According to the Blogosphere and various comments we are seeing, the HTC One smartphone appears to offer a pretty good pixel
density average, suggesting that the iPhone 5 could be a bit inferior?
Well maybe, but that's only half of the story.
First, to get a sense of the HTC One screen's density, a quick
comparison to Microsoft's Surface Pro, which has also been praised
for its display, puts this into perspective. Well somewhat, anyway.
The Surface Pro packs a resolution of 1,920 x 1,080 into a 10.6-inch wafer.
One of the highest pixel densities (208 pixels per inch, to be exact) for a Windows 8 PC to date.
In comparison, the HTC One offers that same resolution (1,920 x 1,080) into a 4.7-inch screen. That's more than 2 million
pixels, yielding 468 pixels per inch (ppi).
"That makes it the current record holder for announced/shipping
consumer products," says Raymond Soneira, president of DisplayMate.
Of course, some products do get close, however. In July 2012, Sharp and LG announced a new class of very high-ppi displays
with 440ppi, which is 1,920 x 1,080 in a 5-inch (phablet) size, Soneira added.
The first shipping product in the U.S. with this display is the HTC Droid DNA, which began shipping in December and it has
a Sharp display, according to Soneira.
And other manufacturers including Samsung are also working on this new format. LG is now also shipping a 440 ppi display,
which, though a slightly lower pixel density, is "visually indistinguishable" from HTC One's display, he said.
Sharp is making its 440+ ppi screens using a technology called Continuous Grain Silicon. "It has higher electron mobility
than either IGZO or amorphous silicon, which allows for maximum aperture ratio/light transmission," according to Soneira.
In other words, more light can get through the closely packed
pixels than conventional technology, leading to brighter,
very-high-resolution
screens.
What about the inevitable comparison to Apple's Retina display
technology you might ask? "Now 468 ppi is substantially higher
than the iPhone 5's 326 ppi. What does that mean visually? In terms of
what Apple calls a Retina Display (equivalent to 20/20
Vision), for 20/20 Vision, 10.5 inches is the viewing distance where
the eye can just resolve the individual iPhone 326 ppi pixels
for people with standard 20/20 Vision."
But Soneira continues... "For 468 ppi, the 20/20 Vision pixel
resolution distance is 7.4 inches -- much closer than a typical
viewing distance for a 4.7 inch display. Watching further away from
the minimum viewing distance means that the eye can't resolve
the pixels and so the high ppi is often wasted."
"The only place where such a level of sharpness is important is for
computer-generated text and graphics. Where 440 ppi
and above will make a slight difference is when people are intently
visually studying the display image for fine image details,"
he said.
NASA has revealed the first radar video of an asteroid flyby that sent a
space rock half the size of a football field buzzing by Earth last
week.
The new asteroid flyby video,
released today (Feb. 19), shows the asteroid 2012 DA14 as it headed
away from Earth over the weekend. The asteroid zipped close by Earth on
Friday (Feb. 15), when it approached closer to the planet than many
communications satellites.
Before Friday's flyby, astronomers suspected asteroid 2012 DA14 was
about 150 feet (45 meters) across. At its closest point, the asteroid
came within 17,200 miles (27,000 kilometers) of Earth, but never posed a
threat of impacting the planet.
Based on the new radar observations, scientists now think asteroid 2012 DA14 is about 130 feet (40 m) wide at its largest point, NASA officials said in a statement.
The new video of the asteroid was made by combining radar observations
of 2012 DA14 by NASA's Deep Space Network radio antenna in Goldstone,
Calif. The 230-foot (70 meters) antenna captured 72 images of asteroid
2012 DA14, which was about 74,000 miles (120,000 kilometers) from Earth
at the time, during observing windows on Friday and Saturday (Feb. 15
and 16). The images have a resolution of about 13 feet (4 m) per pixel. [See more photos of asteroid 2012 DA14]
"The images span close to eight hours and clearly show an elongated
object undergoing roughly one full rotation," NASA officials explained.
During that eight hours, asteroid 2012 DA14 moved even farther from
Earth to a point about 195,000 miles (314,000 km) away.
Astronomers Lance Benner and Marina Brozovic at NASA's Jet Propulsion
Laboratory in Pasadena, Calif., led the radar observing campaign for the
asteroid flyby. They planned to conduct a series of follow-up
observations on Feb. 18, 19 and 20.
Asteroid 2012 DA14 was discovered in February 2012 by amateur
astronomers at the La Sagra Observatory in Spain. Its close flyby was
determined soon afterward, and astronomers ultimately found that it
posed no chance of hitting the Earth.
NASA scientists and astronomers around the world tracked asteroid 2012
DA14 as it approached Earth over the last week, with the space agency
and several groups holding public webcasts to chronicle the space rock's
close shave. It was the closest flyby of an asteroid the size of 2012
DA14 that astronomers have known about in advance.
Asteroid 2012 DA14 came about 5,000 miles (8,046 km) closer to Earth
than the fleet of communications satellites that fly in geosynchronous
orbits about 22,400 miles (36,000 km) above the planet. NASA provided
satellite operators with regular updates on the asteroid's position and
path in case the satellites would have to be moved clear of the space
rock.
NASA and a network of scientists around the world regularly monitor the night sky for signs of asteroids that could pose an impact threat to the Earth.
SOURCE:SPACE.COM
