First Philips Lumiblade OLED lights arrive
By Nilay Patel 
posted May 20th 2009 5:15PM
posted May 20th 2009 5:15PM
posted May 20th 2009 5:15PM
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OLED lights... do we really need them?
But just imagine the contrast ratio - real black when they're turned off!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
Electric light blubs... do we really need them? I mean, we've got candles.
i heard they're power efficient also?
I think the main use will be glare free lighting. Imagine walking into a well room and you can't pinpoint where the light is coming from (in truth, the ceiling may be glowing slightly .. but you can't really tell .. kind of like how when there is an overcast day you can't really tell where the sun is .. but everything is still pretty well lit. Also this can be useful in cars .. the entire front bumper can glow so that there isn't blinding glare to oncoming drivers while the road is still well lit up.
They should have at least chosen another color, that just look like Indiglow from a Timex watch
I thought of a use, stick them on phones (screenside cam) and webcams so they nicely light your face and smooths out any wrinkles and bags under the eyes.
Perhaps a round one with a hole in it for webcams, and also maybe for macrophotography.
Will apple be using this to backlight their new iphones?
OLED displays already exist and don't need a backlight.
This is for illuminating other stuff, not itself.
I think johnbob was talking the about the glowing apple logo on the backside of the iphone.
reminds me of my Timex Ironman Triathlon watch with Indiglo, circa 1998.
Me too, so I looked it up:
http://electronics.howstuffworks.com/gadgets/clocks-watches/question296.htm
Indiglo was an inorganic phosphor. I imagine it was neither very bright nor very efficient and therefore wouldn't have made very good general purpose lighting.
So now even your lights can have dead pixels?
Apparently it was damaged during shipment... the full info was on the read link, typical Engadget to misread a sentence and portray it wrong.
This is the only way for OLED to go.... I mean, sure it looks nice, but its very expensive for me and half of the country.
When are LED bulbs going to be affordable? I see no use for this thing.
What use could there possibly be for a super-thin light source that uses almost no power, does not heat up, and lasts 10000+ hours?
Hmmmm... what other products were expensive when they came out and people had a "hard time" thinking of why they were useful? Oh, I don't know... computers, cell phones, cars... you know, useless shit.
the mans got a point
The question is when will the chinese or even koreans start to make and sell these, and will they have to pay ridiculous royalties to philips, because asking more for a small square that lights up than an equally sized full color display - with touchscreen - seems a bit odd.
This could make for a more compact amBX setup. Maybe even powered by USB.
What is the lumens per watt on this thing? I'm betting not very good. People like to croon about LED, and yet the best LED fixture I've been able to buy only does 50 lumens per watt, which is about half the efficiency of a typical T-5 fluorescent lamp.
Don't be fooled, LED and OLED's are no more efficient than what is already on the market. They do have some some advantages, like fitting in small spaces, dealing with cold environments, vibration, but not with overall lumen per watt.
Ahhh, from the article - "are up to 20 lm/w in efficiency, and Philips say that the lifetime is 10,000 hours"
The typical incandescent does 17 lm/w, halogen 20 lm/w, LED 50 lm/w, CFL 70 lm/w and high quality fluorescent 108lm/w.
So this is about as energy efficient as a halogen bulb, only much less bright. Welcome to the future my friends.
Don't get too tied up with quoted efficiencies for T5 lamps - those figures are measured at 25 deg C (have you felt how hot tubes get?) and don't take into account all the losses from the luminaire - you're looking at 30-50 lm/W for a T5 actually in a product.
Likewise, the OLED lifetimes are still measured to 50% initial brightness, where as commercial lighting is replaced at 70% initial brightness.
Speckles = poor quality encapsulation and cathode deterioration.
Then why do people want this?
At least it's better to backlight laptop screens, right? RIght?
Low power consumption and little to no heat signature? Hmm, wonder if pot, er plants can grow with the right amount of this lighting?
Sure, if you like tall skinny sickly plants.
I could make some cool things with those :)
Anyone know how this differs from electro-luminescent lighting? Flat, Flexible, cool, low power...Let me know what I'm missing.
Philips's enthusiasm.
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I reckon the main use will be glare free lighting. Imagine walking into a well room and you can't pinpoint where the light is coming from (in truth, the ceiling may be glowing slightly .. but you can't really tell .. kind of like how when there is an overcast day you can't really tell where the sun is .. but everything is still pretty well lit. Also this can be useful in cars .. the entire front bumper can glow so that there isn't blinding glare to oncoming drivers while the road is still well lit up.
Generally such lighting is a bit depressing though.
Do want!
There's something about this that just begs to be handled...