alt Hacker NewsJust curious in case somebody knows. Are OLED displays in laptops bad at low light? He cites that as a reason he doesn’t want OLED, but I’ve never noticed such a problem on OLED phones.
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I'm using an OLED X1 Carbon right now in the UK. I use it all the time in low light.
I just turned all the lights off (even the Christmas tree) and ran through a handful of usage situations and couldn't see any issues. I turned some lights on and did the same, I couldn't see any issues. I asked Claude, and got told to do the finger test, and that is barely perceptible. I then used my phone to record the screen and yes - I can confirm that there is an effect that my pixel 9a's camera picks up, barely noticeable at 240Hz, and definitely noticeable at 480Hz.
Maybe the guy is particularly sensitive, but from the framing of the rest of the article I think he's blowing a few things out of proportion.
A lot of computers with OLED displays use PWM for the low brightness levels, and he seems like the type of person who would be sensitive to that sort of thing.
I'd say the inverse is true: OLEDs are the best in low light, as they generally dim well and black means zero illumination of the pixel. Author is ill-informed. Also, OLED burn-in is a non-issue with current displays in any normal situation (e.g. not a kiosk or arcade or other sort of always-on static dashboard).