Amazon.co.uk is now listing LG's EL9500 OLED TV. It costs £1970 (around $3000). This is rather strange as LG has announced that it'll start shipping the TV in europe in May. Perhaps this one is actually shipping from Korea. In any case, a great opportunity for brits to get that cool 15" OLED TV...

LGE EL9500

The LG EL9500 has a 15" OLED panel with 1366x768 resolution, 100,000:1 contrast and a response time that is lower than 0.01msec. It's only 1.7mm thick.

There are reports that Samsung are set to announce a new Super-AMOLED phone soon (in the CTIA exhibition). The phone will be called the Galaxy S and it'll run Android on a 1Ghz processor.

Samsung are also working on "Super AMOLED optimized" content: full-length movies and TV shows and also books and magazines. Sounds interesting.

Samsung is said to be developing a new Windows Phone 7 (WP7) device, and it will have a Super-AMOLED touch display. It will also have 8mp camera, Wi-Fi, 3G and A-GPS. This isn't surprising as Microsoft are expecting most WP7 phones to have AMOLEDs.

We'll wait for an official announcement.

Nippon Seiki has developed new technology that enabled 75% reduction in power consumption for PMOLED displays. They have already commercialized this with a 0.8" green monochrome OLED panel that will be shipping in samples this month. The company also plans to develop panels of other colors including white. It's not clear whether this technology can also be used to make AMOLED panels more efficient.

new green PMOLED vs regular PMOLED

Nippon Seiki says taht the new panel is as efficient as a LED-backlit LCD, and has the same visibility as their previous PMOLED panels. The lower power consumption was realized by making improvements to the structure of an organic EL element, production processes and manufacturing management.

We have some more information about Linde's group and Shanghai University flexible OLED project. It turns out that the packaging and encapsulation is just the first phase, and should be completed by the end of 2010. In the second phase they will develop OLED materials (this will take 2-3 years). In the 2nd phase they will also work with TFT-LCD manufacturers to test volume production of the new OLED designs.

Linde themselves want to sell gases for OLED production, but they also want to get the OLED technology itself to market. They could sell the OLED technology itself via a technology transfer.

Update: the University removed the guide...

Here's something for you: Make your own OLEDs at home. Researchers from the University of Wisconsin has published a nice DIY guide for OLEDs: using a fan, duct tape, glass and power supply. And some stock of Ru(bpy)₃](BF₄)_2...

This is rather cool and reminds me of that MIT professor who showed us how OLEDs work using a pickle...

There are reports that Google sold only 135,000 Nexus One phones in the 74 days since it started shipping. You may ask why 74 days - it's the time it took Apple to sell 1 million first generation iPhones. Motorola sold 1.05 million Droid phones in the same time frame.

They say that this is a disappointment for Google, but we have to remember that the phone is only available online and only for T-Mobile (although that is now changed). Also Google is a company that has a lot of patience and hopefully they'll continue support and development of their phones.

The Holst Centre has released a new proprietary roll-to-roll (R2R) sintering platform for fast and low-temperature curing of printed conductive structures. The center is progressing towards a complete tool set for R2R manufacturing and can be used for plastic electronics such as flexible OLEDs, organic PV solar cells and more. Holst' line now includes printing, coating, drying and lamination stages in addition to the new sintering unit. A vacuum deposition stage is currently in development.

Screen printed structures on foil photo

High web speeds and low temperatures are key elements for R2R manufacturing of plastic electronics. The sintering platform uses a new photonic sintering process, developed by Holst Centre, which heats only the printed target material rather than the whole carrier substrate. The tool can sinter printed conductive structures in less than a second, which is already enabling a fast throughput speed of over 5 meters/minute. It also works at significantly lower temperatures than traditional sintering techniques, preventing distortion of the carrier substrates and reducing energy costs.

UK's Vodafone says that HTC's Desire and Legend phones will be released on April. The Legend has a 3.2" touch AMOLED (480x320) and a 5Mp camera, while the Desire has a larger 3.7" AMOLED (800x480) and a 1Ghz CPU. Both phones are running the Android 2.1 OS. Interestingly The Legend (that phone is exclusive for Vodafone UK) will include Vodafone's own 360 social service on top of the Sense UI.

HTC Desire

We do not know how much the phones will cost, but if you want them unlocked, Amazon will offer then for $601 (Legend) and $795 (Desire).

Update: The N1 is also coming to Sprint soon...

Google's Nexus One phone is now shipping in another version that supports the frequencies used by AT&T in the US and Rogers in Canada. The phone is still unlocked, and costs $529. The Nexus One has a 3.7" touch WVGA AMOLED, runs on Android v2.1 (1Ghz CPU), 5Mp camera and comes with a 4GB microSD.

Google Nexus One