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General discussion

Screens washed-out when used out-of-doors

Mar 9, 2015 4:51AM PDT

This is a touchy subject which manufacturers try to avoid: LCD screens, especially on larger cellphones, are hard or impossible to see outside especially on sunny days. They say to just turn the brightness to #10 but that is the setting all phone stores use when displaying phones so how could that be used outside? I have been told to look for an app to brighten the screen, shade the LCD with my hands, wear sunglasses, etc or some other silly response. The fact is that screens can barely be seen vs. sunlight. OLED screens seem to be the answer as they are used in billboards on Times Square and in Vegas. It seems like they have been unable to harness OLED screens due to cost and other problems. In the meantime, my new LG G3 phone is useless at the beach and park. Any comments?

Discussion is locked

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How to power such things?
Mar 9, 2015 5:02AM PDT

Those outdoor displays use a lot of power as it takes more Watts irregardless of the OLED or such tech.

Not long ago there were https://www.google.com/#q=transflective+lcd but the market spoke. They wanted better.

Sunlight readable displays are going to be something else other than full color gamut displays. Think of what you see in military cockpits next time.
Bob

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They sky is blue, stop signs are red
Mar 9, 2015 2:33PM PDT

You seriously just figured out that your large screen is unusable outside(?) If it's the first smartphone you have ever owned, I can see why you might be frustrated. Otherwise, this is quite old news. Nothing to see here folks...

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Digital camera screens
Mar 10, 2015 3:35AM PDT

Not buying that LCD screens on phones cannot be seen in bright sunlight. All my digital cameras with 3" LCD displays are clearly seen outdoors.

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Still how to power such?
Mar 10, 2015 3:45AM PDT

Those screens suck a lot of power to do so. We just barely got back to more than a day of runtime and now you want to drop that to under a hour? The market will vote again. In fact it has.

Why don't you do a Indiegogo or make such a thing? Great way to learn why things are the way they are.
Bob

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Compare the LCD on a camera to a high end smartphone
Mar 10, 2015 4:16AM PDT

Massive difference in functionality. Here's a hint related to what Bob said- ask yourself how many digital cameras *don't* have removable batteries(?)

Time for you to think out of the box and do a few more google searches, amigo.