1. Abstract
With eth advent of computing devices, there has been a phenomenal growth in the adoption of electronic displays. There has been adoption of electronic displays in these environments. Even as the evolution of electronic devices is seen to be on the increase, there is a need to ensure that the electronic display devices are friendly to the environment and efficient for personal use. Emphasis is seen to be put on safety and green computing. There is also an emergence of hand-held devices which are being adopted at a fast rate and the use of electronic displays is highly adopted for use in these devices. This paper will look at the extent in which electronic display devices have been adopted and more so, on the various applications of electronic displays. It will start at the basics of electronic displays.
2. Introduction
Electronic displays are defined as electronic component that is used in the conversion of electrical signals into visual imagery so that they can be interpreted by human operators. This is an interface between the human and the machine. In normal operation, the machine uses language that is not understandable to human beings. There has therefore been an effort to bring this disparity to a close by having electronic displays that will show what the machine is working on. The visual imagery is composed and processed so that there is minimal human error while interpreting. Electronic displays can be termed as being dynamic in that content are displayed using the shortest time possible from the time they are produced. It makes use refresh techniques so that the same information is displayed up to new information is got. The creation of the image follows a pattern that is created electronically from a visual contrast in luminance. This luminance is obtained in two elements which are individually electrically alterable elements and between electrically excitable and non-excitable elements. For a standard television image to be displayed there is need to be approximately 75000 to 2000000 pixels.
3. Literature surveys
Electronic displays have been used to present graphs, symbols and still and moving video pictures and this has doubled the expansion of micro-electronics for several years. With the use of electronic displays, there has been replacement of traditional mechanical devices of displaying information like galvanometers and counters and to some extent it has also replaced the use of hard copy papers. This is because of the increased use of computers and, microprocessors and inexpensive LSI electronics. There are also digital mass memories. There has been the application of digital displays in the making of digital watches which has been a great success. The hand-held calculators have also been seen to have benefited to a great success. These, together with great use of personal computers have increased the adoption and enhancement of digital displays technology.
4. Methodology
The section serves to review the research methods and approach, which was considered most appropriate for the research, hence were used towards the achievement of the research objectives. The aim of the section is achieved through developing the foundation of the collection of the important research data, which served in the development of the theoretical and conceptual framework. In addition, the section describes the approach used in choosing the case study organization, hence being vital towards laying out essential foundation for the analysis plan.
This research heavily relied on secondary data. The data was obtained from websites of hardware manufacturers. Other information was obtained from journals and product review magazines.
The strength that this method has is that most information is found on review website. It is easier and cheaper to get this information as compared to other means of obtaining data. The weakness is that the information which can be trusted is hard to get. Most data from websites are from uninformed people.
5. Results
There have been dramatic changes in the industry of electronic displays with the advancement in high-information-content FPD. The advancement was because of the introduction of new technology, liquid-crystal displays (LCD). It is clear that color active-matrix LCDs (AMLCDs) have been known to be better in performance when compared to color CRTs when used for video or used for displaying computer graphics. In addition to this, they are known to be portable and thin so that it is lighter. One downside of AMLCDs is that they are expensive thereby limiting their use to only few applications like use in personal computers and television receivers which do not use CRT.
6. Discussion
There are three perspectives that electronic displays can be looked at. These are the application areas, technology that is used and the environment in which they are used.
6.1 Application
The application of electronic displays can be seen in the home color television. The most important industrial application of electronic displays is computer terminal using CRT or FPD. The main application of the CRTs is in the home entertainment television, computer monitors and use in scientific and electrical engineering oscilloscopes, displays in radar devices, alphanumeric and graphic electronic displays. Given the degree dimension of the use of CRT, there has been a concentrated effort to come up with FPDs. The main motivating factor has been so that flat-high-information-content display which could be put to hang from a wall of which could be carried in a briefcase. With time, there has been the electrical phenomenon which has been most extensively created for FPDs; these are the gas discharge (plasma), light-emitting diodes, electroluminescence, liquid crystallinity and cathodoluminescence. It has been found out that the cost of FPDs is higher than that of CRTs basing on character-per basis HIC displays.
In the years before the 1990s, there has been restricted adoption of FPDs because of its cost and applications which are specialized. With two major breakthroughs in the period of 1980s, LCD emerged as the most preferred FPDs. The two inventions here are the super twisted nematics (STN) LCD and evolution of AMLCD which can be manufactured. STN are also referred to as passive-matrix LCD (PMLCD). STN technology enhanced LCDs in that they can be made to be as HIC FPD; this is so because the matrix addressing capability is improved with the use of STN. These two types are made in both monochrome and full color. It is also clear that AMLCD is fast enough so that it can be used in both video and multimedia displays which are comparable to CRTs. On the other hand, PMLCD is fast enough so that it can be used for computer but it cannot be used for video. Although this is the case, PMLCDs are known to be half the cost of AMLCDs. This is the advantage that they have over AMLCDs.
The applications of LCDs are seen in devices which are used in portable computing and memory aids; they are applicable in areas like electronic games, aircraft, and motored vehicles, map devices which are moving with regard to global positioning satellites (GPS) for boats which are used for navigation, devices which are used for educational purposes, devices which are used for video and are hand-held, television displays, entertainment devices and information dissemination which fit use in educational purposes. LCDs are also known to be used in helmet displays and also used in virtual reality displays.
There are four categories that electronic displays can be placed and each category is defined by its technological boundaries and cost. This categorization is seen to be helpful in the extent in which the electronic displays can be used.
6.2 Technology
The technology of electronic displays can be seen to be using light in creating the displays. An example is that of CRT where color can be created on a CRT which is equipped with a shadow mask which in turn duplicates all the colors that are seen to occur in nature. This achieved using the CRT by making use of three electron guns and three phosphors in a triad of red, green and blue on each screen in each given pixel that is available. The shadow mask is in turn made of metal screen which has a hole that will be used for each triad phosphor dots (pixel). They are located and aligned with the phosphor screen. There is then a constraint of the beam of electrons that come from the three guns; this constrains is done by each shadow mask hole so that it hits each respective phosphor spot (Bylander, 2009).
Phosphors that are used for penetration are used in the creation of color in CRT displays so that they eliminate the need to have shadow mask and the need to have extra guns. One limitation of this is that the brightness is low and also that the color is limited. The technology behind this is that two phosphors are normally placed on the screen in two layers. Alternatively, the two phosphors can be placed in microspheres of two layers. There is then an operation of the CRT and gun anodes in two energy states so that they produce either low-energy or high-energy electron beam which is switchable in time (Whitaker, 2004).
FPD technologies produce monochromatic and full color. The production of full color is achieved by use of triad of red, green and blue for each of the pixels. An alternative method is to flash in a sequential manner at 180Hz of red, green, or blue at each pixel area. The use of full color is known to be important and useful in entertainment television displays. Full color displays is not necessarily needed in industrial electronic displays (Singh, & Sharma, 2007).
The essence of electronic displays follows their ability to turn on and off in given individual pixels. In a normal situation, the normal HIC display has a quarter million pixels in an array which is orthogonal; in this case, each has an individual control by the electronics. The resolution of the pixels is just at or below the resolving power of the eye given at one minute of arc. In this regard, it is found out that a good-quality picture is possible to be created from a pattern of pixels which are activated. This is shown in figure 1. The concept of pixels that is used in electronic displays has evolved from the current FPD technologies and digital electronics (Leachtenauer, 2004).
It is possible to have alphanumeric character fonts in flat-panel and CRT digital display techniques; this is achieved by having the appropriate pixels in an array. One of the standard sizes is that of 5x7 array where two characters are in between the characters and other two are in between the rows (shown in figure 1) (Sharp, 2004). In this case, all letters and numbers can be created on this format of array. There is an evolving efficient and elegant array that is used for displaying characters and many letters of the alphabet, this is called the seven-bar font (shown in figure 2). In this case, each bar is a pixel by definition. At first, this font was regarded to be crude when compared to Leory font and other fonts which are aesthetic. This font (seven-bar) is accepted universally. There is another 14 bar font which is usually used for alphanumeric characters (Andrews, 2009).
6.3 Environment
Electronic displays have been used in various environments. Various types of electronic displays fit various environments. It has been found out that home entertainment environments do not require stringent requirements as compared to industrial environments or personal computing environments. AMLCDs, for example, are known to be advanced and preferred in personal computing environments than PMLCDs. They are therefore adopted in these environments. CRTs can be used in both environments but they are found to be hazardous to the environment. They are therefore being eliminated and the environmental crusaders are in a campaign to eliminate this form of electronic display. The reason is that it uses cathode ray tube which is not friendly to the environment. There is therefore an outcry to eliminate this technology (Hallberg, 2009).
Electronic displays can also be used in hand-held devices. Mobile phones have greatly made use of electronic displays. There has been a great revolution in the mobile phone market with the adoption and use of smaller screens to display the content of the mobile phones. Electronic displays have been used to enhance mobile technology.
7. Conclusion
With the enhancement in gadgets that are used for personal computing, there is a lot of emphasis in developing electronic displays which are environment friendly and also safe for humans. Future gadgets that will be used in personal computing should be friendly to the environment and should also ensure that it is convenient and reliable to the users. With many people getting access to computing devices, there is a need to ensure that the gadgets that are used by these people are safe and convenient. Many people will have the liking for the technology if they have a good display device in play. Electronic displays have a role to play in the adoption process of the computing devices.
8. Recommendation
The design of electronic devices should be in tandem with personal safety and environment. The electronic devices should be green and good enough to be used safely in the environment. There should be eradication of hazardous electronic display gadgets like CRT.
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