Left is BOE, right is presumably Samsung

Samsung panel photo taken from here:

https://www.reddit.com/r/SteamDeck/comments/185biuu/no_one_is_talking_about_the_subpixel_arrangement/

My LE Deck OLED has BOE screen which I confirmed through that firmware dump command. I don’t have any dead pixels or any issue with the screen, but I think this difference in su-pixel structure is VERY interesting.

There’s been some complaint about red/green fringes on text, but not everyone seems to see it equally well. I looked at mine, Even looking very closely to the point Im seeing individual pixels and the small gaps between the pixels, I just don’t see it.

https://preview.redd.it/kaphnbcgo53c1.png?width=1794&format=png&auto=webp&s=6a1b743e31de9466b9b3a5613e3f7f11f5486042

If we zoom in and look at the text, this is in desktop mode in Chrome, we can see there is in fact no sub-pixel anti-aliasing, the font is made up of whole pixels.

BTW I think BOE layout is better than Samsung because every pixel is symmetrical and the gaps are evenly distributed. Where as the Samsung has alternating left/right leaning blue pixels, which creates a big gap every two pixels, and this can lead to a slightly more grainy look.

https://preview.redd.it/hbycma4tq53c1.png?width=478&format=png&auto=webp&s=6c45fc75c6852eba2f129ec9a887a5db6b72e183

You can also see the slight blurring effect from the anti-glare screen I have on mine. The blur radius is smaller than these sub-pixels, it cannot reduce the sharpness of displayed images, but it can soften the appearance of individual pixels.

  • GreaseCrow@alien.top
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    1 year ago

    And here I was thinking the BOE panel was worse, too bad I have a dead blue subpixel :(

    • Call_Me_Rivale@alien.topB
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      1 year ago

      But to be honest. As a person who is quite curious, I love to learn about these small differences, since it reveals further questions about the manufacturing and implications of the difference. Playing and analyzing the Steamdeck is fun in itself. There is also something similar going on with other devices. Also its nice to have an curious, informed user group.

  • everythingmustmatch@alien.top
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    1 year ago

    Thanks for those photos. I’m not sure which I’d consider ‘better’ so I’ll have to take your word for it. HOWEVER…please confirm that I’m not going crazy. I swear text in the SteamOS is much blurrier on my normal OLED Deck compared to the LCD version. Has anyone else had the same thought?

    • SolarianStrike@alien.topB
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      1 year ago

      The software have to account for the sub-pixel layout especially when rendering text. This is what ClearType does in Windows. If Valve have yet to optimize for the OLED decks, it happens.

    • __Sigurd__@alien.topB
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      1 year ago

      My inner demons trying to get me to RMA my dead pixel BOE deck while posts like this are making me think I should just get over it and replace the display later if it breaks or gets burn in down the line.

      It really does look incredible, and I have gotten super picky about display uniformity since the plague of uneven LCD TVs have been killing my home movie enjoyment. Found that Samsung with their QLED line has the least grey uniformity issues on their TVs these days and if I ended up with a steam deck that had uneven brightness or colors that was unable to be RMA’d I’d be way more bothered than with a couple dead pixels. Though… That being a choice needing to be made is upsetting itself.

      /Rant

      E: ignore me I’m just enjoying this deck too much and having paranoia about RMA luck.

      • YouOnly-LiveOnce@alien.topB
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        1 year ago

        i have a dead blue and dead red pixel. The blue is hardly noticable and can only really see it in testing with 100% blue and its just a sliver.

        Red is extremely noticable and even if I didn’t look for dead pixels its right in middle and incredibly obvious, glows green, and looks like a pin hole in tons of scenes

    • DinJarrus@alien.top
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      1 year ago

      It’s not. I owned an LE and the colors on the Samsung one were way better and brighter.

  • WetRacoon@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    Glossies are gonna stay in denial and keep huffing their copium, no matter how much actual data you throw at them.

  • HORSE_PASTE@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    Anyone know if the 1TB uses BOE? I got a 512 with a Samsung panel, and the greys are grainy. I would like to return it and get a BOE panel.

    • DinJarrus@alien.top
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      1 year ago

      Dude, it’s not even noticeable. Stop listening to the garbage in this subreddit. It’s all in your head now that ONE user made this comparison.

      • SeptimusXT@alien.topB
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        1 year ago

        It’s noticeable even on phones with smaller screens and higher resolutions. This also didn’t appear yesterday, it’s an old problem with Samsung displays.

      • HORSE_PASTE@alien.topB
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        1 year ago

        Got it, thanks for letting me know. I suppose I should just be happy and stick with what I have. It’s a little grainy on greys but it’s not the end of the world and isn’t really noticeable in games so far.

        • AcanthaceaeOpening65@alien.topB
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          1 year ago

          No problem! If it’s not too bad I would keep it. The one I received is pretty bad so you could potentially do worse exchanging it. If you want to test it in a game you can download a demo of inside, that game uses the problematic grey right at the start menu.

  • phormix@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    That’s pretty cool to look at. So size-wise Samsung has a higher blue bias an a low green bias, whereas BOE has a fairly similar red/geren with some bias towards blue.

    • DrKrFfXx@alien.topB
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      1 year ago

      Human vision is more sensitive to green, so they probably calculated they needed a less bright/smaller area green subpixel to convey a similar performance to the other subpixels.

  • invid_prime@alien.topB
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    1 year ago

    Call me crazy but the blue sub pixel on the BOE panel looks larger than the red and green sub pixels. This should be good for longevity since you won’t have to drive the blue as hard, and blue sub pixels seem to be the most likely to burn out or limit the useful life of a panel.

    Driving them less hard/bright = longer lifetimes