Samsung’s quantum dot-based OLED TV could ship in 2022, report says

At present, there are two TV technologies available to most people: LCD and YOU ARE. Of course, people with tons of money could MicroLED TV, but mere mortals have only two choices. The world’s largest television manufacturer, Samsung, was firmly in LCD camp for many years, while the city’s rival LG is the biggest name in OLED. The LCD screen has its strengths but still has lags behind OLED in terms of overall picture quality.

Now Samsung is working on a new kind of TV that aims to combine two display technologies into something greater than the sum of its parts. It is an OLED / quantum dot hybrid. According to Korea IT News, Samsung Display will end production of LCD panels by the end of 2021, switching to QD-OLED next year. At the same time, Samsung Electronics could start selling these new TVs as early as 2022.

Here’s what we know so far:

Samsung’s $ 11 billion bet on quantum dots

Samsung has been selling quantum dot enhanced LCD televisions for a few years under its QLED Mark. In our tests on Samsung QLED TVs does not match the overall picture quality of the OLED, however, mainly because of The incredible contrast and off-angle performance of OLED. In October 2019, Samsung Display announced the construction of a factory to manufacture televisions combining these technologies:

Samsung Display will invest 13.1 trillion won by 2025 to build “Q1 Line”, the world’s first QD display mass production line on the Asan campus. The new line is expected to start production in 2021 with an initial 30,000 sheets (8.5 generations) and will produce a huge QD screen of 65 inches or more.

It’s an investment of about $ 11.1 billion. Although the company calls this “QD display”, it is not electroluminescent, aka “direct view” quantum dots. This technology is still several years away. It will be a QD-OLED hybrid.

During the announcement, South Korean President Moon Jae-in also referred to Samsung’s rival LG regarding Korea’s place in global television production: “It is important to maintain the top spot in the world. global display market with game-changing technologies, ”Moon said. “Following LG Display’s 3 trillion won investment in large OLED panel production in July, Samsung Display’s latest investment plan further sheds light on the outlook.”

One thing you may have noticed is that Samsung calls this “QD screen”, which can be confusing since these are not direct-view quantum dots (more on that later). Considering that LG has spent years being the only name in town (figuratively and literally) for OLED, Samsung is unlikely to call any version of this technology OLED. We will probably have to wait until CES 2022 to find out.

How would QD-OLED work

So how will this work? Nanosys, a company that makes quantum dots, shared some details. Its CEO, Jason Hartlove, is understandably optimistic about the technology, which relies on converting light from an OLED panel:

“Quantum Dot Color Conversion is a whole new way to render colors in displays,” he told CNET. “The result is pure quantum dot color with much higher efficiency because no light is lost in a color filter.”

The combination of quantum dots and OLED plays on the strengths of both technologies. The idea with any TV is to create red, green and blue light. LED LCDs with quantum dots, like current Samsung QLED TVs, use blue LEDs and a quantum dot layer to convert some of that blue to red and green. With the current version of OLED, yellow and blue OLED materials create a “white” light. In either case, the color filters only pass the color needed for that specific subpixel.

The idea with a QD-OLED is to simplify these designs into one, using OLED to create blue light and then a layer of quantum dots to convert some of the blue to red and green.

The advantages of this method are numerous in theory. By using a single color or a single material of OLED, the manufacturing costs are greatly reduced because it is easier to build. LG, for example, only uses two OLED materials, blue and yellow, for each pixel in the entire screen. Light-blocking color filters create green and red. QDs are nearly 100% efficient, significantly better than filters, so in theory hybrid TVs will be much brighter. In addition, there is the possibility even wider color ranges at all light levels.

Because every pixel can be turned off, these hybrid TVs will also have the incredible contrast ratios for which OLED is known.

Since blue OLED materials always age faster than red and green, having the entire panel in one color means the TV ages more evenly without a color change. Keeping this aging to a minimum, and thus having a television that does not appear dark after a few years, is one of the main manufacturing problems. This is especially true in this HDR era of extreme light levels.

While this new Samsung factory is focusing on TV-sized screens, the technology could work in phone-sized screens as well. Given that Samsung doesn’t seem to have a problem making great little OLEDs, I’d be surprised if it was in a rush to shake up this market with something as advanced as this. Also, Samsung’s phone-sized OLEDs use red, green, and blue OLEDs compared to LG’s blue-yellow. Samsung tried to make RGB OLED TVs and just couldn’t make a profit from them. What is more likely, and mentioned in the latest rumors, is that they will use this technology to build ultra-high resolution 8K computer monitors with larger TV screens.

As mentioned earlier, it is clear that Samsung strongly believes in this technology as it is ending production of LCD screens at its factories in Korea. It doesn’t mean that from next year it won’t sell all LCD. Samsung is a massive company and the part of the company that makes LCD screens, Samsung Display, stop production. The part of the business that sells Televisions, Samsung Electronics, did not make such an announcement. In fact, part of the most recent delay was that Samsung Electronics needed LCD panels before they were ready to start selling QD-OLED panels. They have been working on this for 2021, and in the future they will likely source LCD panels from a third party.

In the future

QD-OLED seems to be around the corner. But what about even more future display technology? Well, the people of the quantum dot seem to think direct view quantum dot displays are only a few years away. These light-emitting quantum dots, or ELQDs, would have all the benefits of OLED, all of the benefits of QD, and none of the LCD issues or OLED wear and longevity issues. A very promising technology indeed.

The other new TV technology that’s already hitting the market, the extreme high end of the market anyway, is MicroLED. It has many of the same benefits as the QD-OLED hybrid, but doesn’t scoff at those pesky organics. Affordable versions of which are still some distance away. Oh, and MicroLEDs also use quantum dots. It is a fascinating technology with uses way beyond television screens.

In the meantime we have mini LED, which is pretty cool too and a lot cheaper than any of them.

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In addition to covering television and other display technology, Geoff takes photo tours of museums and cool places around the world, including nuclear submarines, massive aircraft carriers, medieval castles, airplane cemeteries and more.

You can follow his exploits on Instagram and YouTube, and on his travel blog, BaldNomad. He’s also written a bestselling sci-fi novel about city-sized submarines, as well as a sequel.