Quantum Dots for The Future

Samsung and LG are the definition of the bitter rivalry among hardware tech companies. They both compete in essentially every product they make, appliance, phone, TV and etc. Recently the focus has been about what the two companies are doing for their TV products. Samsung is betting on something called Quantum Dot while LG is betting on OLED. It doesn’t seem like the people talk about tv technology like they did a couple of years and there doesn’t seem to be a craze for either. Regardless, the technology is being pushed and is showing potential in changing the way we receive content.

 

Currently in the market, LG produces OLED Tv panels and Samsung is producing a somewhat hybrid of Quantum dot and LCD. The reason for the hybrid, Samsung hasn’t been able to get to pure Quantum dot technology to quite work yet, so instead have been slowly improving the technology over the years and phasing out old technology like LCD.

 

In the TV realm, the experts say that OLED, which is Organic Light-Emitting diode, is currently superior in terms of the Samsung’s offerings. OLED is an advancement in LED technology. It uses organic materials to produce different colored light. It is able to give dark blacks, produce huge range of colors, use less energy, and be thin and light. The problem is the OLED is almost at it limits in terms of its technology and capabilities. Samsung currently is pursing a technology that is hard but if done right, it basically beats out OLED in very way possible. It is much more efficient, super thin, brighter, etc. 

 

Currently, Samsung’s QLED uses a thin layer of quantum dots in front of a layer of blue LEDS. The blue led provides the blue light and also provides the energy for the green and red quantum dot to work. The blue light basically provides higher energy light than that of red and green, so the quantum dots can convert blue photons into red and green photons. The problem with this that, there is wasted light because layers of color filters, LCD and polarizers blocking the certain light to create the required imagine. The next step is to create a layer quantum dot that have red, green and blue dots, and to use electricity, rather than light, to activate them. This drastically improves the efficiency, performance of the displays and reduces the number of different layers that block light. This is considered the ultimate use of the technology and looks to change the way we use our devices.

I think that Quantum Dot technology will impact the way we design user interfaces and devices. The new display will be much more thinner and power efficient, so the hardware, such as phones, will have to be redesigned to meet user’s needs. We can also expect this to change the way we interact in VR. The displays can produce colors and imagines that are very life-like. I would imagine that game designers would leverage this but also be cautious of it because it makes game element too life-like. We could also see thin foldable displays that will launch a new wave of HCI studies.

 

 

Morrison, Geoffrey. “How quantum dots could challenge OLED for best TV picture.” CNET, CNET, 22 Jan. 2018, www.cnet.com/news/how-quantum-dots-could-challenge-oled-for-best-tv-picture/.

Picture: https://news.samsung.com/za/qled-tv-vs-oled-tv

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