The annual Consumer Electronics Show (CES) has always been the platform where new technologies are introduced. At this year’s CES for TVs, it was QD-OLED, a new display technology that is set to come this year. In the last decade or so, we have moved from LCD, LED to YOU ARE and QLED, and now there’s QD-OLED. Here we explain what is QD-OLED and how it really works.
What is QD-QLED?
QD — or Quantum dots — are actually tiny semiconductor nanocrystals. These nanocrystals glow a specific colour and are activated by light. What follows next are brighter, natural and accurate images in colour reproduction. QD-OLED takes on the existing OLED technology and makes it better with the help of quantum dots. OLED displays have always been much better than LCD ones and the QD-OLED makes it much better.
How does QD-OLED display work?
Samsung is one of the main driving forces behind QD-OLED display. And the company explains how it actually works. A QD display is a self-luminous display and consists of a TFT layer — the electronic circuit that controls the light-emitting layer —, a light source that emits light, and a QD light-emitting layer that expresses colours using the light emitted from the light source. QD display uses blue, which has the strongest light energy, as a light source to achieve relatively bright luminance. The blue light generated from the light source of the QD display has a very high colour purity, and the red and green QD that produces colour by receiving the blue light also produces colour light with high colour purity. All these combine in a QD display to deliver natural and brighter colours on a TV.
What are the advantages of QD-OLED?
Quantum dots can attain higher levels of brightness and are also quite stable. What this will do is avoid TVs from suffering from any sort of ‘burns’ on the display. QD-OLED will also ensure that colours don’t get too washed out. The QD display enables a high contrast ratio of 1,000,000:1 because of the darker black colour expression. A ‘traditional’ display has a contrast ratio of 100,000: 1. Samsung claims that in the visible spectrum, short-wave blue light with wavelengths between 41 nm and 455 nm is known to affect sleep by increasing eye fatigue and suppressing melatonin secretion with its short wavelength and strong energy. What QD-OLED does is that it optimises blue light exposure to ensure a more comfortable viewing experience.
How much will QD-OLED TVs cost?
The price hasn’t been revealed but we do expect it to cost quite a bit more than the usual OLED and LED TVs. Samsung and Sony already have plans to launch TVs with this new tech sometime in 2022. However, the prices and launch dates have still not been revealed.
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