Samsung gets rave reviews about its mobile phone hardware, with one exception — the display. Though the Korean company uses color-rich AMOLED screens, it uses a less desirable PenTile screen instead of the preferred RGB display. People that don’t like the PenTile display claim the screen is not as crisp as an RGB display and report a color fringing that effects how images look on the smartphone’s screen. You can check out this 2010 Ars technica article about the Nexus One and its PenTile display for an in-depth explanation.
Philip Berne talked to MobileBurn about display technology and explained that Samsung chose PenTile for its phone because of longevity and reliability. Due to its subpixel arrangement, a PenTile display should last longer than its RGB counterpart, which is important to mobile phone customers who often buy a phone with a two-year contract.
Though many people complain about PenTile, Berne points out that the company’s Galaxy Nexus phone has a PenTile display that’s been optimized to reduce the fringing and clarity complaints attributed to a PenTile display. He also told MobileBurn that Samsung is working on AMOLED screens with an RGB stripe layout and would introduce that technology when it was reliable enough to release on their smartphones.
[Via MobileBurn]