IDT to swap solar cells into LCDs, but not for energy reasons

Solar-powered LCDs? Oh, yeah -- we've got those. Sadly, that's not at all what Integrated Digital Technologies is aiming to improve upon next week at Computex, though we still find its approach to trimming LCD weight and manufacturing costs an interesting one. If we're digesting this correctly, we're hearing that the outfit plans to create interactive displays (or iScreens) that have embedded solar cells in the TFT array rather than extra film or glass with photo sensors. The result? A cost savings of up to 30 percent in manufacturing, not to mention a rather significant decrease in weight. Without any images to go by, it's still a wee bit tough to really wrap our heads around this new take, but hopefully we'll see more next week in Taiwan.

[Via TG Daily]

[(Unverified) Posted May 31st 2009 10:18AM]

The point should be, it makes an optical touch screen.

[Level 5 Posted May 31st 2009 10:25AM]

Good.. maybe we won't have to pay over a grand for 30" 2560x1600 displays anymore..

[(Unverified) Posted May 31st 2009 10:48AM]

This was one of my ideas for a device like the iphone! Imagine having your iphone charge everytime you use it because of the light tracing onto the screen!

[Whiternoise Posted May 31st 2009 12:13PM]

Not reading the article fail?

[v3xx Posted May 31st 2009 5:00PM]

i agree not reading the article fail, but i cant wait for the day when most electronic materials are able to power themselves on the heat they give off plus solar plus the room temperature and whatever els we can think of. or till they can make energy solid state.

[Master of the Intangible Posted Jun 2nd 2009 1:26AM]

I agree but... we have "solid state energy" already, it's called a magnet.

[(Unverified) Posted May 31st 2009 11:08AM]

price would be interesting

[looselycoupled Posted May 31st 2009 2:04PM]

Since when are touchscreens now referred to as "interactive displays" ?

[Whiternoise Posted May 31st 2009 2:45PM]

By the sounds of it, it's not necessarily a touch screen. If the solar cells are used to detect when part of the screen is covered, by measuring differences between cell output voltage and the ambient light level, then you could wave at your phone to lock it, things like that.

[idiot Posted May 31st 2009 2:09PM]

huh?

[(Unverified) Posted May 31st 2009 3:38PM]

Don't think will be attractive price point initially. Maybe in 2 years we could see some cost savings. Would be great in 30" + arena!

-JT
[e-mail]

[dkabal Posted May 31st 2009 4:05PM]

IDT is more commonly the abbreviation for Integrated Device Technology, a large (near $1B market cap) US-based company trading as IDTI on NASDAQ.

[matamou Posted May 31st 2009 5:49PM]

Cool

[Kenneth Lam Posted May 31st 2009 8:29PM]

im not sure how it's going to be, but it's kind of stupid if the solar cell is assembled into the LCD screen. as sunlight/lighting always makes the backlight looks dim..

[(Unverified) Posted Jun 1st 2009 3:31PM]

Blah Blah Blah.....GO CHEAPER STUFF!