Before you head to the London Show on Saturday, take a glance at your monitor and think about whether it’s time to upgrade to something newer. If it is, R-Comp may have something just for you – they’ll be bringing a range of monitors with high refresh rates and OLED displays.
Here’s Andrew Rawnsley’s press release in full:
We are pleased to announce that at the London Show this weekend we will displaying a range of high refresh rate monitors, including stunning OLED displays.
There are essentially three components here:
- High refresh and super-wide monitor driver software (Also allows for larger screen modes for failing eyesight)
- High refresh IPS displays
- High refresh OLED displays
Let’s break these down in more detail:
1) Driver software
Available via !Store or free with monitor purchases, these drivers and RISC OS application software unlock a wide range of modes and capabilities at refresh rates up to liquid smooth 175 frames per second.
For a long time, no matter what RISC OS computer you purchase, your desktop has been limited to 60 frames per second (or less), largely dictated by the capabilities of your monitor. You could buy a nice, fast computer, but the smoothness of your desktop would be (largely) unchanged because the monitor itself was the limiting factor.
Now, with high refresh rate displays becoming more affordable (from £199) it is now possible to deliver high refresh rate experiences on RISC OS, breaking the 60 Hz barrier.
The drivers unlock a huge range of modes up to 4K resolution, including many that are not exposed by the monitors themselves. This allows more comfortable use of 27-32″ 4K displays on RISC OS which would otherwise prove a bit too small to use. Additionally, the drivers provide super-wide support up to nearly 100 frames per second – a far cry from the 40 fps available when we first showed super-wide displays a few years ago.
I’m sure some readers are thinking – “with EDID monitor detection, why do we need drivers in 2024?”. This is a very simple thing to answer – when we hooked a high refresh rate monitor up to our test Pi4 board, it gave a blank screen, and we were effectively locked out (although the included mode-recovery software helped).
The only way to get a picture via EDID ended up being (if memory serves) to drop to 30 Hz, because of the limited options available.
You see, EDID is great, but most displays only implement a small number of resolution and refresh rate options. If the connected device is at all fussy, then you may not have much luck.
Thanks to the monitor drivers, we were able to drive the monitor in question at more-or-less 100 Hz instead of 30. That’s why we need drivers.
Plus, of course, RISC OS can’t rely on OS-scaling to make things smaller/larger. The drivers provide a lot of mode-choice so that users can easily magnify their desktop if you’re eyesight isn’t quite as sharp as it was. This functionality is available even if you don’t have a high refresh rate screen.
Also included is our Titanium multi-monitor driver software, our !USBvideo software (allows monitor connections via USB displaylink to RISC OS computers, e.g. Pinebook), !RevertMode, !MultiMon and various other software that we’ve developed. There are also “standard” refresh rate drivers for most modern platforms included, allowing you to get the most out of almost any monitor, on any modern system.
The software can be purchased separately for £14.99 on !Store right now.
2) High refresh IPS monitors
High refresh IPS monitors provide a great combination between excellent picture quality, and high refresh rates. They offer the best “traditional” display quality, whilst unlocking refresh rates well above older screens. Starting at around £199 and rising based on size of screen (we’ll have a £299 32″ (with adjustable stand and speakers) for sale at the show), these provide affordable quality.
3) But OLED takes things to another level
You’ve probably heard the press and media raving about OLED TV image quality. Now, the monitor industry has caught on, and OLED monitors are now available offering exceptional image quality, accuracy and beauty.
Let’s take a slight digression to understand “delta-E” – the measurement of image accuracy. Basically this is a rating of how far the colours deviate from an “ideal” monitor colour curve. A “perfect” display would have a delta-E of zero, but that’s not something you’d see in reality.
As such, there are broad definitions for delta-E ratings to get some idea of what is good or bad. Supposedly, a delta-E of under 3 is fine for print-work, and most people will be happy with things in the 3-4 range.
A well-calibrated display may well be in the 1.5 delta-e range, and this would be considered decent by most movie or photo users.
A delta-e of under 1 is considered pro-grade and typically something that requires professional calibration and/or a four-digit+ price tag.
All this is a prefix to the out-of-the-box delta-e certification that came with our OLED monitor – just 0.38 ! This is in the industry standard SRGB mode, and more “vibrant” (read – less accurate) modes are also available for different purposes.
OLED displays are available from £599 and super-wide options for not-too-much more.
Whilst this may seem expensive, you can have an OLED display AND a N.Ex.T computer for less money than an Iyonix cost new, and about half what many people paid for their RiscPC. And that’s ignoring inflation!
i.e. show visitors can order a N.Ex.T with an OLED display for £999 inc VAT. Or why not go super-wide for £1,199?
(For reference, the Iyonix launched for £1,249).