- LGS Innovative Display is designed for car use
- The company says that a display and buttons can merge seamlessly into a
- The technique is just a concept but we could soon see it in cars
The argument about physical buttons in modern vehicles continues to rage, with some vocal sectors (undoubtedly led by journalists) that call for a reduction in potentially distracting touch screens and lighter location switches as they run.
But LG may have come up with an exciting solution as it is revealed a stretchable car display in front of Sid Display Week in California – without a doubt ces in the screen world.
The company says its unique screen that miraculously miraculously comes to life with a physical dial and buttons is designed to transform any interior space into a display … but one with physical buttons built into it.
There is little information about the inner work of innovation, but LG claims that the display can expand by up to 50%, while a high resolution of 100 PPI (pixels per inch) and full RGB color can be compared to a standard monitor.
In a Videodemo (below), the company shows how a dial gets out of the touch screen surface when activated, allowing the user to increase or reduce volume or other settings with a curling of a finger.
Similarly, two more buttons get out of the display under the main disc, which allows the user more easily to navigate menus.
LG points out that a conventional car fascia requires a separate car display and physical buttons while this does not. Although it seems to have ignored the fact that many carmakers tend to remove the physical buttons anyway.
As a result, LG thinks its expandable display, complete with protruding touch buttons, offers the best of both worlds that are “easy to operate even while driving”.
Alongside the stretchable display, the South Korean Tech giant also shows the world’s largest pillar-to-pillar 57-inch bile display as well as an 18-inch slidable OLED screen that can be rolled up and hidden in a vehicle’s interior headliner.
Analysis: A Touch for many
While LG’s Display technology is mighty impressive and looks like something that comes directly from a foreign aircraft, it doesn’t really solve the question of driver’s distraction when behind the wheel.
The beautiful thing about physical buttons is that they remain static, easy to find, and the kind of thing that drivers can operate with muscle memory alone, negating the need to take their eyes away from the road.
LG’s demonstration reveals that the device must be tapped a number of times before the physical buttons appear, often via very small and possibly quite fiddly parts of the screen.
It’s almost like a futuristic BMW IDRive system, but with additional steps required to reveal the physical dials and buttons that made the German Marque’s system so easy to use … even though the new version has controversially sent by buttons.
Although a stretchable display may not be the best solution for drivers, it can be an ultra-luxurious system for those traveling at the back of the right, designers give designers the freedom to keep seats looking clean and minimal while offering a little drama when the residents decide they will enjoy some Netflix on the 18-inch sliding OLED screen that is hidden.
