Posted on Wednesday, May 09 2012 @ 20:57 CEST by Thomas De Maesschalck
Raymond Soneira, founder, president and CEO of DisplayMate Technologies, claims Apple's new iPad was the company's plan B because Sharp didn't have its IGZO display technology ready in time. If Apple could have gone through with its plan A, the third-generation iPad would not be thicker and heavier than the older models.
Some analysts are now saying that the gen 3 iPad design that made it out the door earlier this year was Plan B for Apple. Plan A was an iPad that didn't have the additional heft. (While the Apple tablet's height and width remained the same, the thickness of the new iPad swelled slightly to 0.37 inch and the weight edged up to 1.44 pounds.)
That's what Raymond Soneira, the founder, president and CEO of DisplayMate Technologies, is saying, and he knows a lot more than me about the ins and outs of the newest iPad.
"The plan was to use this new technology called IGZO from Sharp -- a lot higher electron mobility that allows them to make the transistors a lot smaller and the circuit elements a lot smaller," he said.
In short, smaller transistors and circuit elements allow more light through and reduce the number of backlights needed, resulting in a thinner display assembly.
More details
CNET.
