the web and all in something that won’t dominate your pocket or purse, then the Nokia 700 could well be the first Symbian device we’d suggest you consider.

This certainly is a Galaxy S – styled device, but it won’t be coming with the newest version that we’re seeing on the USA Galaxy S II lineup. That said, it has just about everything else – oh except the dual-core processor, you’ll still be using a 1GHz single-core Hummingbird here. This will be the second Samsung device to be capable of using its 4G LTE network, and with Android 2.3.x Gingerbread, you’ll be up to date on the Android front. This is currently the only device on Verizon’s LTE network to feature a keyboard, and a… classic looking keyboard at that.

The display is 4-inch and WVGA Super AMOLED Plus, meaning it’s certainly bright enough to beat the competition, but should you place it next to any of the Galaxy S II units out there (three of the, starting this week,) you might fall short. That said, there are, again, some added security features you’ll see mentioned briefly in the video promo, and this device is inexpensive at $149.99 attached to a 2-year contract starting October 13th. Certainly not meant to win any races – made to fill out some holes in the Verizon lineup instead.

Also remember to check out the sale pack this week via AmazonWireless for Verizon – all devices for a penny. Yes, a penny!

I’m almost unsure of where to start I’m enjoying this phone so much. The Samsung Galaxy S II really is a pretty awesome smartphone. It has it all from a simple design that is sleek, thin and lightweight — while being extremely powerful and fast at the same time. For all the details you’ll need check out my hands-on and unboxing. We’ll start with the video hands-on overview below and then get into all the details shortly.

AT&T Samsung Galaxy S II hands-on

Hardware

The hardware we all know plenty about — plus was laid out in the video above but just in case here are a few more details. We have Android 2.3 Gingerbread, a 1.2 GHz Samsung Exynos processor, 1GB of RAM, and 16GB of internal storage under the hood. Optional micro-SD support for extra storage, 8 megapixel camera around the rear with LED flash and a 2 MP front shooter for video chatting and more. All of that neatly packed into an ultra lightweight and thin design.

On the front we have a 4.3″ Super AMOLED Plus display with a 480 x 800 resolution. The screen is bright, vibrant, and extremely clear and really just looks better than anything else on the market thus far although the qHD displays are looking better and better. Shown in the images below you can see the AT&T branding, 2MP front camera, earpiece, as well as the four dedicated capacitive touch buttons.

Moving along to the left, right, and top of the device we have a very clean and simple design. No bright aluminum buttons or volume rockers, no weird textures on them either, just a plane jane black style. Many might like the aluminum accents some smartphones offer and I do too, but the Galaxy S II just has a simple and clean elegance to it. The only bezels present are the aluminum around the camera and the 3.5mm headphone jack up top.

Software

Here we have Android 2.3.4 Gingerbread and the latest Samsung Touch Wiz 4.0 to keep things pretty. With only a few slight changes to the entire Gingerbread look and feel this is a pretty stock device but features some added benefits. Nothing extremely crazy here like Sense UI, just a few added features and small changes. AT&T chose not to overdue it with bloatware either and for that — we thank you. We have a few dedicated AT&T applications and that is about it. The pre-installed apps other than AT&T specific things are Amazon Kindle, Live TV, Memo Pad, My Files, Qik, Quick Office, Words with Friends, and YP (Yellow Pages). Many additional apps such as another email app, video player, calender, file explorer, and a dairy application have been enhanced by Samsung’s Touchwiz to make the most of the 4.3″ display.

Samsung’s Touch Wiz also has a unique new feature with the just announced 4.0 for the Galaxy S II in the US and that is Motion Control. Once enabled, users can move icons on homescreens, zoom on images and webpages and more all by touching the screen and moving or panning the device rather than dragging multiple fingers. It’s quite neat and made moving icons from screen to screen extremely easy.

When first unveiled back in August our man Chris Burns was live at the Samsung event for some hands-on time with the SGSII. Below is a quick video of that coverage as well as a more detailed rundown of the changes to the software and user experience.

Performance

As usual we’ve ran a wide array of benchmarks and speedtests to see how this SGSII fends in the real world compared to other devices. Many other dual-core smartphones score well under 3000 in quadrant, especially stock devices with no tweaks or adjustments. The Samsung Galaxy S II with the in-house Exynos chip performs extremely well across all benchmarks and especially well in Quadrant. We’ve tried a few and were pleased to see the AT&T SGSII scored around 3800 in Quad — completely stock! Impressive if I don’t say so myself and you can really tell during day to day usage. My Sensation 4G gets around 2400 out of the box, big difference right?

Below are a few pictures showing just how well the SGSII also performs in Vellamo, and CF Bench, as well as a few quick tests on AT&T’s 4G HSPA+ network (no 4G LTE here).

I know benchmarks don’t tell the entire story, and many users don’t care to read about them and would just like to know about real world usage. I’m happy to report the Galaxy S II is really one of the quickest, most fluid and easy to use phones I’ve had my hands on to date. I’ve experienced no delays or lag during browsing, gaming, benchmarks, loading multiple images in the gallery or anything. Even downloading about 10 app updates at a time the experience was barely touched and the overall performance was stellar. From adding icons to different pages, to flipping through homescreens and the application tray there is no gitters or choppy moments that I’ve experienced yet. This is truly a great performing smartphone that will meet any users demand.

Battery life and Camera

The AT&T SGSII comes with a 1650 mAh battery under the hood and while every user is different I’ve managed to have better than average battery life. From using this smartphone over the past week or so the battery lasts a bit longer than most. My Sensation 4G has a similarly sized battery and it just doesn’t manage to stay powered as long. Many reviewers of the original SGSII from Europe mentioned similar results where the SGSII battery life seems to outmatch rivaling handsets. This could be in part to changes made by Samsung, and another thing worth mentioning is the highly efficient AMOLED display, it seems to consume less power and really helps. Stand-by time was not fully tested but I left the device untouched for over 3 days and it remained around 25% when I finally plugged her in. While I’ve not done any video loop tests I have however played plenty of Angry Birds, Fruit Ninja, used Google+ allll day, and browsed the web off and on throughout daily tasks and the phone holds up extremely well in the battery department. The Galaxy S II battery life is above average and will last most users more than the average work day.

As for the camera we have an 8 megapixel shooter and just like the battery life — the Galaxy S II seems better than the rest in terms of overall camera performance. I’ve snapped a few shots around the house and outside so you can see low light and standard lighting results. Many phones currently offer an 8 MP camera just like the DROID Bionic, but the slow shutter speed and mediocre performance makes the Samsung shooter just that much better. Here are a few pictured taken with the SGSII.

We’ve also tested the 1080p video capture and the Galaxy S II does impress here also. Very smooth and decent in regards to video capture although you must remember this is a phone, but they are getting better and better as they come. Below is a short video demo of the kids (my dogs) playing and messing around just for an idea of real world indoor video capture results. (Isn’t the puppy cute?)

Quick Comparison and Accessories

I’ve quickly snapped a few photos of the AT&T Galaxy S II sitting next to the big bad DROID Bionic by Motorola and Verizon Wireless. While both are comparable regarding specs, the SGSII doesn’t feature LTE but does however have a faster processor. I’ll break down the details later but for now here are a few pictures of the two just for an idea on size and thickness for those that may be wondering.

Also thanks to Chris Burns and our sister site Android Community we have a quick video showing the Galaxy S II accessories that Samsung will be releasing here in the U.S shortly although details on pricing and availability remain unknown. We have a car dock, home dock with additional battery and a desk dock shown in the video below

Galaxy S II accessories hands-on

Wrap-Up

The AT&T Galaxy S II is essentially the same exact SGSII we’ve seen, known, and loved for the past few months. With the same screen size and specs as the international version the only changes are a few to the UI, and the capacitive touch buttons below. Having a winning combination of being thin, light, fast, and affordable the Galaxy S II is a clear winner for the US as well as Europe and outside of the US sales have already passed 10 million globally. With the AT&T version being the closest U.S. Galaxy S II to the original, what more reason do you need to get this amazing smartphone?

Feel free to ask any questions in the comment section below and I’ll be sure to look them over and try to answer them as accurately as possible. More photos of the Galaxy S II can be seen below in the gallery. Look over the pictures, decide if this awesome smartphone is for you, and if so head down to a AT&T store on October 2nd and pick one up for just $199.

I’m going to redirect your attention back to the original announcement post for all the extra specification details you might need that aren’t listed here in the post, just so you know what you’re getting into. See that ginormous pile of lenses? That’s certainly one of the camera’s biggest strengths: versatility. Then there’s the big 3-inch AMOLED display on the back, a hypersonic dust reduction mode for cleaning the sensor, and several completely NEW lenses just for this release including 18-100mm, 16mm, 60mm, and 85mm focal length.

One of the most indicative of power photo comparisons Pozadzides does for his hands-on post is a comparison of chocolate photographed by two different combos. First there’s the Canon 1D Mark IV and a 50mm 1.4 Sigma lens, then the Samsung NX200 with a 60mm 1.4 lens. The first camera is right around $5,000 to purchase, while the NX200 is much closer to $1,000. Then there’s a gallery of photos taken by Pozadzides that shows a whole slew of different lighting conditions, combos, and environments of all sorts.

At this point I should remind you to head back to Pozadzides’ original post to see the rest of his hands-on look at the device since he’s so generously allowed this album to be public, then you should also take a look at our OWN hands-on with the device here, complete with awesomely loud surroundings at IFA 2011:

[via GeekBeat]

We’ve previously experienced this most impressive bright and brilliant technology in the Super AMOLED Plus on the recently released Samsung Infuse 4G and as recently as earlier this week on several new models of the Samsung Galaxy S II as revealed in New York City. Compared to essentially any competitor’s smartphone or tablet display technology, Samsung’s Super AMOLED Plus display ends up being the clear winner as far as clarity and overall abilities in brightness go.

The Samsung Galaxy Tab 7.7 comes in a lovely metal casing with rounded edges for both a high-quality feel and a portability unmatched in the Galaxy Tab lineup thus far (at least as far as Honyecomb tablets go, that is.) This device will be working on your HSPA+ 21 Mbps network carrier for true mobile abilities, you able to access data and internet wherever you go quickly becoming the only way to fly, especially in tablet form. This device is powered by an unnamed 1.4 GHz dual-core processor, it’s display’s resolution sits at 1280 x 800 (WXGA) on a 7.7-inch screen, and its utterly massive 5,100 mAh battery should keep you chugging along for days on end, no problem. Unlike the Samsung Galaxy Tab 10.1, this newest tablet has a microSD card slot into which you can insert up to a 32GB card for memory expansion galore.

You’ll be working with the newest version of Google’s Android mobile operating system Android 3.2 Honeycomb with Samsung’s newest TouchWiz UX user interface working on top of Android to bring you a true Samsung experience. You’ve got full 1080p video playback, DivX included multi codec and Universal Remote Control functionality able to work with your TV, Set top box, DVD player, Blu-ray player, AV audio system, and more!

Like all recent Samsung releases, this device has access to Samsung’s several “Hub” access points for media including Game Hub, Music Hub, Social Hub, and Readers Hub. The newest of these is the Game Hub, the Galaxy Tab 7.7 being the first Samsung device to come with it out of the box, it containing social games, all the social games your heart could possibly desire. Finally there’s Voice and Video support – speak directly to your tablet in a video chat for clear video and voice or set your device for Receiver Mode for a more private talk.

Follow along with us LIVE for the rest of the Samsung Unpacked event at IFA 2011 for total coverage of every Samsung device we’ll be marveling over for weeks and months to come!

Intertek tested the screens for color accuracy using a spectrophotometer that measured color temperature against standardized display color. The winner in the test was the 4.5-inch AH-IPS screen with three times more color accuracy than the Super AMOLED. The two screens were also tested for power consumption. The AH-IPS screen was found to consume 624mW of power compared to consumption of as much as 1,130mw for the 4.3-inch AMOLED.

That means that the AH-IPS screens are more power efficient than the AMOLED screens. The power consumption was tested at 600 nits brightness. The 4.5-inch AH-IPS screen that was tested is set to hit the market in the second half of 2011. I wonder if this is the screen the next iPhone will use.

[via OLED-Display]

The sensors are being ordered from Chunghwa Picture Tubes and other Taiwanese sources. The shipments of the sensors are said to start in the second half of the year. While the sensors are set to be used in 4-inch AMOLED screens Samsung is also ramping up to produce 7-inch AMOLED or possibly Super-AMOLED screens on its own 5.5G line in the second half of the year.

Samsung showed off a prototype AMOLED at FPD-International 2010 with a resolution of 1024 x 600. Samsung has stated that it wants better resolution than that prototype could muster leading to suspicion that the screen that enters producing in the second half of this year will be a Super-AMOLED. These stories point to some new gear coming later hits year or in 2012. Samsung leans on Android a lot so any new smartphone or tablet would likely be running the Google Android OS.

[via Android Community]

However, Samsung also envisages the flexible AMOLED technology being applied to smaller devices, like watches, and larger ones, like tablets and MIDs; there’s also the potential for lighting and other applications around the home and office. The screens use a polyimide plastic substrate rather than the more traditional glass substrate, which allows them to be furled around a 2cm diameter cylinder.

Since they use AMOLED technology, power consumption is lower and there’s no tricky backlight to handle. Samsung is even going so far as to describe the displays as “unbreakable” though that seems like a promise almost guaranteed to backfire.

More recently, Samsung showed off a prototype foldable AMOLED display with no seam that could be used to make a reasonably-sized tablet that collapses down to something little larger than a phone. However, it’s unclear when this panel will go into production.

[via OLED-Display]

It’s not just backlight units, either. Samsung’s new 5.5G AMOLED production line may have opened early but its potential output still falls well short of the sort of quantities Apple would require for the iPad 3. Initially, the first production stage will produce 24,000 substrates monthly, and while second and third lines are expected to increase that figure, it would still be an insurmountable bottleneck.

Nonetheless, while the iPad 3 – which is now expected to arrive in early 2012 – may not get Super AMOLED, that doesn’t mean Apple isn’t looking ahead to possibly using the technology down the line. The company is rumored to have made a $3.9bn investment in securing display supplies for the future, as part of its attempt to keep incoming Apple hardware competitively priced.

The production has commenced at the plant two months earlier than expected. The production line will be focusing on small and medium-size panels and there are plans to open two other 5.5G production lines too. The first production stage will spit out 24,000 gen 5.5 substrates monthly. The glass substrate size on the new 5.5g line will be 1300 x 1500mm compared to the 4.5g line producing a substrate of 730 x 920mm.

The new plant coming online means that Samsung is also hiring more employees for the facility. Samsung will hire 3,000 new workers. The construction of the plant began last June. Samsung claims that the new plant will help it to reduce costs and increase its productivity and competitiveness on the market globally.

[via OLED-Display]

At that meeting, the sources suggest, Cook offered Samsung Display an advance to secure AMOLED panels for the third-gen iPad. If true, that would mark a transition for the tablet from LCD panels – with LG Display the primary supplier – to the rival technology.

However, it’s not all clear cut. A Samsung Mobile Display spokesperson said “he had not heard of such discussions with Apple” while the company is believed to have seen its AMOLED production timetable set back by the Japanese earthquake. Samsung has previously said that it has no plans to use its Super AMOLED or Super AMOLED Plus displays in tablets of its own this year.

Production at Samsung’s 5.5Gen facility is expected to hit 48,000 substrates per month, rising to 100,000 in the first half of 2012. If the rumors regarding Apple’s intent are true, that suggests it won’t be until next year that Samsung could likely meet the demand for the iPad 3. Supplies of the iPad 2 have been constrained since its commercial release, with LG Display’s inability to meet panel demand cited as a key cause, and only now is the situation believed to be alleviating.

Earlier this week, a judge ruled that Samsung must hand over various Galaxy tablets and phones – some of which unreleased – to Apple’s legal team for examination. It seems they might not be the only samples the company is providing Cupertino, though under far more agreeable circumstances.

[via OLED-Info]

There’s gold and silver awards in each of the following three categories: Display of the Year, Display Application of the Year, and Display Component of the Year. The first two categories had the same two manufacturers in first and second, Apple and Samsung. Samsung is more than likely crying and stomping their feet because everyone knows that their AMOLED displays are wild and they’re gunning for the top. That said, here’s the results:

Display of the Year
Gold Award: Apple iPhone 4 Retina Display
Silver Award: Samsung Mobile Display On-cell Touch AMOLED

Oh my goodness what a battle that was! Those winners and every other winner is explained in a bit more detail in the press release below. Continuing on with the Display Application of the Year, it’s again Apple and Samsung in the first and second place. Whether or not Apple is pumping their first for their winning iPad entry is anyone’s guess – Samsung on the other hand just can’t seem to win enough awards for it’s undeniable Galaxy S line of Android phones.

Display Application of the Year
Gold Award: Apple iPad
Silver Award: Samsung Galaxy S Mobile Smartphones

Finally, the oddity. Display Component of the year is the sweet category where real odd and awesome innovation is really high-fived the most. It’s here that Apple and Samsung don’t even show up, much less get first and second. E Ink Triton Color ePaper and some flexible substrate for displays from ITRI are the big Gold and Silver. Flexibility in ePaper – a combination that cannot be beat save for by the real thing. No more dead trees!

Display Component of the Year
Gold Award: E Ink Triton™ Color ePaper Display
Silver Award: ITRI Flexible Substrate for Displays

Do you think these are the best choices for each of the gold belt titles? Which display did you like best in 2010? How about thus far in 2011? Let us know, let’s talk!

Check out the full press release for all the extra details:

SOCIETY FOR INFORMATION DISPLAY NAMES PRODUCTS CHOSEN FOR 2011 DISPLAY OF THE YEAR AWARDS

Apple, E Ink, ITRI and Samsung Top Field in Remarkable Year for Display Innovation

CAMPBELL, Calif., May 17, 2011— (Virtual Press Office) – The Society for Information Display (SID), the leading global organization dedicated to the advancement of electronic display technology, today announced its selections for the 2011 Display of the Year Awards (DYAs). The prestigious annual awards honor the products judged by the international DYA committee to exhibit the greatest degree of technical innovation, commercial significance and likely social impact, among other factors. This year’s winners comprise myriad breakthrough developments, and given the preponderance of mobile/handheld technologies, DYA 2011 could easily be subtitled the “Up Close and Personal” awards.

Bob Melcher, chairman of the SID Display of the Year Awards committee, noted, “This list of 2011 DYA award winners honors innovations that are continuing to make interactions with handheld communication and computing devices more exciting, intuitive and useful than ever before. They demonstrate the remarkable contributions made by the display industry to broaden and enhance the lives of people.”

The six products chosen—two each for Display, Display Component and Display Application of the Year—will be honored during Display Week 2011, being held this week at the Los Angeles Convention Center. The Gold Award-winning company in each category will screen a short video on its winning product during the awards ceremony at the annual SID luncheon on Wednesday, May 18.

A brief description of each of the winning products is provided below. In-depth descriptions of the award winners can be found in the Display Week 2011 Show Issue of Information Display magazine.

Display of the Year

Gold Award: Apple iPhone 4 Retina Display
This year, Apple extended its track record of revolutionizing personal communications technology with the introduction of the industry-leading iPhone 4 Retina display. Packing four times the number of pixels into the same 3.5-in. dia. screen found on earlier iPhone models, the 640×960-pixel Retina display set a new benchmark for mobile display resolution, low power consumption and image quality. Utilizing Mobile IPS (in-plane switching) technology, the iPhone 4 Retina display achieves a viewing angle superior to conventional mobile LCDs, providing an enhanced viewing experience for the end user in virtually any application. The display features a host of technical advancements: customized LTPS TFT backplane with organic passivation and optimized pixel design; user-customizable, auto-adjustable brightness using ambient light sensing; advanced IPS compensation polarizer technology for high contrast (800:1) and color consistency regardless of viewing direction; 8-bit color depth; an ultra-thin, tiny-footprint driver IC; and patent-pending mechanical integration.

Silver Award: Samsung Mobile Display On-cell Touch AMOLED
Samsung Mobile Display developed its OCTA – on-cell touch active-matrix light-emitting diode (AMOLED) – display to meet the ever-increasing performance and industrial design demands of today’s modern mobile devices. Unlike prior-generation touch-capable mobile displays, the OCTA display integrates the touch sensor onto the display itself, rather than fabricating the sensor on a separate glass substrate and then laminating it onto the display. This innovation, embodied in the OCTA’s projected capacitive touch detection technology, greatly reduces product weight and thickness, while increasing touch performance and response via the multi-sensor input capability that enables gesture recognition for the most advanced mobile devices. Moreover, because AMOLEDs are self-emissive, no backlight is required, allowing the Samsung OCTA display to deliver very high performance and exceptional display quality, with highly accurate and sensitivity-optimized touch input, in a module that is less than 2 mm thick and provides nearly 100-percent light transmission and exceptional outdoor visibility.

Display Application of the Year

Gold Award: Apple iPad
The iPad marks a new era of tablet computing, transforming the way people communicate, consume and create content, play games and learn. The iPad LCD’s Mobile IPS technology combines with its innovative Multi-Touch user interface and unique system design to enable the iPad’s versatility in numerous applications. The iPad display provides a superior viewing experience with a minimized gamma shift over viewing angles, enabling designers to create innovative apps that further enhance the viewing experience. The iPad’s fully customized design leverages the existing amorphous silicon thin-film transistor (a-Si TFT) infrastructure in an innovative, ultra-thin product with the unique LCD and an innovative power-management system that achieves maximum power efficiency – 10 hours of battery life for WiFi web surfing and 9 hours for 3G web surfing.

Silver Award: Samsung Galaxy S Mobile Smartphones
In June 2010, Samsung Mobile launched its first-ever premium portfolio of smartphones – the first-ever premium smartphone suite to be simultaneously unveiled by all four major U.S. mobile carriers. The Galaxy S lineup provides a premium viewing experience with a brilliant 4-inch display powered by Samsung’s Super AMOLED touch-screen technology, which yields thinner displays to enable some of the industry’s thinnest, most responsive, full-featured smartphones. Created to be an ideal medium for viewing premium entertainment content, the Samsung Galaxy S phones tap into Samsung’s own content service, Samsung Media Hub, optimized for the best viewing and audio experience based on device screen size, screen type, video resolution, memory type, processor and sound profile. The next-generation Super AMOLED Plus adds RealStripe screen technology and a greatly increased sub-pixel count – 50 percent more sub-pixels than the original Super AMOLED – complementing the mechanics of the human eye to ensure images look clearer and more detailed than ever before.

Display Component of the Year

Gold Award: E Ink Triton™ Color ePaper Display
E Ink Triton™ is a color electronic paper display, which delivers the same great paper-like reading experience adopted by eReader devices around the world, but now with the added capability of color. Triton delivers the same high-contrast, sunlight-readable, low-power performance as the black and white E Ink Pearl™ product. The addition of color enhances the reading experience to better address the needs of ePublishing markets, including eBooks, eNewspapers, eMagazines and eTextbooks, as well as electronic signage. Triton adds a color filter array (CFA) over a black and white electrophoretic display (EPD) film. Each pixel in the CFA consists of four sub-pixels; red, green, blue and white. This arrangement creates a low-power EPD display with thousands of colors that is highly readable in direct sunlight yet does not sacrifice the black and white reading experience. In addition to color, E Ink Triton delivers 20 percent faster page update times compared to previous technologies.

Silver Award: ITRI Flexible Substrate for Displays
ITRI has developed an innovative flexible substrate for displays of all sizes. Compatible with existing TFT infrastructures and processes, the ITRI flexible substrate is a novel inorganic dominated silica/polyimide (PI) hybrid film whose silica content can be increased to as high as 60 percent of the total weight, making it highly suitable for the fabrication of flexible displays. The ITRI flexible substrate can be manufactured with either batch-type or roll-to-roll (R2R) processes. For batch-type processes, the substrate is prepared by coating the PI solution on glass carriers, and then fabricating TFT devices on the substrates. The PI/silica film exhibits excellent adhesion with silicon dioxide, silicon nitride and indium-tin-oxide without requiring any other primer or surface treatment process. For R2R processes, the ITRI substrate can be made with a variety of attractive properties, such as a low coefficient of thermal energy (CTE) of 20 ppm/ºC, high transmittance (around 90 percent, within the wavelength range of 400 to 700 nm) and excellent flexibility. To date, a flexible color filter, an active-matrix electrophoretic display (AM-EPD) and a flexible touch film have been made on the ITRI flexible substrate.

Samsung has announced the development of a very cool AMOLED screen that is foldable and has no seam in the screen. This is the best of both worlds. You get a single larger screen for your content and still get the smaller profile device that is more portable. The new seamless folding screen is also touch compatible. Samsung did note according to OLED-info that while most research is going into AMOLED screens that can bend and are flexible, this foldable screen has promise for portable form factor devices.

The display uses two AMOLED panels, silicone rubber, and a glass cover along with a modular case. The prototype screen was folded 100,000 times in testing and the brightness at the center of the device where the two screens meet was only reduced by 6%. Samsung has shown off something similar to this as far back as 2008. The video below is that 2008 demo and you can clearly see the seam of the displays. The new screen won’t have that seam.

[via OLED-info]

The new plant was expected to come on line this year, producing 7-inch and larger AMOLED panels as well as smaller screens for PMPs and smartphones. However, component delays resulting from the Japanese earthquake added what Samsung estimated could be up to three months to the roadmap; similar shortages have impacted Samsung’s chip production.

Samsung demonstrated a 7-inch Super AMOLED tablet prototype back in November 2010, only weeks after the original model – with an LCD display – went on sale through US carriers. The company initially expected production in 2011 to be 10x that of the previous year.

[via OLED-Info]

The LCD displays made by Sharp will feature a low-temperature poly-silicon technology, which will allow for a lighter and thinner display that will also consume less energy. These p-Si LCDs have thin film transistors (TFT) made of polycristalline silicon. Through this method, display drivers are mounted directly onto the glass substrate, thus reducing the TFT layer and making a thinner display. The p-Si display also has a higher aperture ratio that produces more vivid images, enhances durability, and reduces the amount of connecting pins.

This report is interesting because it suggests that Apple is not considering the organic LED displays such as the ones used by Samsung with their Super AMOLED technology. This news also comes just after Apple and Samsung’s legal battle began between their competing smartphone and tablet devices. Perhaps Apple is trying to shift away from Samsung as a main components suppler?

[via AppleInsider]

That could mean that replacements to the T-Mobile G2x and other recent LG handsets might switch to AMOLED panels. The displays used in Nokia’s recent Symbian smartphones have arguably been the best thing about the devices, with the so-called “Clear Black” technology on the E7 and other handsets providing excellent viewing angles and vividly-saturated colors.

LG Display will begin its 8-Gen OLED fab ramp-up – producing OLED TV panels – perhaps as early as mid-2013, having begun testing the technology later this year.

[via OLED-Info]

“If the situation lasts long, operation schedules would have to be changed. Analysts say operations of Japanese equipment plants could be suspended for one month at the shortest to three months at the longest, if the quake effects remain longer” Samsung Mobile Display spokesperson

The problems are also impacting chip production at Samsung Electronics, who have seen vital components in the manufacturing process – such as CVD (chemical vapor deposition) hardware used to produce thin films – become unavailable since they are produced in Japan. As well as infrastructure issues, Japanese manufacturers are also dealing with temperamental power supplies.

No exact Samsung chips have been named as affected by the delays, though the Giheung plant is known to provide large numbers of Apple A4 processors along with Samsung’s own Hummingbird variant. 50-percent of the Giheung plant’s 40,000 chip-sheets per month are believed to go direct to Apple.

[via OLED-Display]

The concept images we got show two concealed OLED screens, one of them paired with a touchpad. For solar lovers out there, the design includes an integrated solar charging panel on the back of the handset. Joseph also shows a rendering that suggests what seems like a primarily gesture based UI. The touchpad area is a slight concave depression that contains another AMOLED screen. We don’t know why he decided to have a partial touchpad and separate screen when most devices these days seem to be gravitating after the iPhone’s basic design. He claims that the solar charging system will charge the battery to 80% of full capacity. We’re looking forward to seeing this design, and others from Mr. Lee in the future.

Check out our other articles on concept designs here.

[via Concept Phones]

Update: Video after the cut

Both are monochrome, with the AMOLED delivering more than 15,000 cd/m2 brightness. Now, while those specs may not be much in the grand scheme of displays, the Fraunhofer panel can do something no Samsung Super AMOLED Plus screen can: interspersed between the AMOLED pixels are the CMOS photoreceptors, meaning – as in the image above – the panel can both see and display objects simultaneously.

Fraunhofer has previously suggested that the bi-directional OLED panels could be used in futuristic wearable displays, like in the mockup below. However, it could also mean your cellphone screen could scan business cards (the OLED panel acting momentarily as a scanner light source). VGA and higher resolution displays and smaller chip sizes are currently under development.

[via OLED-Info; video via OLED-Display]

That’s down in no small part to the JetEffect 3.0 and BBE+ processing, tuned by Cowon’s own CEO Namkyu Park, aka “Golden Ears”. There’s also an integrated speaker, accelerometer, FM radio (with recording functionality) and a microSD card slot, along with a T-DMB tuner.

Pricing at Advanced MP3 Players is 8GB for £219, 16GB for £239 or 32GB for £279; US shoppers can pick up the 32GB version through Amazon for $369.99. More details on specs here.

Samsung Mobile Display will be on hand at next year’s Consumer Electronics Show, where they will be showing off the world’s first large transparent AMOLED display, which the company says is being produced to work in either TVs, or PC monitors. Samsung is proud of the technology therein, as it doesn’t matter whether the display is turned on or off — it will retain 30% transparency. That’s compared to the standard 10 percent transparency in other units, from other companies.

Samsung also says that the transparent AMOLED they plan on showing off will have the highest resolution of any transparent AMOLED display so far, at least on displays that are 19-inches or larger. The technology could be used for people to surf the Internet and watch TV in a whole new way, or even display images on other objects, like the back of a seat in a car. And, if that’s not enough, Samsung will also be showing off a 14-inch version of the same technology, which they plan on using for notebook displays.

[via OLED-Display; thanks, Erik!]

And what is this wild new thing called i-Function? The i-Function lens is a brand new easy way to control your camera. Right now you’ve got to wrap your hand around the lens while you hold the camera – since this hand is already being used to adjust settings, the i-Function system adds a button built-in to the i-Function lens, allowing the user to adjust their settings without taking their camera off-target. Should be fun to see how that works out. The i-Function button activates shooting controls such as aperture, shutter speed, ISO, and white balance.

The camera features a simple to use panorama mode, has the best-in-class APS-C sensor – larger than Micro 4/3, this sensor creates fabulous images with total simplicity (plus allows videos to be recorded with a shallow depth of field for sweet results.) Built-in flash and electronic VGA (640×480) viewfinder, 3.0″ AMOLED LCD screen, reduced glare, enhanced color reproduction, 720p HD recording, and a whole lot more. Take a peek at the full specs in the press release below:

Samsung Launches the NX11: the Latest NX System Camera and Lens Line Up
Create high quality images with the camera’s easy-to-use i-Function lens

Ridgefield Park, New Jersey – December 28, 2010 – Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd, a global leader in digital media and digital convergence technologies, today announced the launch of the NX11 – the latest addition to the highly successful NX family of cameras. The NX11 contains a feature set similar to Samsung’s first mirrorless interchangeable lens camera, the NX10, however the NX11 is also compatible with the new i-Function lens that was introduced for the NX100. The NX11 will come complete with an 18-55mm i-Function lens, as well as two new i-Function lenses, a 20mm pancake and a 20-50mm zoom silver color lens. The launch reinforces the company’s commitment to leading innovation in the compact system camera market.

The i-Function lens puts the perfect picture at the fingertips of all photographers by providing an exceptionally easy way of controlling the camera. Since a typical camera user wraps their hand around the lens when holding the camera, the new i-Function system allows photographers to naturally use their left hand to change the camera’s advanced settings via a button built into the i-Function lens, without needing to take the camera off the target. Users can toggle between shutter speed, aperture, EV, WB, and ISO quickly and easily by simply using the i-Function button or ring on the lens, meaning easier and quicker configurations while shooting.

The NX11 also focuses on usability, with a change in the grip design to make shooting easier and more comfortable for users. Additionally, the NX11 has a lens priority mode dial, simplifying the search for the best mode for each lens. The camera also includes a convenient, one-touch i-Function button that activates common shooting controls like aperture, shutter speed, ISO and white balance, meaning easier and quicker configuration while shooting. The camera makes taking great landscape scenes or pictures of large groups simple by featuring a panorama mode, which allows the user to take panoramic pictures in one press-and-sweep motion. As with the NX10, the NX11 uses the best-in-class APS-C sensor for better image quality. The APS-C sensor is larger than Micro 4/3 and delivers high quality images with ease.

“Today’s launch is important for Samsung in reinforcing our position as a leading innovator in the digital camera market and for showing our innovation in the compact system camera market,” said Mr. Hyunho Chung, Executive Vice President and Head of the Digital Imaging Business, Samsung Electronics. “The NX11, while offering the best features of the NX10, has an upgraded design and the additional i-Function capability with more lenses. The launch of our next offering in the NX range also demonstrates our commitment to our customers, by producing user driven innovation in the form of easy-to-use functions and upgraded customization.”

Alongside the built-in flash and built-in electronic VGA (640×480) viewfinder, the NX11 has a 3.0” AMOLED LCD screen. The AMOLED screen reduces the glare from sunlight so that consumers can see their images under any lighting conditions. The user can also get a more vivid, clearer image through enhanced color reproduction. The NX11 provides high quality video with 720p HD recording, and its large APS-C sensor allows the videos to be recorded with shallow depth of field, providing effects similar to those in motion picture movies.

Specifications Sheet
*Specifications are subject to change without prior notice.

NX11

Image Sensor
23.4×15.6mm
CMOS
Approx. 14.6 Megapixels

Lens
Samsung NX Mount
Samsung Lenses for Samsung NX Mount

Image Stabilization
Lens Shift (depends on Lens)

Dimensions and weight
123 x 87 x 39.8mm (excluding the projecting part)
353g (without battery and card)

Additional features
Super sonic drive
3.0” AMOLED
EVF VGA (640×480) 921k dots equiv.
Multi : Normal 15points, Close Up 35points
Face Detection : Max. 10faces
Electronically controlled vertical-run focal plane shutter
Metering : Multi, Center-weighted, Spot
TTL Auto Pop-up flash
Smart Flash, Auto, Auto + Red-eye reduction,
28mm wide-angle coverage (Equivalent to 35mm)
Samsung External Flash available (SEF-42A, SEF-20A, SEF15A : Optional)
Hot Shoe
Smart Auto, Lens Priority, Program, Shutter Priority AE, Aperture Priority AE, Manual, Sound Picture, Panorama, Scene, Movie
Beauty shot, Children, Close Up, Text, Sunset, Dawn, Backlight, Fireworks, Beach & Snow, Night, Portrait, Landscape, Sports
RAW : 14M (4592×3056)
Super fine , Fine, Normal
High Definition Movie Recording with MP4 (H.264)
Frame rate – 30fps

Price
$649 (with bundle zoom lens)

Availability
February

SAMSUNG 20-50mm Black, Silver

Category
　
Lens N me
SAMSUNG 20-50mm F3.5-5.6 ED Black/Silver

Focal Length
20 – 50mm (equivalent to 30.8-77mm in 35mm format)

Elements in Groups
9 elements in 8 groups (1 Aspherical lens, 1 Extra-low Dispersion lens)

Angle of View
70.2°- 31.4°

Aperture
F3.5 – 5.6 (Min. F22), (Number of Blades : 7 , Circular Aperture Diaphragm)

Mount Type
Samsung NX Mount

Optical Image Stabilizer
No

Minimum Focus Distance
0.28m

Maximum Magnification
Approx.0.22X

i Scene
Beauty, Portrait, Children, Backlight, Landscape, Sunset, Dawn, Beach&Snow, Night

Lens Hood
No

Filter Size
40.5mm

Max. Diameter x Length
64 x 39.8mm

Weight
Approx. 119g (without hood)

Operating Temperature
0 ~ 40°C

Operating Humidity
5 ~ 85%

Special features
i-Function

World’s first under 40mm length
SAMSUNG 20mm Black, Silver
Category

Lens Name
SAMSUNG 20mm F2.8 Black/Silver

Focal Length
30mm (equivalent to 30.8mm in 35mm format)

Elements in Groups
6 elements in 4 groups (1 Aspherical
lens

Angle of View
70.2°

Aperture
F2.8 (Min. F22), (Number of Blades : 7 , Circular Aperture Diaphragm)

Mount Type
Samsung NX Mount

Optical Image Stabilizer
No

Minimum Focus Distance
0.17m

Maximum Magnification
Approx. 0.18X

i Scene
Night, Landscape, Sunset, Dawn, Backlight, Beach&Snow

Lens Hood
No

Filter Size
43mm

Max. Diameter x Length
62.2 x 24.5mm

Weight
Approx. 89g (without hood)

Operating Temperature
0 ~ 40°C

Operating Humidity
5 ~ 85%

Special features
i-Function

Minimum focus distance (0.17m)

SAMSUNG 18-55mm i-Function

Lens Name
SAMSUNG 18-55mm F3.5-5.6 OIS i-Function

Focal Length
18 – 55mm (equivalent to 27.7-84.7mm in 35mm format)

Elements in Groups
12 elements in 9 groups (1 Aspherical lens)

Angle
f View
75.9°- 28.7°

Aperture
F3.5 – 5.6 (Min. F22), (Number of Blades : 7 , Circular Aperture Diaphragm)

Mount Type
Samsung NX Mount

Optical Image Stabilizer
Yes

Minimum Focus Distance
0.28m

Maximum Magnification
Approx. 0.22X

Lens Hood
Included

Filter Size
58mm

Max. Diameter x Length
63 x 65.1mm

Weight
Approx. 198g (without hood)

Operating Temperature
0 ~ 40°C

Operating Humidity
5 ~ 85%

About Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd
Samsung Electronics Co., Ltd. is a global leader in semiconductor, telecommunication, digital media and digital convergence technologies with 2009 consolidated sales of US$116.8 billion. Employing approximately 174,000 people in 193 offices across 66 countries, the company consists of eight independently operated business units: Visual Display, Mobile Communications, Telecommunication Systems, Digital Appliances, IT Solutions, Digital Imaging, Semiconductor and LCD. Recognized as one of the fastest growing global brands, Samsung Electronics is a leading producer of digital TVs, memory chips, mobile phones and TFT-LCDs. For more information, please visit HYPERLINK “http://www.samsung.com”www.samsung.com.

In fact, there’s a lot of tech you’d usually expected to find in a phone inside the D3, like an accelerometer and vibration feedback. There’s also a microSD card slot – augmenting 8GB, 16GB or 32GB of onboard storage – along with HDMI and USB 2.0 connectivity. It doesn’t look like Android Market access is included, but Cowon does throw in a Twitter and social networking app.

As you’d expect from Cowon, the list of supported file-types and codecs is huge, and includes 1080p Full HD support. No word on pricing at this stage, but audiophiles looking for an iPod touch alternative might find something here worth waiting for.

[via OLED-Display]

In fact the spec sheet is impressive all round, with only the dual-LED flash – rather than Xenon – being a low point. It’ll supposedly record stereo audio and support auto-focus and macro shots, while there’s an optional WiFi-enabled microSD card for throwing wireless into the mixture as well. That memory card slot boosts the 4GB of onboard storage.

It’s ambitious stuff, and we can’t help but suspect that the Poco Pro is trying to do too much at once. A 14-megapixel CMOS sensor of the small size required to fit into a 85.6 x 54 x 5 mm casing is probably not going to be great at dealing with normal lighting, and the £200 price tag seems over-ambitious. Iain Sinclair is taking £100 ($154) deposits on the first units now, but we’ll wait until the reviews come through before getting over-excited.

[via Gizmag]

Some of the interesting finds iFixit uncovers are on the motherboard: Skyworks SKY77529 Tx Front-End Module for Dual-Band GSM / GPRS / EDGE, SanDisk SDIN4C2 16GB MLC NAND flash, Samsung KB100D00WM-A453 memory package and S5PC110A01 1GHz Cortex A8 Hummingbird Processor (duh, but look at all those extra numbers and letters!), Infineon 8824 XG616 X-Gold baseband processor, Wolfson Microelectronics WM8994 ultra-low power audio codec. Lost yet?

They speak of the smile-screen as well. Smile-screen because it’s curved. They mention that Google saying this phone has a “curved glass screen” might be misleading, some people believing that meant it was a curved Super AMOLED screen, which it isn’t. As you can see in the photo they took above, the front glass panel is definitely curved, while the rest of the components are as flat as the board. They mention also that the LCD is fused to the front glass panel, making it a bit more difficult to repair should the front panel ever be shattered. Watch out for phone crushers.

[Via iFixit]

What you don’t get is the Venue Pro’s slide-out QWERTY keyboard, with the Dell Venue instead relying solely on its touchscreen for text-entry. An FCC filing for the Dell Venue was spotted back in late October, complete with GSM/EDGE/UMTS/HSPA support, though the full specifications of the handset aren’t yet known.

In Korea, the Venue will be priced at around 700,000 won ($608). No word on a US or European launch, but we’re guessing it won’t be long before Dell brings the Venue to closer shores.

At least, if this new report from DigiTimes pans out. According to them, Coretronic will be the main supplier of the second generation iPad’s Back Light Units, or BLUs. What that means, is that there won’t be any AMOLED displays in the iPad 2, as AMOLED doesn’t require any back lighting.

Furthermore, it’s already been suggested that Chimei Innolux and LG have been chosen to crank out the LCD displays for the iPad 2. This news about the supplier for BLUs just drives home the potential fact that the next version of the iPad will feature an LCD panel. That does still leave some room for that whole Retina Display rumor, though.

[via DigiTimes]

R3 Media Network

SlashPhone
Swype Beta for Android Gets A New Update
CyanogenMod 6.1 Now Available For Update
White iPhone 4 to be Launched in Spring 2011?
Windows Phone 7 Gets Cut and Paste

Android Community
Nexus S Review and Rundown by TechCrunch
Nexus One Owners: Have You Received Gingerbread Yet? [Update: Not for a Few Weeks]
Android 2.3 SDK Officially Released
Samsung W899 is twin Super AMOLED touchscreen clamshell
Google eBookstore launches with new eBook Reader for Android
ZDNet outlines the top Android phones
Big day for Android today says Notion Ink, NFC suspected
NOOKcolor Android 2.2 Froyo hack revealed [Video]
DK28 Froyo Test Build for Epic 4G

SlashGear
Nexus One Gingerbread OTA Update Due in a Few Weeks
BenQ DV S11 Camcorder Breaks Cover, Features Pico Projector Built-In
A Cartoonish Way to Prevent Cruelty
Google Nexus S official [FEATURED]
Acer Aspire 5745DG [REVIEW]
Sprint Network Vision will combine 3G/4G base-stations, boost voice/data/PTT
Verizon may pay Apple to lock out T-Mobile/Sprint iPhone tips analyst
Tony Hawk rides 630hp V8-powered skateboard
AT&T worst US carrier claims Consumer Reports
Low-bandwidth Skype custom app created for UN Refugee aid workers [Video]
FedEx expects to ship 16 million packages on December 13
Rear view cameras to become standard on just about all Ford cars
Verizon announces the first cities to get LTE service
Chinese netbook rips off Dell duo and Sony Vaio P
December 13 may be launch day for Mac App Store
World’s largest floating Christmas tree on display in Rio de Janeiro
New Facebook profile: Switching is super-simple
Cyber Monday was big, rest of week softened
OnLive and Vizio planning Netflix rival services tip insiders
$25 iPhone 4 at Radio Shack after discount & trade-in deals
AOL considers Yahoo! deal after potentially ditching dial-up
T-Mobile Galaxy Tab unlimited messaging restored after websales glitch
Apple credit card secrecy driving magazine publishers away
“Apple City” campus plans tip Norman Foster as designer
Facebook Profile Changes Rolled Out Today
Parrot AR.Drone [REVIEW]
Which is better: Short or long video games? [COLUMN]

To see more wrap-up posts, follow the following tags: [The Daily Slash] or [SlashGear Morning Wrap-up]

Samsung is starting to show that, here in the near future, one market they will be focusing on is going to be the foldable and flexible. Especially when it comes to consumer electronics. They took some time out of their busy schedule to showcase what they believe the next stage of home entertainment will look like. Their idea, is that you should be able to enjoy your 3D entertainment wherever you are in the living room, thanks to your TV being folded in a particular way.

Samsung is also going to push for their future-tech 3DTVs to range in sizes, so you don’t just have to enjoy it in your living room. We don’t see this happening in the next year or so, but we do see Samsung having a lot of cool things to show off in the next few years. We can certainly hope we’ve got some foldable, flexible TVs to look forward to in the future.

[via OLED-Display; thanks, Erik!]

DigiTimes reports that makers in Japan, Taiwan, and Korea are all actively developing the AMOLED online market with more capacity. Samsung Mobile Display is one of the firms that is building capacity and will account for 90% of the total AMOLED panel market in 2010. SMD is set to start building panels at its new 5.5G plan.

Taiwanese AMOLED makers like AU Optronics will take some of the current market share from SMD according to DigiTimes with AMOLED screens coming from pair of 3.5G factories and a 4.5G factory. AU Optronics may also move another of its 4G plants or even one of the 6G plants over to AMOLED production in the near future to increase production capacity. More capacity is a good thing since it means more screens, less shortages, and lower prices.

At that point, Samsung’s current output of around 3m small-size AMOLED displays per month will increase exponentially to 30m such panels, vastly increasing supply and hopefully preventing the sort of shortages we saw earlier in 2010. Then, manufacturers like HTC were forced to switch to alternative technologies for their smartphone screens, such as Sony’s Super LCD, when AMOLED was scarce.

Samsung is crediting the Galaxy S and its stable of US variants for helping drive Super AMOLED demand and awareness. The company recently showed off a new, 7-inch panel using the technology, and which is expected to make it inside a refreshed Galaxy Tab in 2011.

[via OLED-Display]

Unfortunately there are no details beyond that, nor any photos of the handset. Verizon’s version of the Samsung Galaxy S, the Verizon Fascinate, is model SCH-i500, so there’s speculation that this Samsung Stealth V could be a successor to that device or a companion scaled to take on the HTC Desire HD.

[via Android Community and via GSMArena]