Data signal adjustment for displays

• US 10,607,549 B2
• Filed: 05/24/2018
• Issued: 03/31/2020
• Est. Priority Date: 09/01/2017
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Original Assignee: Apple Inc.
• Inventors: Aflatooni, Koorosh, Rieutort-Louis, Warren S., Guillou, Jean-Pierre S., Emelie, Pierre-Yves, Cho, Myung-Je, Albrecht, Marc, Williams, Graeme M., Chang, Sean C., Wang, Zhao
• Primary Examiner(s): Lamb, Christopher R
• Application Number:
  US15/989,066
• Publication Number:
  US 20190073962A1
• Time in Patent Office: 677 Days
• Field of Search: None
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2300/04 Structural and physical details of display devices
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2310/0232 Special driving of display border areas
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0209 Crosstalk reduction, i.e. to reduce direct or indirect influences of signals directed to a certain pixel of the displayed image on other pixels of said image, inclusive of influences affecting pixels in different frames or fields or sub-images which constitute a same image, e.g. left and right images of a stereoscopic display
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0223 Compensation for problems related to R-C delay and attenuation in electrodes of matrix panels, e.g. in gate electrodes or on-substrate video signal electrodes
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0233 Improving the luminance or brightness uniformity across the screen
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0285 using tables for spatial correction of display data
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0666 for control of colour parameters, e.g. colour temperature
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0686 with two or more screen areas displaying information with different brightness or colours
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 3/3275 Details of drivers for data electrodes

Abstract

A display may have an active area that includes display pixels. The display may include an inactive notch region that extends into the active area. Data lines may provide image data from display driver circuitry to the display pixels. The image data may include data signals that correspond to portions of the display that do not include pixels, such as the inactive notch region. The null data signals may cause nonuniformities in the displayed image. The null data signals may be adjusted to minimize the nonuniformities. Null data signals corresponding to the inactive notch region may be adjusted to have gray levels that gradually decrease with distance from the border between the inactive notch and the active area. All of the data signals corresponding to the inactive notch may be set to a uniform gray level.

Claims

1. A display comprising:

pixels that form an active area, wherein the active area has a notch-shaped recess; and

display driver circuitry that provides image data to the pixels in the active area and that provides null data corresponding to the notched-shaped recess, wherein the null data includes black data corresponding to a first pixel row in the notched-shaped recess and gray data corresponding to a second pixel row in the notched-shaped recess.

2. The display defined in claim 1, wherein the notch-shaped recess includes a transition portion adjacent to the active area, and wherein the gray data provided by the display driver circuitry corresponds to the transition portion.

3. The display defined in claim 2, wherein the notch-shaped recess includes an upper portion, wherein the transition portion is between the active area and the upper portion, and wherein the black data provided by the display driver circuitry corresponds to the upper portion.

4. The display defined in claim 3, wherein the transition portion comprises a plurality of pixel rows, and wherein the display driver circuitry provides the gray data to the plurality of pixel rows in the transition portion using a plurality of different gray levels.

5. The display defined in claim 4, wherein the plurality of different gray levels includes first, second, and third gray levels that decrease linearly.

6. The display defined in claim 4, wherein the plurality of different gray levels includes first, second, and third gray levels that decrease exponentially.

7. The display defined in claim 1, wherein the notch-shaped recess accommodates a speaker, a camera, and an ambient light sensor.

8. The display defined in claim 7, wherein the pixels comprise organic light-emitting diodes.

9. A display comprising:

rows and columns of pixels that form an active area that is configured to display images, wherein the active area has a notch-shaped recess;

first data lines that extend across the rows of pixels and that terminate in an edge of the active area adjacent to the notch-shaped recess;

second data lines that extend across the active area and terminate at the notch-shaped recess;

first gate lines that control data loading from the first data lines and the second data lines into a first set of the rows of pixels in the active area;

second gate lines that control data loading into a second set of the rows of pixels in the active area from the first data lines and not the second data lines; and

display driver circuitry configured to;

while using the first gate lines to control the data loading, provide the second data lines with image data;

while using a first set of the second gate lines to control the data loading, provide the second data lines with first non-image data; and

while using a second set of the second gate lines to control the data loading, provide the second data lines with second non-image data that is different than the first non-image data, wherein the first and second sets of the second gate lines are adjacent.

10. The display defined in claim 9, wherein first non-image data is black image data, and wherein the second non-image data includes gray image data.

11. The display defined in claim 10, wherein the gray image data includes a plurality of different gray levels.

12. The display defined in claim 11, wherein the second set of the second gate lines is interposed between the first set of the second gate lines and the first gate lines.

13. The display defined in claim 12, wherein the second set of the second gate lines includes:

a first gate line between the first gate lines and the first set of the second gate lines, wherein the display driver circuitry is configured to provide a first gray level to the second data lines while using the first gate line to control the data loading;

a second gate line between the first gate line and the first set of the second gate lines, wherein the display driver circuitry is configured to provide a second gray level to the second data lines while using the second gate line to control the data loading; and

a third gate line between the second gate line and the first set of the second gate lines, wherein the display driver circuitry is configured to provide a third gray level to the second data lines while using the third gate line to control the data loading.

14. The display defined in claim 13, wherein the gray levels decrease exponentially from the first gray level to the third gray level.

15. The display defined in claim 13, wherein the gray levels decrease linearly from the first gray level to the third gray level.

16. The display defined in claim 9, wherein the first non-image data and the second non-image data are not provided to any of the pixels.

17. A method of operating a display having display driver circuitry that provides image data to data lines, a data signal attenuator, a data signal compensator, and pixels that form an active area, the method comprising:

with the data signal attenuator, adjusting a first portion of the image data to black data;

with the data signal compensator, adjusting a first portion of the black data to gray data; and

with the display driver circuitry, providing a second portion of the black data to the data lines corresponding to a first pixel row in a notch-shaped inactive region in the active area and providing the gray data to the data lines corresponding to a second pixel row in the notched-shaped inactive region, wherein the gray data does not drive any of the pixels.

18. The method defined in claim 17, further comprising:

with the display driver circuitry, providing a second portion of the image data to the pixels that form the active area.