Miniature Displays & Sunlight Readability

Does anyone have comments or insights into sunlight readability characteristics of current miniature displays? The displays I'm interested in are in the 0.95" to 1.2" diagonal range (used in cellphones, and MP3 players, etc.). Full colour is preferred (though PLED displays are a possibility). Power consumption is also a concern, so solutions that provide good readability via high brightness, but will suck a battery dry in no time are a non-starter.

I've looked at:

- TFT LCD with transflective backlight; (most common, but inneficient in transmissive mode, so backlight must be over-powered to provide good visibility in darkness).

- TFT LCD with TMR (transmissive/micro reflective) backlight; (supposedly better in transmissive mode than transflective, not as good in reflective mode)

- OLED; (cheap!, emissive, seems lifespan issues may be addressed for current production, but brightness at 90-150cd/m2 may make sunlight readability an issue).

- E-Ink (front-lighting required for dark viewing is undesireable, no "off-the-shelf product" available - every one is custom, update rate is slow (500msec!) - not that we _need_ fast update, contrast of panel in pictures I've seen does not appear great).

How does a transflective or TMR STN display compare with TFT?

I don't _have_ any of these displays. I've been working on technical specifications. I'd like to buy samples, to test, but difficulty in driving and interfacing to many different displays (each with a custom connector!) make this impractical - not to mention that some sample quantities of some displays are prohibitively priced.

Other factors that may come into play:

- surface finish on glass to reduce front surface reflectance in bright sunlight.

- product lifespan - piggy-backing on cellphone market means your supply is tied to _their_ market trends - so your supply may disappear overnight.

Also interested in supplier recomendations & comments. I've already evaluated offerings from OSD, OSRAM, Varitronix, and Nan Ya Plastics. The big guys (toshiba, samsung, etc.) seem to focus on BIG displays (TVs, Monitors), and would be less interested in the miniscule business our project would represent.

If only they could get field emissive displays (FEDs) into production (and they work to expectations ;-)...

Thanks in advance, R. Main.

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mrmain
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