Data Modul is based locally, in Munich. It is the largest distributor of specialist displays in Germany. At the 2014 show, the company had divided its stand into several different areas, varying by applications.
A particular highlight was sunlight-readable displays from several of Data Modul’s partners. A selection of these, in 2″ – 7″ sizes, were from Ortus Technology. Ortus has its own display technology design called Blanview, which is a type of transflective LCD. Because these do not require very bright backlights to operate in direct sunlight, they are said to consume around 30% less power than competing products.
JDI fell back on a very bright backlight and anti-glare coating for its module, a 7″ unit. It had 1,200 cd/m² of brightness and 800 x 480 resolution – I was very impressed with the coating, as even under the show lights I saw no bright spots. KOE produced a similar display, in an 8″ size, with 1,500 cd/m² of brightness.
The final sunlight-readable display was an optically-bonded bar-type unit from KOE, with 450 cd/m² of brightness and 1280 x 242 resolution.
Next was the new display area. A module (M280DGJ-L30) using Innolux’s 28″ UltraHD panel was on show; we first saw this in products at CES this year (Display Monitor Vol 21 No 3). It had 300 cd/m² of brightness and a 1,000:1 contrast ratio. Next to it was a 24.5″ OLED display from Sony. Resolution was 1920 x 1080, with a 5,000:1 contrast ratio and 250 cd/m² of brightness. Placing these displays next to each other may have been a mistake, as the OLED looked vastly superior to the LCD unit – especially off-angle.
A curved (convex) display in a landscape orientation was an AUO product. It is intended for gaming applications, such as casinos. Resolution is 1920 x 1080, with 350 cd/m² of brightness and a 1,000:1 contrast ratio. Radius is 180mm. Full specifications have not been announced yet, as the display is still under development.
Two other areas were of interest. One showed the range of complete solutions that Data Modul is offering, for industrial and medical use. These include, for example, monitors with embedded PCs. Customers can select the components to be used, or rely on Data Modul’s own choices.
Finally there was an interesting demonstration of capacitive touch being used while the operator was wearing a thick glove, or when the screen was covered in water. This uses a combination of mutual and self capacitance.
