Foldable phone opens into large OLED screen

The phone, demonstrated by Samsung, opens up into an OLED screen.

(PhysOrg.com) -- A new cell phone developed by Samsung opens like a book to reveal a larger OLED screen, essentially turning the phone into a portable media player. Samsung recently demonstrated the prototype at the FPD International 2008 tech trade show in Japan, possibly as the shape of things to come.

As you can see from the video, when the device is closed it looks like a typical cell phone. It has a small screen and a menu of icons, with the appearance of a touch screen.

When the phone unfolds, it displays a flexible OLED screen about five inches across. The material´s flexibility allows the screen to open and fold seamlessly, rather than be composed of two separate screens. The large display would be convenient for surfing the Internet, and is even large enough for watching movies or playing games.

There are no technical specifications, and most likely it will be a long time before the device is commercialized.

via: PC Pro

© 2008 PhysOrg.com

   

• ShadowRam - Nov 24, 2008
  • Rank: 4.5 / 5 (8)
  I want an e-book, that works along the same lines.
  
  SD-Card compatible, with some internal memory as well.
  
  Outside is like a nice hardcover book.
  
  Inside is an OLED display, movies, pictures, PDF Files.
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• earls - Nov 24, 2008
  • Rank: 3.5 / 5 (2)
  Yeah, and doesn't run hot as hell. It's coming buddy, it's coming.
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• zbarlici - Nov 24, 2008
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  keep dreaming boys but unless a breakthrough happens either in storage capacity of batteries, or in the electrical efficiency of displays, you will probably be plugging into an outlet every half hour... considering you want to keep your gadget quite small. But one thing at a time makes more sense, and this is a great first for flexible displays. Great job, Samsung!
  
  
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• PinkElephant - Nov 24, 2008
  • Rank: 4.5 / 5 (2)
  Look to e-paper, not OLEDs for e-books and such. OLEDs have severe issues with endurance and oxidation. 3-color e-paper displays have none of those issues, and furthermore are far more conservative with battery power (indeed, they are just about the most conservative display tech imaginable.) The only issue with e-paper, is refresh rate: but for books/news/static web content you don't need high refresh rates.
  
  As for the folding mode of this prototype, somehow I doubt it would wear well over time. The crease where the display folds will most likely result in progressive degradation of that area, due to micro-fractures induced over time by the folding/unfolding.
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• jeffsaunders - Nov 24, 2008
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  yep e-paper that is what i want. so I can read electronic books. wouldn't hurt to have it in a phone either.
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• morpheus2012 - Nov 25, 2008
  • Rank: 1 / 5 (1)
  was about time
  
  
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• O2L - Nov 25, 2008
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  nice took quite e long time
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• trantor - Nov 25, 2008
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  there are already e-paper phones. But the epaper screen is small and quite primitive. But its one of the cheapest phones on the market and the one with longer battery life.
  
  epaper consumes less energy because energy is spent ONLY when changing the image. Since e-paper is made for static images (like a page from a book), it will only spend energy when you scroll or turn the page.
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• QubitTamer - Dec 02, 2008
  • Rank: 4 / 5 (1)
  This is all buggy-whip technology. Almost all discrete displays will become a thing of the past if either a contact lens or intra-corneal artificial lens can be developed with a nano-scale 32-bit color high resolution display embedded in it. It could be powered by body heat or a magnetic induction field from implanted nano-wires around the eye orbit. Video signals would be broadcast in a multitude of frequencies that the lenses would decode and render as a video display... we would literally be immersed in a sea of visual information and stupid things like cell phones, pda's laptop computers, dvd players, big-screen tv's etc would all be relics of the past.
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• LuckyBrandon - Jan 08, 2009
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  sounds like qubit is for taking the distraction out of our hands and implanting it directly into our eye to REALLY mess us up.
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• Nerdle - May 12, 2009
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  Sounds like Qubit isthinking way farther then what we are capable of doing at the moment.
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