Samsung said to be stepping into the 440ppi realm with Samsung Galaxy S4
When Apple first unveiled its high resolution “Retina” display for the iPhone series, many marveled — at the time, no other smartphone could boast a display nearly as sharp. That was multiple years ago, though, and as we all know things tend to change very fast in the tech world.
A changing of the guard, if you will, has already happened in many different areas. Android is now the world’s top mobile smartphone OS, Samsung has become the world’s biggest mobile OEM, and I might finally be able to get my mom to upgrade from a dumbphone this year. Welp, it looks like things are going to get even more interesting starting in 2013.
DigiTimes is reporting that Samsung Display is working on a new sub-pixel arrangement for its smaller AMOLED panels, and that the new display would be featured quite prominently in the Samsung Galaxy S4. We’re expecting nothing short of a 1080p display, of course, and in order to maintain a pixel density of 440ppi or higher Samsung is said to be using a hexagonal and diamond-shaped layouts as opposed to the more traditional side-by-side layout.
Samsung is currently trailing Apple in terms of sheer ppi, with each company’s respective flagship devices — the Samsung Galaxy S3 and the iPhone 5 — sporting 306ppi and 326ppi, respectively. Samsung’s feat is still a tad more impressive considering the 4.7 inch display size of the Galaxy S3 compared to the iPhone 5’s 4 inch display.
The HTC DROID DNA and several other 5-inch, 1080p smartphones have already bested those figures, though, with pixel densities of 440+ ppi. Some were worried Samsung wouldn’t be able to bring that sort of sharpness to its AMOLED-based panels in time for the next iteration of the Galaxy S, but should these rumors hold up it looks like that won’t be an issue.
Unfortunately we’re still left wondering when, exactly, we might see the next big thing unveiled. Samsung is almost sure to be headed to Mobile World Congress, but recent murmurings suggest we won’t be seeing the Galaxy S4. Instead, their showing is rumored to feature the Samsung Galaxy Note 8.0 as the star of the show, and a couple of other neat surprises might be awaiting us behind several red velvet curtains. We’ll be in Barcelona to take it all in so be sure to keep it parked here.