Apple's iPad Air Adopts IGZO Technology for Thinner, Lower-Power Displays

[Meandmunch]

As impressive as all that reduction was I still wish they could get rid of that 1-2 millimeter gap of air between the glass and the screen itself. Look into the corners of your iPad screen and you will see what I am talking about. It is also this gap that produces the fairly hollow sound when tapping your screen gently with your fingernail. The display should be somehow laminated or brought right up to the glass, to truly "touch" the images on display.

 

[NorEaster]

Grabbing concepts and putting huge amount of R&D to make it work is inventing something to me...

Sure...I'll agree with that. I agree that the original iPhone was innovative; it provided the right combination of existing touch screen technology inside a great form factor with appropriate and user-friendly software.

But sticking an IGZO screen into an iPad is not innovative. Merely putting a new component (that wasn't invented by Apple itself) into one of its devices doesn't reflect innovation.

 

[buysp]

Is your body ready?
Mine is

 

[Brittany246]

I remember seeing someone complain a few days ago that the iPad Air didn't have an IGZO screen. Funny.

 

[MYB]

I can't tell a difference whatsoever and I've had a 3 and 4 iPad

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Sounds like you're the problem and not Apple.

I have an iPad 3. Text looks better on my iPad Air, but, in Clash of Clans, my village looks sharper on the iPad 3. IDK why it is so, but the iPad 3 is definitely more detailed in a side by side comparison.

 

[BvizioN]

True, but they could have at least announced it at the keynote, since "regular" apple users don't watch the keynote.......just saying....

While you are right about regular user not watching the keynote, you are wrong if you think what Apple says on keynote won't reach the regular user. All them journalists at keynote will be feeding the public through blogs and papers right from the keynote.

 

[paul4339]

from what I've read, LTPS has a higher leakage current than IGZO - which means it has to be refreshed more frequently to prevent flickering (...the opposite, with IGZO it's possible to skip drive cycles). Maybe it doesn't make a difference (I don't know), but there are some advantages in IGZO as well as it's less expensive at this time.

 

[Sharkey311]

I have an iPad 3. Text looks better on my iPad Air, but, in Clash of Clans, my village looks sharper on the iPad 3. IDK why it is so, but the iPad 3 is definitely more detailed in a side by side comparison.

Perhaps devs will push an update out to fix it?

 

[Nozuka]

I had my heart set on IGZO so when they announced the Air and said nothing about it, I was so pissed off at Apple for not having used this technology. I came very close to not buying the iPad and waiting until the next gen with IGZO came out.

you do realize how crazy that is, right?
its still the same device with the same batterylife, just like before this annoucement. but now that you know its IGZO, its somehow better?

 

[Mickyjames]

Apple's iPad Air Adopts IGZO Technology for Thinner

This is very interesting products i really like this wow...

 

[Solomani]

Incoming lighter Macbook Air... because pounds is far too heavy.

Macbook Vacuum? Macbook Anoxia?

 

[osx11]

While you are right about regular user not watching the keynote, you are wrong if you think what Apple says on keynote won't reach the regular user. All them journalists at keynote will be feeding the public through blogs and papers right from the keynote.

Year but the regular user doesn't care about PCIe-based flash....yet they mentioned that a lot......

 

[zedsdead]

I did a side by side with my iPad 3, and the Airs screen is slightly less bright at full brightness with slightly worse viewing angles also.

Not a huge difference, but definitively worse.

 

[Tech198]

even though the iPad Air is the same 2048x1536.

Most of the Air is consumed by the battery..... I fail to see how see this.

lamernation ? oh great... just make the repair score go from 1 to 0.. Apple likes to control their own products, despite YOU bought them..

 

[BvizioN]

Year but the regular user doesn't care about PCIe-based flash....yet they mentioned that a lot......

They did. And they did mention the 64bit A7. However, the guy on the initial comment did say

Apple sometimes doesn't announce what tech they use if it's gonna confuse the regular user.

Meaning sometimes they do, sometimes they don't.

 

[macchiato2009]

i hope iPad Mini Retina will be the same

 

[JulianL]

This article is incorrect. IGZO is more power efficient than LTPS, not less. Apple is not stupid. The power efficiency was paramount in enabling the reduction in size and power consumption of the ipad air.

Is that really true? In that case either...

1 - The iPad Air doesn't have an IGZO screen
2 - Apple did a bad job of implementing IGZO in the Air
or 3 - DisplayMate messed up their power consumption tests

... because, adjusting for the same luminance and screen area, DisplayMate actually measured the LTPS screen in the Amazon tablet as being 30% more power efficient than the alleged IGZO screen in the iPad Air.

I'd be interested in more info on the relative power efficiency of LTPS vs IGZO because I'd really like what you say to be correct (and I'm not saying it isn't - all I know about displays is what I read and what other people tell me).

from what I've read, LTPS has a higher leakage current than IGZO - which means it has to be refreshed more frequently to prevent flickering (...the opposite, with IGZO it's possible to skip drive cycles). Maybe it doesn't make a difference (I don't know), but there are some advantages in IGZO as well as it's less expensive at this time.

I'd certainly heard that benefit of IGZO vs a-Si but I hadn't read about it against LTPS as well. If rkuo is correct then that would bring an added benefit if an LTPS to IGZO switch was made for the iPhone 6 because, at least for my use, I spend a lot of time looking at static screens (reading ebooks, looking at a map, looking something up in Wikipedia or my Evernote database or just consulting my calendar). The hardware being able to skip refresh cycles when I'm reading ebooks could give a very worthwhile boost to my battery life.

 

[everything-i]

"Amazon's use of low temperature polysilicon (LTPS) technology, which offers even better performance and lower power requirements than IGZO."

This is interesting!

Not possible for Apple to consider this technology yet as the screen sizes and yields are no where near what is needed to be a candidate for the larger screen higher volume products Apple produces. There have been other companies using IGZO for a while but again with much lower volumes. It takes a long time for these new technologies to ramp up to high volume production and even now there are issues with IGZO that are going to cause shortages at launch for the mini.

 

[wikiverse]

you do realize how crazy that is, right?
its still the same device with the same batterylife, just like before this annoucement. but now that you know its IGZO, its somehow better?

It's not really that crazy. People support certain technologies, ideologies and products and vote with their wallet. Read his comment again but swap iPad Air for eggs and IGZO for free range. Or for 'mac pro' and 'made in America'. For whatever reason, he believes IGZO is valuable and wants to support its use. Or maybe he owns shares In Sharp and supports it for that reason.

 

[Jensend]

Is that really true? In that case either...

1 - The iPad Air doesn't have an IGZO screen
2 - Apple did a bad job of implementing IGZO in the Air
or 3 - DisplayMate messed up their power consumption tests

... because, adjusting for the same luminance and screen area, DisplayMate actually measured the LTPS screen in the Amazon tablet as being 30% more power efficient than the alleged IGZO screen in the iPad Air.

I'd be interested in more info on the relative power efficiency of LTPS vs IGZO because I'd really like what you say to be correct (and I'm not saying it isn't - all I know about displays is what I read and what other people tell me).


I'd certainly heard that benefit of IGZO vs a-Si but I hadn't read about it against LTPS as well. If rkuo is correct then that would bring an added benefit if an LTPS to IGZO switch was made for the iPhone 6 because, at least for my use, I spend a lot of time looking at static screens (reading ebooks, looking at a map, looking something up in Wikipedia or my Evernote database or just consulting my calendar). The hardware being able to skip refresh cycles when I'm reading ebooks could give a very worthwhile boost to my battery life.

Most of the power usage of an LCD comes from the backlight. I doubt reducing refreshes of the liquid crystals makes a huge difference in overall battery usage.

 

[carmenodie]

They make it sound like them clowns at Amazon are doing R&D like Apple.
Bezo just got some off the shelf parts and tossed Amazon's name on it.
And it remains to be seen if Amazon can have those new kindles churned out in high volumes.

 

[MacBH928]

Does the IGZO screen looks better or worse than iPad 3/4 ? does it add anything other than energy saving?

 

[brn2ski00]

Nice read - I do love my iPad Air, more than any other iPad that I have had.

I am more impressed by going from the iPad3 to the Air then going from the iPad1 to the iPad3.

 

[TheUndertow]

From what I read, WOW

I can't wait to get my iPad Air which arrives tomorrow. Coming from a iPad 1 to iPad Air.

MASSIVE jump - I've had each gen and this one is by far the most amazing tech so far!

 

[coco67]

DAMN IT! Thank you Apple you finally get it! I hope all of those producer will do the same with android device