Japan Display has announced the creation of an incredible 4K resolution tablet screen, measuring 10.1-inches, which paves the way for such high resolution displays to make it on to mainstream devices in the near future. The company lists the pixel count on its beast of a screen as 3840 x 2160, which qualifies as 4K, but because of the general confusion around what is and isn’t 4K, it may end up being promoted as UltraHD or something similar. Japan Display has come up with its own name too, calling it 4K2K, which is more confusing than if it had been left simply as 4K.
When eventually fitted to a tablet, such a high resolution screen could spell disaster for standby time. However, we’re told the new display’s power consumption is equivalent to a 10.1-inch, 2560 x 1600 pixel screen, such as the one fitted to the Galaxy Note Pro 12.2. Inside Samsung’s slate is a whopping 9500mAh cell, returning around 13 hours of Wi-Fi use. We’d be happy with that on a 4K tablet.
Screen tech fans will be interested to discover the display is an RGB panel, and not a PenTile screen, so the image should be crisp, sharp, and colorful. The other notable spec is the pixel density. This is a big screen, so 438 pixels-per-inch may not sound that impressive, but it’s way beyond what we’re seeing now. For comparison, the aforementioned Galaxy Note Pro 12.2 can only manage 247ppi.
There’s no indication when we’ll see Japan Display’s 10.1-inch, 4K screen fitted to a tablet. It does say samples are being shipped out at the moment, but that doesn’t mean it’s ready to step up production. Japan Display works with various manufacturers, for example, one of its 5-inch, 1080p panels is fitted to the new OnePlus One.
The 10.1-inch, 4K screen is the second major display announcement this month, following AU Optronics unveiling of the world’s first 5.7-inch, 1440p AMOLED display, which should eventually find a home on larger smartphones.
