Nokia

There are rumors that Nokia is preparing a new handset, called the N87 Vasco, which will have a 3.7" touch AMOLED. It will also have a 12mp camera (Carl Zeiss optics & Xenon flash, with infra-night vision), Wi-Fi, GPS, FM radio & transmitter, ARM Cotex 8 CPU (800Mhz), 16/32Gb of internal memory.

UPDATE: This video has been removed from YouTube

Yesterday we posted a video comparing the Samsung Omnia II's OLED vs the Nokia N900's LCD (and the OLED is much better, of course). Now the same user has uploaded another video, showing how the displays behave in direct sunlight - and the OLED is much better. This is interesting, as usually people say that OLED are very bad in such conditions. A couple of months ago we posted a story on this - showing examples of OLEDs in sunlight that are completely non-readable. Barry Young from the OLED association told us that newer OLED displays will be much brighter - perhaps he was right.

So the 2009 holiday season is almost here - and obviously you'd like a new gadget with an OLED display. So what are your options?

OLED TVs

Sadly, there aren't that many OLED TVs around as we'd hope for. Sony is still selling the XEL-1 (at around $2,200) - but you should hurry, as they have stopped the production line, and will soon stop offering this TV. Your other option is LG's 15" OLED TV - but this is currently available in Korea only, for around $2600. It's probably best to wait a few years before actually buying an OLED TV...

Mobile phones

There are many OLED phones you can choose from... it seems that every week Samsung releases yet another smartphone with a large touch OLED. Samsung currently offers dozens of models - including the Impression,  the Moment, the Behold II, the Omnia II and the Jet. Nokia is offering the N86 and even HP recently announced an OLED phone - the iPAQ Glisten. 

Samsung Moment

Digital Cameras

Compared to mobile phones, there are very little OLED digital cameras around... There's the Samsung TL320 and the NV24HD, and also Nikon's new S70 - with a large touch AMOLED, 12Mp sensor and 5X optical zoo.

Nikon S70

Rogers Wireless in Canada is the first north-American carrier to sell the Nokia N86, on their 3G HSPA network. It sells for $100 (with a 3 year plan that includes a data plan). 

Nokia N86

The N86 can also be bought unlocked in the US for 395$. The N86 has a 2.6" AMOLED display, 8Mp camera, 8Gb of memory and a microSD.

Via Elecronista

The Nokia N86 is finally available for US customers - being sold unlocked for 469$. 

The N86 is a dual slider with 8Mp camera, 2.6" OLED, 3G and WiFi. 

Engadget reports that there are rumors that Nokia is set to release a new AMOLED phone next month. The Erdos (part of the high-end 8xxx series) has a 2.4" (320x240) OLED display, A-GPS, 3G support, Wi-Fi, USB, a 5Mp camera and 8Gb of internal memory. It's an ultra-thin, ultra-shiny slider.

OLED is an emissive display technology - it means that the OLED materials emit light. This is in contrast to a reflective display - which uses an external light source - an ePaper display for example, or a 'real' paper. OLEDs are bright, and provide great image quality, but because they are emissive, when viewed under direct sunlight (or any strong light source) they have a readability problem.

The best display technology for direct sunlight (besides ePaper) is said to be transflective LCDs, which uses a reflective layer under the LCD's filter. However this reduces the transmissive capabilities of the LCD, and the contrast is compromised as well. With OLEDs, unfortunately, it's not possible to use a reflective layer as the OLEDs themselves emit light.

We have received some word from Nokia N85 users saying that the display is not readable in sunlight - it behaves very poorly. It seems this issue is widespread. Check out this photo for example, showing a prototype N85 outside:

Here's a short video showing the Samsung Omnia II outside. As you can see, the contrast is very poor. In this case they use the automatic brightness mode.