From “The Frame,” Samsung has taken several steps forward with its latest display innovation—“The Wall.” Unveiled at First Look, CES 2018, the ground-breaking television is the world’s first consumer MicroLED 146-inch TV display.
“The Wall” is a breakthrough TV that can transform into any size, and as expected from Samsung, offers incredible brightness, colour gamut, detail and contrast. It represents Samsung’s vision of the future, as the TV continues to evolve to enhance everyday life.
We’re familiar with LED, QLED and OLED, but what is MicroLED? It’s really quite a misnomer. LEDs (light-emitting diode) have a white backlight, with several stacked layers consisting a liquid-crystal display, colour filters and polarisers to light images as you see them on TV.
OLED on the other hand, has no backlight. Each individual pixel lights up when needed, hence you get blacker than black and whiter than white visuals.
But what about MicroLED then? MicroLED is like OLED, comprising extremely tiny LEDs that comprise a red, green and blue sub-pixel.
Because they’re self-emitting (yes like OLED), “The Wall” does not require colour filters or backlight, hence it offers more flexibility in terms of form factor, and thinness.
It also excels in durability and luminous efficiency, lifespan and power consumption, which Samsung says sets the standard for future screen technology. This is because MicroLEDs are inorganic, unlike OLED, which can degrade and age over time, and suffer burn-in.
The Wall is aptly named, as it is bezel-less and module-based. It allows consumers to customise their TV sizes and shapes to suit their preferences and needs. Whether it is for a wall-size display, or wide-screen, it’s modular nature ensures flexibility.
So, MicroLED is as good if not better than OLED, doesn’t age, doesn’t suffer burn-in, and is as flexible as it can be.
When can you buy one? Samsung says this year, but being a wholly new technology, it will not be produced at scale. You know what that means. It’s likely to cost a yacht and a couple of kidneys.
Regardless, it’s exciting technology and it isn’t too far from our reach, if TVs are your thing.
Source: Samsung
