OLED屏能否助三星挽回頹勢？

????當韓國三星集團（Samsung）推出一款針對智能手機和平板電腦的全新屏幕時，許多批評人士都覺得這款屏幕有些發紅。

????也許用“發紅”來形容并不確切——其實它更接近一種飽和得有些不真實的亮紅色。

????三星是OLED領域幾乎無可爭辯的王者。OLED的全稱是有機發光二極管。近年來，隨著三星在高端和低端手機市場受到了越來越大的挑戰，該公司開始利用自己在OLED市場的霸權穩固。在利潤較低的低端市場上，愿意犧牲利潤換取市場份額的當地廠商，比如小米（Xiaomi），著實給三星造成了不小的沖擊；而在利潤相對較高的高端市場上，以蘋果（Apple）iPhone為代表的競爭對手又給三星帶來了極大的壓力。每家企業都希望自家的設備銷量好，問題是大家的產品大同小異，是什么刺激消費者買這一款，不買那一款呢？

????三星希望它的顯示技術能夠成為刺激購買欲望的因素之一，因為它的競爭對手們使用的都是不那么鮮艷，但更受信賴的屏幕技術。

????蘋果的iPhone、iPad以及大約三分之二的其他智能手機均使用LCD屏幕，即液晶顯示屏。LCD顯示屏通過扭轉液晶來使一定量的光線穿過每個紅、綠或藍像素。這一技術很知名，也很成熟，但它也有一個比較大的缺點：液晶自己是不發光的，液晶背后的發光板會顯著影響電池壽命。另外算上液晶屏本身和其它必要技術配件的厚度，LCD屏通常要更厚、更硬一些。

????目前三星的大多數設備采用的是AMOLED屏幕（又叫主動矩陣有機發光二極管）。這種技術使電流通過一些有機材料薄膜（紅綠藍色）來發出有色光。由于AMOLED顯示屏自身可以發光，它不需要背光板。更妙的是，當不需要某些像素發光時，它們會被“關閉”掉，從而節省電力，而且AMOLED顯示屏上的黑色也要比LCD顯示屏更深、更純。隨著工藝和材料的進步，如今的AMOLED顯示屏已經造得比以往更薄、像素密度極高，有的甚至還能彎曲，而且它的色域也非常廣。

????最重要的是，這些工藝進步很大程度上來自同一個制造商，即三星電子集團旗下的三星顯示公司（Samsung Display）。IHS公司高級總監維尼塔?賈克漢瓦表示：“可能還有其他幾家公司涉及這項技術領域，但這些顯示屏實際上都來自三星，除此以外，市場上再沒有其他廠家為手機或平板電腦生產OLED或AMOLED顯示屏了?！?/p>

????三星當然樂于談談它的顯示技術。在今年夏天發布的一段Galaxy Tab S平板電腦推廣視頻中，一位女士在網上購買了沙拉碗、裙子和高跟鞋，等快遞到了，卻發現實物的顏色跟網站上的圖片顏色偏差很大，不由得唉聲嘆氣。這時旁白說道，三星Galaxy Tab S平板電腦可以展示“專業的RGB標準”，每個像素“都是一個活的像素，能夠創造一系列色彩組合?！睗撆_詞就是說，三星的屏幕是有機的，是不一樣的，在色彩顯示上做得更好。

????When critics of Samsung see the Korean technology mega-corporation turn out yet another huge, impressively sharp screen for a new phone or tablet computer, it makes them see red.

????Well, not red, actually—more like a super-saturated, unrealistically bright version of red.

????Samsung is the near-undisputed king of OLED, or organic light-emitting diode, display technology. It has been using its dominant position in that market as a source of stability as it enters an increasingly untenable situation: eroding sales on both ends of the phone price spectrum. On the low end where profit margins are thin, Samsung has been under attack by local manufacturers such as Xiaomi, which have been willing to sacrifice profit for the sake of market share. On the high end where margins are better, rivals such as Apple’s iPhone have proved to be fiercely competitive. Every company in the business hopes that large sales volumes will make their big bets pay off in the end; the question is what will prompt consumers to buy one glassy device over another.

????Samsung hopes that display technology will be one of those things as its rivals use less flashy but more trusted screen technology.

????Apple’s iPhones and iPads and roughly two-thirds of all smartphones have LCD, or liquid-crystal display, screens. LCDs essentially twist and untwist liquid crystals to allow a certain amount of light through each red, green, or blue sub-pixel, the term for the components that make up each individual pixel in a display. The technology is well-known and well-worn, but it comes with a major downside: liquid crystals provide no light of their own. The necessary backlight that accompanies such displays is a substantial draw on battery life; taken together with the crystals and other necessary technology, such displays make the resulting screen thicker and more rigid.

????Most of Samsung’s modern devices have AMOLED (as in “active-matrix organic light-emitting diode”) displays. The technology involves passing a current through tiny, thin films of organic material (red, green, or blue), which cause them to throw off colored light. AMOLED screens generate their own light, so they do not need a backlight. Even better, when the pixels are not needed, they are actually “off,” saving device power and allowing blacks to be deeper and truer than with LCDs. Manufacturing and material improvements have made AMOLED displays thinner, extremely pixel-dense, occasionally curved, and able to display a huge range of colors.

????Most importantly, these manufacturing improvements come largely from one single maker: Samsung Display, a division of Samsung Electronics. “There may be a couple of other players, technically, but, really, these displays come from Samsung,” says Vinita Jakhanwal, senior director of analyst firm IHS. “There is no other OLED or AMOLED maker making displays for mobile phones or tablets.”

????Samsung certainly wants to talk about its display technology. In a video promotion for its Galaxy Tab S tablet this summer, women purchase salad bowls, dresses, and shoes online, only to sigh in deep exasperation when a different shade of blue-green, yellow, or shale comes out of the box. The Galaxy Tab S, the voice-over claims, displays the “professional RGB standard” and each pixel is a “living pixel, capable of producing a variety of color combinations.” The message: Samsung’s screens are organic, different, and simply better at colors.