LG Display debuts five-inch Retina Display killer with 1080p HD resolution and 440ppi

[devilstrider]

LG Display debuts five-inch Retina Display killer with 1080p HD resolution and 440ppi pixel density​

Smartphone displays are becoming larger in size, and along with that, we're seeing a nice trend that's bringing greater pixel density. While LG Display's newly-announced 1080p HD mobile display isn't the most pixel dense that we've seen -- a distinction that belongs to Toshiba -- the five-inch panel is more appropriate for consumer applications and boasts an impressive pixel density of 440ppi. Its 16:9 aspect ratio was designed with HD content in mind, and the LCD technology isn't anything to sneeze at, either: it's a variant of IPS known as Advanced High Performance In-Plane Switching (AH-IPS), which is said to boast wide viewing angles, fast response times and improved brightness efficiency. Best yet, it seems that consumers won't have long to wait before the panel works its way into consumer technology -- the five-inch HD display is set for availability during the second-half of this year. To learn more of the Retina Display-shattering deets, you'll find the full PR after the break.

http://www.engadget.com/2012/05/27/lg-display-five-inch-1080p/?a_dgi=aolshare_twitter​

 

[MacDawg]

I personally would have no interest in a 5" phone
It would be much too large for my work flow and usage as a phone
I have my iPad for things larger than a phone

 

[Konrad9]

I personally would have no interest in a 5" phone
It would be much too large for my work flow and usage as a phone
I have my iPad for things larger than a phone

Ok... but it's still a higher density display, so they could downsize it and it would still be a higher resolution than the iPhone. Apple needs to up the resolution in the next iPhone if they want to keep it as the highest resolution phone available.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

And before someone says there is no point to go higher than what Apple is using remember Apple setting is at 18 in. Move that number to 12 or closer then it is an issue. I would like to point out 18 in is father away than I often times hold my phone personally from my eyes.

 

[KnightWRX]

And before someone says there is no point to go higher than what Apple is using remember Apple setting is at 18 in. Move that number to 12 or closer then it is an issue. I would like to point out 18 in is father away than I often times hold my phone personally from my eyes.

Apple's 300 PPI claim was at 12 inch.

 

[Rodimus Prime]

Apple's 300 PPI claim was at 12 inch.

hmm what it the iPad at 18" then?

Either way I do find myself personally using my phone often times in the sub 12" range. For example if I am playing a game on my phone it is I believe around 9" from my eyes. It more of it depends. It hovers I believe in the 14-8in range for me depending on what I am doing with it at the time.

My table yeah is a little father but often times is around 12 in from my eyes when I am reading on it. Which is lined up with how far away a book is. As an odd note that is just at the range I can see with out glasses.

 

[KnightWRX]

hmm what it the iPad at 18" then?

Yes, it was, with its 263 PPI screen.

 

[BaldiMac]

And before someone says there is no point to go higher than what Apple is using remember Apple setting is at 18 in. Move that number to 12 or closer then it is an issue. I would like to point out 18 in is father away than I often times hold my phone personally from my eyes.

Apple's 300 PPI claim was at 12 inch.

hmm what it the iPad at 18" then?

Either way I do find myself personally using my phone often times in the sub 12" range. For example if I am playing a game on my phone it is I believe around 9" from my eyes. It more of it depends. It hovers I believe in the 14-8in range for me depending on what I am doing with it at the time.

My table yeah is a little father but often times is around 12 in from my eyes when I am reading on it. Which is lined up with how far away a book is. As an odd note that is just at the range I can see with out glasses.

Evidently, Apple considers the iPhone "retina" at 10".

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1335308/

And, yes, what is the point of a higher pixel density in a 5" phone?

 

[juanm]

Evidently, Apple considers the iPhone "retina" at 10".

https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1335308/

And, yes, what is the point of a higher pixel density in a 5" phone?

On a phone, I don't know, but this could make a killer field monitor for cinematography, assuming the color is accurate!

 

[Randomoneh]

Relation between human visual acuity, angular resolution and apparent image realness

Ladies and gentlemen.

What Apple did with iPhone 4 and 960x640 display was great at the time. They have shaken the industry and made them do better. But is there room for improvements? Let's see.

Relation between human visual acuity, angular resolution and apparent realness of an image​

Ability of eye to see detail is called visual acuity. Precise vision is tested by ability to distinguish fine pair of black lines (1 pixel wide) separated by one pixel wide white line. Like this (first line pair).

You can test it on your screen by moving away from your screen until you see one line (usually gray) instead of two (black). Mark that distance and measure it. Now you have to know your display's height in inches and vertical resolution. By knowing these things, you can calculate your visual acuity, expressed in (cpd) or pixels per degree.

If a person has visual acuity of 60 cycles per degree (cpd), that means that person has visual acuity of 60*2= 120 pixels per degree.


Want to know how to calculate measure and calculate your visual acuity?


OK, so we have:

DH = display height in inches, measure just the display, without bezel!
D = distance from you computer display (not TV! - rectangular pixels! measured in inches when two black lines no longer seem like two lines but one (usually grayish).
VR = vertical resolution. For 1920x1080 display, vertical resolution is 1080 pixels. For 1280x800 display, vertical resolution is 800 and so on...

Here's an calculation example.

DH = 8.16198 inches
D = 72.83464 inches
VR = 800 pixels

Here, in the first field we type or paste DH, in second field we type or paste D. We leave third field empty and press calculate. Voila!

In the third field we got angle (in degrees) which display height occupies. In this case, we got 6.414.
Let's call this angle A.

A = angle (in degrees) which display height occupies.

We're almost there! All you have to do now to calculate visual acuity (VA) is to divide vertical resolution with angle (VR with A)

VA = visual acuity
So for our example: VA = VR/A = 800/6.414 = 124.727

Visual acuity in this example is 124.727 pixels per degree or 62.3635 cycles per degree.
Average visual acuity is about 120 pixels per degree or 60 cycles per degree.


Is iPhone display good enough for our eyes?


Let's see for viewing distance of 12 inches. iPhone display has DH of 2.91217 inches, distance we're calculating for is 12 inches and VR is 960.

Again, we go to this site. In the first field, we paste DH. As we said, for iPhone this is 2.91217. In second field we type in viewing distance from display to our eyes. In this case, we want to calculate for 12 inches. We press calculate and in the third field we got the A - angle (in degrees) which display height occupies. In this case, A is 13.837 degrees.

We have said average visual acuity is about 120 pixels per degree. To get the needed display's vertical resolution (NVR), we need to multiply angle A with visual acuity VA.

NVR = needed vertical resolution
NVR = A*VA = 13.837*120 = 1660.44

For average viewer, at distance of 12'', iPhone's vertical resolution should be 1660 pixels. To get horizontal resolution, we divide vertical resolution with aspect ratio (1.5). We get 1107 pixels.

So, for average viewer, at distance of 12'', iPhone's resolution should be 1660x1107 pixels.


But is everything beyond this waste of pixels?


Short answer - no.

Even though at some distance, two lines seem like one, we can still perceive quality beyond this number (beyond our visual acuity). How do we know that? Japanese NHK did tests in which they determined that observers could tell the difference in image quality all the way up to 155 cycles per degree (cpd) - that is astonishing 310 pixels per degree!

Until the day we have it - please don't comment "Why do we need anything above...".

Have any questions? I'd be glad to answer them. For those who want to know more about the subject - I recommend this book by Colin Ware.

Thanks.

 

[BaldiMac]

Ladies and gentlemen.

What Apple did with iPhone 4 and 960x640 display was great at the time. They have shaken the industry and made them do better. But is there room for improvements? Let's see.

Relation between human visual acuity, angular resolution and apparent realness of an image​

Ability of eye to see detail is called visual acuity. Precise vision is tested by ability to distinguish fine pair of black lines (1 pixel wide) separated by one pixel wide white line. Like this (first line pair).

You can test it on your screen by moving away from your screen until you see one line (usually gray) instead of two (black). Mark that distance and measure it. Now you have to know your display's height in inches and vertical resolution. By knowing these things, you can calculate your visual acuity, expressed in (cpd) or pixels per degree.

If a person has visual acuity of 60 cycles per degree (cpd), that means that person has visual acuity of 60*2= 120 pixels per degree.


Want to know how to calculate measure and calculate your visual acuity?


OK, so we have:

DH = display height in inches, measure just the display, without bezel!
D = distance from you computer display (not TV! - rectangular pixels! measured in inches when two black lines no longer seem like two lines but one (usually grayish).
VR = vertical resolution. For 1920x1080 display, vertical resolution is 1080 pixels. For 1280x800 display, vertical resolution is 800 and so on...

Here's an calculation example.

DH = 8.16198 inches
D = 72.83464 inches
VR = 800 pixels

Here, in the first field we type or paste DH, in second field we type or paste D. We leave third field empty and press calculate. Voila!

In the third field we got angle (in degrees) which display height occupies. In this case, we got 6.414.
Let's call this angle A.

A = angle (in degrees) which display height occupies.

We're almost there! All you have to do now to calculate visual acuity (VA) is to divide vertical resolution with angle (VR with A)

VA = visual acuity
So for our example: VA = VR/A = 800/6.414 = 124.727

Visual acuity in this example is 124.727 pixels per degree or 62.3635 cycles per degree.
Average visual acuity is about 120 pixels per degree or 60 cycles per degree.


Is iPhone display good enough for our eyes?


Let's see for viewing distance of 12 inches. iPhone display has DH of 2.91217 inches, distance we're calculating for is 12 inches and VR is 960.

Again, we go to this site. In the first field, we paste DH. As we said, for iPhone this is 2.91217. In second field we type in viewing distance from display to our eyes. In this case, we want to calculate for 12 inches. We press calculate and in the third field we got the A - angle (in degrees) which display height occupies. In this case, A is 13.837 degrees.

We have said average visual acuity is about 120 pixels per degree. To get the needed display's vertical resolution (NVR), we need to multiply angle A with visual acuity VA.

NVR = needed vertical resolution
NVR = A*VA = 13.837*120 = 1660.44

For average viewer, at distance of 12'', iPhone's vertical resolution should be 1660 pixels. To get horizontal resolution, we divide vertical resolution with aspect ratio (1.5). We get 1107 pixels.

So, for average viewer, at distance of 12'', iPhone's resolution should be 1660x1107 pixels.


But is everything beyond this waste of pixels?


Short answer - no.

Even though at some distance, two lines seem like one, we can still perceive quality beyond this number (beyond our visual acuity). How do we know that? Japanese NHK did tests in which they determined that observers could tell the difference in image quality all the way up to 155 cycles per degree (cpd) - that is astonishing 310 pixels per degree!

Image

Until the day we have it - please don't comment "Why do we need anything above...".

Have any questions? I'd be glad to answer them. For those who want to know more about the subject - I recommend this book by Colin Ware.

Thanks.

Thanks for the fantastic information! It looks like from your calculations that the average person could see a difference upwards of 570 ppi. Wow.

How does your calculation differ from Apple's formula shown here?
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1335308/

 

[rhett7660]

I would love to see this on a product that is a little bigger than 5". I think that is too big for a phone. Put this on a tablet or maybe a 11" or 15" screen. That would be nice IMHO.

 

[Randomoneh]

Thanks for the fantastic information! It looks like from your calculations that the average person could see a difference upwards of 570 ppi. Wow.

How does your calculation differ from Apple's formula shown here?
https://forums.macrumors.com/threads/1335308/

Apple is using very loose figure (even Sony agrees on this: page 4, "For example, researchers at NHK...") of 1 arcminute / 60 arcseconds for apparent size of pixel. Meaning angular resolution of 60 pixels (30 cycles) per degree of view.

As I have said, average visual acuity is 60 cycles-per-degree, that is 120 pixels per degree, but that's not the end of it since we can perceive image quality up to 155 cycles-per-degree or 310 pixels per degree.

Now, when one is holding iPhone 12 inches away, display occupies 13.8369 degrees of that person's vertical view.

Meaning if same person was looking at two iPhones, both of them 12 inches away from him, one with resolution of 4289x2859, other with some lower resolution - he would feel greater sense of "realness" when looking at the 4289x2859 screen (310*13.8369 = 4289, 4289/1.5 = 2859).

 

[BaldiMac]

Apple is using very loose figure (even Sony agrees on this: page 4, "For example, researchers at NHK...") of 1 arcminute / 60 arcseconds for apparent size of pixel. Meaning angular resolution of 60 pixels (30 cycles) per degree of view.

As I have said, average visual acuity is 60 cycles-per-degree, that is 120 pixels per degree, but that's not the end of it since we can perceive image quality up to 155 cycles-per-degree or 310 pixels per degree.

Now, when one is holding iPhone 12 inches away, display occupies 13.8369 degrees of that person's vertical view.

Meaning if same person was looking at two iPhones, both of them 12 inches away from him, one with resolution of 4289x2859, other with some lower resolution - he would feel greater sense of "realness" when looking at the 4289x2859 screen (310*13.8369 = 4289, 4289/1.5 = 2859).

So, basically, Apple's started with the assumption that the average visual acuity is 60 pixels per degree. From the Sony article, it sounds like its a reasonable assumption that has been accepted for a long time, but not an accurate number for the limits of average human perception as we can now measure it. Is that a reasonable summary? Thanks!

 

[Randomoneh]

So, basically, Apple's started with the assumption that the average visual acuity is 60 pixels per degree. From the Sony article, it sounds like its a reasonable assumption that has been accepted for a long time, but not an accurate number for the limits of average human perception as we can now measure it.

It is reasonable in a sense that 60 pixels per degree is a reasonable trade-off - apparent pixelation is low enough so that pixels are not clearly visible AND cost is low because number of pixels is relatively low.

Take a look at this image once again.

It's a matter of diminishing returns.

Will we ever have displays with 300, 310 or 320 pixel per degree values at normal distances?
Certanly. But there's a long way from here to there.

Edit: Sharp developed 6.1'' 2560x1600 display. At 12 inches away, it has angular resolution of 105.3 pixels per degree. At the same distance, iPhone has angular resolution of 69.4 pixels per degree.