Sharp Sampling 4K IGZO Displays for 15.6-inch Laptops

By Tarun Iyer
published

The tyranny of ubiquitous 1366 x 768 displays may soon be coming to an end.

Sharp has announced that in order to "support emerging demand for 4K panels for notebooks," the company has become the first manufacturer to provide 15.6-inch notebook displays that offer a resolution of 3840 x 2160 (282 ppi).

Though technical specifications are still pending, it is known that the panels utilize Sharp's IGZO technology which "improves light transmission and enables thin-film transistors to be more compact."

Sharp began sample deliveries of its 4K IGZO LCD panels this month, and production is scheduled to begin in February 2014 at Sharp's Kameyama Plant No. 2. While there's no information on what companies will be adopting this display, XBit Labs has speculated that Apple may install it onto the next-generation MacBook Pro "provided that supplies are decent."

16 Comments Comment from the forums
  • The Indomitable
    But I still can't get a good 120hz 1ms response time IPS in 24"
    And they wonder why the desktop market is losing sales.
    Reply
  • slomo4sho
    What is the purpose of this? There are not mobile GPUs that can currently support gaming at 4K resolution...

    Next we will be seeing 4K on phones... As if the clarity between a 720P and 1080P wasn't already baseline indistinguishable by the human eye...
    Reply
  • Geef
    Pretty soon won't need digital projectors for movie theaters. Just a laptop with a projector on the other side. The dude with the laptop can play the movie and surf the web all at the same time. :p
    Reply
  • InvalidError
    11630727 said:
    What is the purpose of this? There are not mobile GPUs that can currently support gaming at 4K resolution...
    Why does it always have to be about gaming? There are many uses for laptops aside from that and I bet the majority of them are used for non-gaming purposes just like the majority of desktops are also used for non-gaming purposes. Last time I remember seeing numbers about it, computers sold for gaming accounted for less than 10% of retail sales.
    Reply
  • John Bauer
    Imagine a 15.6" 4K notebook, next to your 120" 4k TV, next to your 30" 4K monitor... What a setup.
    Reply
  • slomo4sho
    11630777 said:
    Why does it always have to be about gaming? There are many uses for laptops aside from that and I bet the majority of them are used for non-gaming purposes just like the majority of desktops are also used for non-gaming purposes. Last time I remember seeing numbers about it, computers sold for gaming accounted for less than 10% of retail sales.

    Video and photo editing is also out of the question on a laptop.That leaves what? Watching videos? Higher resolutions mean greater viewing area on the desktop which equates to smaller font sizes at any given screen size. I suppose they should include a pair of glasses with magnification as well :)
    Reply
  • dimar
    I wonder how small a defective pixel going to be?
    Reply
  • The Indomitable
    11630727 said:
    What is the purpose of this? There are not mobile GPUs that can currently support gaming at 4K resolution...

    Next we will be seeing 4K on phones... As if the clarity between a 720P and 1080P wasn't already baseline indistinguishable by the human eye...

    actually, it's quite easy for me to tell the difference between a 1080p phone and a 720p phone.
    But that's not the point. Very, very soon they're gonna run into a brick wall as far as advancing mobile displays go. After a flexible 1080p screen, what more could you want in a phone?
    Where as on the desktop, there's so much more to improve on and they just won't do it.
    Reply
  • JD88
    Hold your 300+ppi phone up next to your PC monitor and you'll see the difference. Even from a couple feet back the difference is huge. I'm not sure it's something that is "needed" but it sure looks good.

    If you've ever used a Chromebook Pixel or Retina MP you know what I'm talking about. Looking at those screens is pure joy.
    Reply
  • kenyee
    Programming would be good at 4K resolution if you have amazing eyesight :-)
    1920x1200 displays work decently well for Eclipse and Visual Studio though they'd work better w/ 4:3 displays which no one makes any more :-P
    Reply