Backlight Archive

  • Video: Toshiba’s AC100 Tegra netbook runs on Android 2.1

    Video: Toshiba’s AC100 Tegra netbook runs on Android 2.1

    Hot on the heels of the W100 dual touchscreen tablet, Toshiba also unveiled the AC100 today, a 10.1-inch netbook that runs on Android 2.1. One of the big selling points of the AC100, which is the company's first Android machine, is that it can remain in standby mode for up to seven days (the eight hours of battery life aren't too shabby either).

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  • Innoversal Lattice Tablet gets its Pixel Qi touched

    Innoversal Lattice Tablet gets its Pixel Qi touched

    Pixel Qi. If you haven’t heard of them, you will. Everyone will want one of their screens. They offer both a full color LCD screen and an E-Ink screen in one. From what I have seen so far, the technology appears to be very promising. Other companies seem to think so as well, and are lining up to use Pixel Qi screens in their devices

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  • Gadgets of days gone by: Sega Nomad

    Gadgets of days gone by: Sega Nomad

    This week at CrunchGear, we’re looking back at some of our favorite gadgets from the not-so-distant past — old phones, computers, media players, toys… those devices that still stand out in our memories despite their obsolescence. Feel free to contribute some of your own nostalgia. I was always a Sega kid. Not exclusively, mind you — [...]

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  • Gadgets of days gone by: The Game Boy

    Gadgets of days gone by: The Game Boy

    This week at CrunchGear, we’re looking back at some of our favorite gadgets from the not-so-distant past — old phones, computers, media players, toys… those devices that still stand out in our memories despite their obsolescence. Feel free to contribute some of your own nostalgia. My Grandma Sadie bought me my Nintendo Game Boy in the [...]

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  • Better LCD TVs? New CCFL backlights to compete with LEDs

    Better LCD TVs? New CCFL backlights to compete with LEDs

    Japan's Sanken Electric has developed a new type of cold cathode fluorescent lamp (CCFL) backlight for LCD TVs that's as power-efficient as LED backlights but is supposedly up to 60% cheaper to mass-produce. Approximately 90% of all LCD TVs currently on the market have CCFL backlights. A 32-inch LCD TV usually requires six CCFL tubes, but Sanken says their new lamps are so efficient that only two of them are enough (one at the top and another one at the bottom of the device).

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  • Samsung looks to mass produce 3.3″ AMOLED touchscreen displays

    Samsung looks to mass produce 3.3″ AMOLED touchscreen displays

    Standard, boring LED screens: your days are numbered! Samsung announced today that it will begin mass producing AMOLED displays with touch functions built right in. The displays will be 3.3″ WVGA touchscreens that will be, thanks to the AMOLED technology, much thinner than your average touchscreen display on current phones. The beauty of this technology [...]

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  • New polarizer film to boost contrast of LCDs more than 10-fold

    New polarizer film to boost contrast of LCDs more than 10-fold

    A Japanese company called Zeon claims it has developed a film for the polarizing plates of LCD screens that boosts picture contrast by more than an order of magnitude. The company is already selling films for those plates to LCD TV makers like Samsung whose screens are based on vertical alignment technology. It produces films for OLED screens, too. Zeon's new, so-called phase difference film, however, is made from Cyclo Olefin Polymer, which makes it suitable for LCD TVs based on in-plane-switching (IPS) technology. Makers relying on IPS technology are Panasonic or Hitachi, for example. The new Zeon film inhibits the diffusion of light from the backlight. As a result, viewers get to see clearer pictures.

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  • Archos 9 tablet PC just now available for pre-order at $550

    Archos 9 tablet PC just now available for pre-order at $550

    Although previously targeted for launch on October 22nd with a price tag of $500, it looks like Archos’ 9-inch tablet is just now available for pre-order on the company's web site and priced at $550.

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  • New Sharp LCD technology will save power, boost picture quality

    New Sharp LCD technology will save power, boost picture quality

    Sharp Japan today announced [press release in English] the development of a new method that makes it possible to control the alignment of liquid crystal molecules in LCD screens with high precision. In practical terms, this means the new UV2A technology could lead to TVs that save energy and display pictures with higher contrast ratios.

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