Michael Hell’s latest editorial for symbian-freak touched a topic which is highly sensitive for some S60 users: he talked about one of the very few S60 devices with a “high-res” (aka non-QVGA) screen. Indeed, his E70’s screen managed to impress me in a recent meet-up – according to some, Nokia should start deploying higher-res screens soon in order to stay competitive.
While I personally think that Nokia has more pressing problems like manufacturing quality, I think that the age of QVGA screens will automatically come to an end soon. The reason for this: screen manufacturers.
A higher Motorola employee told me last year that QVGA and VGA screens now cost the same, and that the first are becoming more and more expensive every day. In fact, Asus even deployed a VGA screen and software-limited it to QVGA for reasons understandable only for members of this slightly batty company.
Screen manufacturers can save money by reducing the number of screens offered. As the cost difference between QVGA and VGA screens is minimal (same is valid for power consumption – most of it is due to the backlight, which is the same for both screen types), there is little reason for manufacturers to keep an ancient technology alive for much longer…
What do you think?
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