VESA Releases New Electro-Mechanical Standards Set for LCD Notebooks Panels

August 26, 2004

Newly released standards from the Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) have been developed to enable LCD manufacturers and panel consumers to better control supply and demand cycles.

These specifications will define requirements for the standardization of mechanical dimensions and selected electrical interface requirements of 12.1-inch, 12.1-inch wide, 15.4-inch and 17-inch wide panels intended for use in LCD notebooks. The intent is that panels built to these specifications will be able to be used in most applications without requiring alterations in either the product tooling or the display module.

“The intent is to enable panel suppliers to meet VESA’s objective of transparent usage across various product platforms, and to do so while maintaining panel product differentiators that are important to many suppliers, according to Bill Lempesis, VESA’s executive director.”

Earlier this month, VESA has introduced a new standard designed to support ease of use and true Plug & Play capability for display and graphics subsystems in the personal computer.

Developed to address the rapid pace of new graphics hardware and software product introductions, the Plug & Play (PnP) Standard defines a procedure for Plug & Play in the display/graphics subsystem. It assumes that the graphics subsystem in the computer has been installed, enumerated and configured by a computer system and covers all operations that take place in the monitor, video interface, and from any sources of computer-generated images. These include graphics cards, chips or systems on a motherboard, tablet PCs, PDA, workstation computer or a notebook PC's external monitor video ports.

The new standard also incorporates references to operations that occur in the OS and in device drivers, and includes a list of required elements and processes for true PnP. One basic recommendation in the PnP standard suggests that the capabilities of the video generating hardware -- such as video pixel formats, color depth, vertical refresh rates, and others - match or exceed the capabilities of the monitor.

"The new standard supports VESA's efforts to promote ease of use and improve the user's experience," said Bill Lempesis, VESA's executive director. "It was developed to meet, exceed and/or complement standards objectives including support for Microsoft's Plug and Play definitions, the Digital Visual Interface (DVI) specification Version 1.0, and other digital interface standards."

For more information about the Notebook Standard Panel Standards, please visit the VESA web site at http://www.vesa.org