By Reuters
Special to CNET News.com
September 10, 1998, 9:10 p.m. PT
URL: http://www.news.com/News/Item/0,4,26232,00.html
( I'm very leery of IBM's announcments. Remember the supposed new drive
technology that was announced last year that still hasn't shipped? )
Scientists at IBM say they have developed a new flat-panel computer display
that allows users to see text and images with 200 pixels-per-inch clarity,
a resolution virtually indistinguishable from the printed page.
The prototype display, code-named Roentgen after the inventor of the X-ray
machine, has four times the pixels in the same space as common cathode-ray
tube desktop monitors, which display 80 and 100 pixels-per-inch. It relies
on active-matrix LCD (liquid crystal diode) technology to produce color
images that, from a normal viewing distance of 16 inches or more, eliminate
for the human eye the fuzziness associated with electronic displays.
"We are right at the point at which human vision ceases to notice any
distortion," Robert Wisnieff, leader of the research team, said of the 200
pixels-per-inch displays.
Office equipment using such displays could significantly reduce, if not
eliminate, eyestrain. Experts believe computer eyestrain is linked to the
effort the human eye must make to fill in gaps that exist between the small
light elements of computerized displays, which represent only a fraction of
the elements of a real world image.
"There's a good experimental correlation between [computer screen]
legibility and lower eyestrain," Wisnieff, manager of the advanced display
technology laboratory at IBM Research in Yorktown Heights, New York, said
in an interview.
The LCD displays initially are aimed at high-end niche uses like aircraft
design, medical imaging, legal record scanning, and digital art libraries,
but eventually should find their way into IBM desktop and notebook
computers, according to Wisnieff.
Early Roentgen displays will cost in excess of $5,000, or several times the
$1,500-to-$2,000 pricetag of IBM's most expensive cathode-ray monitors, he
said, but prices will fall as demand picks up and mass manufacturing
economics take hold.
"Ultra-high resolution displays have the potential to greatly increase the
usability ... of digital images, Wisnieff said. "We also expect the degree
of clarity and crispness offered by the Roentgen prototype to be in high
demand for graphic design and electronic publishing applications." The
first Roentgen products should be in customer hands later this year,
starting with medical imaging systems.
Besides offering 200 pixels-per-inch, the new displays offer full color
depth and gray-scale shading on a 16.3-inch diagonal viewing area of 2,560
by 2,048 pixels, or 5.2 million full-color pixels in all. Each screen uses
15.7 million transistors and 1.64 miles of thin film aluminum alloy wiring.
Fellow IBM researcher Kevin Warren said his group has devised a graphics
adapter system using standard, off-the-shelf components capable of
processing the more than 1 billion bits of graphics data per second that
such screens demand. This allows the displays to be connected to widely
available high-performance PCs running Windows operating system.
Work on the Roentgen displays, which began 18 months ago, is the latest
outgrowth of research begun in the mid-1980s by IBM on active-matrix
displays. It builds on a 150 pixel-per-inch monitor under development since
1995 known as "Monet," so-called due to its capacity to depict fine line
brushstrokes of a painting. Monet technology is now used in IBM's
state-of-the-art ThinkPad 770 notebook model.
The latest development represents more a triumph of manufacturing
improvements than design breakthrough, researchers said, and is the product
of close work with IBM's ThinkPad display factory in Japan. "We had to
think in advance how far we could stretch the design by working with our
factory counterparts in Japan," which allowed IBM to build scores of
prototypes on a standard manufacturing line instead of one-of-a-kind models
in a lab, Wisnieff said.
The researchers contrasted the work, which uses existing materials and
display manufacturing equipment, with efforts by competitors to develop new
imaging materials known as polymorphous silicon. Such technology is
unproven and more costly, since it will require these companies to switch
over their plants to new equipment.
Major rivals in the field include Asian electronics makers NEC, Samsung
Electronics, and Toshiba. Also, a unit of Xerox currently offers a 142
pixel-per-inch screen.
--when you want it it goes away too fast, when you hate it it always seems to last. - Marilyn Manson
<> tbyars@earthlink.net <> --============_-1306591354==_ma============ Content-Type: text/enriched; charset="us-ascii"
By Reuters
Special to CNET News.com
September 10, 1998, 9:10 p.m. PT
URL: http://www.news.com/News/Item/0,4,26232,00.html
( I'm very leery of IBM's announcments. Remember the supposed new drive technology that was announced last year that still hasn't shipped? )
Scientists at IBM say they have developed a new flat-panel computer display that allows users to see text and images with 200 pixels-per-inch clarity, a resolution virtually indistinguishable from the printed page.
The prototype display, code-named Roentgen after the inventor of the X-ray machine, has four times the pixels in the same space as common cathode-ray tube desktop monitors, which display 80 and 100 pixels-per-inch. It relies on active-matrix LCD (liquid crystal diode) technology to produce color images that, from a normal viewing distance of 16 inches or more, eliminate for the human eye the fuzziness associated with electronic displays.
"We are right at the point at which human vision ceases to notice any distortion," Robert Wisnieff, leader of the research team, said of the 200 pixels-per-inch displays.
Office equipment using such displays could significantly reduce, if not eliminate, eyestrain. Experts believe computer eyestrain is linked to the effort the human eye must make to fill in gaps that exist between the small light elements of computerized displays, which represent only a fraction of the elements of a real world image.
"There's a good experimental correlation between [computer screen] legibility and lower eyestrain," Wisnieff, manager of the advanced display technology laboratory at IBM Research in Yorktown Heights, New York, said in an interview.
The LCD displays initially are aimed at high-end niche uses like aircraft design, medical imaging, legal record scanning, and digital art libraries, but eventually should find their way into IBM desktop and notebook computers, according to Wisnieff.
Early Roentgen displays will cost in excess of $5,000, or several times the $1,500-to-$2,000 pricetag of IBM's most expensive cathode-ray monitors, he said, but prices will fall as demand picks up and mass manufacturing economics take hold.
"Ultra-high resolution displays have the potential to greatly increase the usability ... of digital images, Wisnieff said. "We also expect the degree of clarity and crispness offered by the Roentgen prototype to be in high demand for graphic design and electronic publishing applications." The first Roentgen products should be in customer hands later this year, starting with medical imaging systems.
Besides offering 200 pixels-per-inch, the new displays offer full color depth and gray-scale shading on a 16.3-inch diagonal viewing area of 2,560 by 2,048 pixels, or 5.2 million full-color pixels in all. Each screen uses 15.7 million transistors and 1.64 miles of thin film aluminum alloy wiring.
Fellow IBM researcher Kevin Warren said his group has devised a graphics adapter system using standard, off-the-shelf components capable of processing the more than 1 billion bits of graphics data per second that such screens demand. This allows the displays to be connected to widely available high-performance PCs running Windows operating system.
Work on the Roentgen displays, which began 18 months ago, is the latest outgrowth of research begun in the mid-1980s by IBM on active-matrix displays. It builds on a 150 pixel-per-inch monitor under development since 1995 known as "Monet," so-called due to its capacity to depict fine line brushstrokes of a painting. Monet technology is now used in IBM's state-of-the-art ThinkPad 770 notebook model.
The latest development represents more a triumph of manufacturing improvements than design breakthrough, researchers said, and is the product of close work with IBM's ThinkPad display factory in Japan. "We had to think in advance how far we could stretch the design by working with our factory counterparts in Japan," which allowed IBM to build scores of prototypes on a standard manufacturing line instead of one-of-a-kind models in a lab, Wisnieff said.
The researchers contrasted the work, which uses existing materials and display manufacturing equipment, with efforts by competitors to develop new imaging materials known as polymorphous silicon. Such technology is unproven and more costly, since it will require these companies to switch over their plants to new equipment.
Major rivals in the field include Asian electronics makers NEC, Samsung Electronics, and Toshiba. Also, a unit of Xerox currently offers a 142 pixel-per-inch screen.
--
when you want it it goes away too fast,
when you hate it it always seems to last. - Marilyn Manson
<<> tbyars@earthlink.net <<>
--============_-1306591354==_ma============--