Multi-primary color liquid crystal panel drive circuit, multi-primary color liquid crystal panel drive method, liquid crystal display device and overdrive setting method

• US 9,230,494 B2
• Filed: 03/16/2011
• Issued: 01/05/2016
• Est. Priority Date: 03/18/2010
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha (Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd.)
• Original Assignee: Sharp Kabushiki Kaisha (Hon Hai Precision Industry Co., Ltd.)
• Inventors: Hasegawa, Makoto, Tomizawa, Kazunari
• Primary Examiner(s): Wang-Hurst, Kathy
• Assistant Examiner(s): Wilson, Douglas
• Application Number:
  US13/635,486
• Publication Number:
  US 20130010014A1
• Time in Patent Office: 1,756 Days
• Field of Search: None
• US Class Current: 1/1
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2300/0452 Details of colour pixel setup, e.g. pixel composed of a red, a blue and two green components
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0242 Compensation of deficiencies in the appearance of colours
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0252 Improving the response speed
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2320/0693 Calibration of display systems
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2340/06 Colour space transformation
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 2340/16 Determination of a pixel data signal depending on the signal applied in the previous frame
• CPC Class Codes: G09G 3/3607 for displaying colours or for displaying grey scales with a specific pixel layout, e.g. using sub-pixels display of colours in flat matrix panels other than liquid crystal displays G09G3/2003; grey scales specific for television H04N3/127

Abstract

A multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver (100) according to the present invention includes: a multi-primary-color converter (110) which performs a multi-primary-color conversion to convert the grayscale levels of an input video signal in each of a plurality of vertical scanning periods into grayscale levels of four or more primary colors; and an overdrive circuit (120) which sets, based on the grayscale levels that have been subjected to the multi-primary-color conversion in one vertical scanning period and on the grayscale levels that have been subjected to the multi-primary-color conversion in another vertical scanning period that is earlier than the one vertical scanning period by at least one period, the grayscale levels of the four or more primary colors in that one vertical scanning period. The present invention provides a multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel that can improve the display quality even when the input video signal has varying grayscale levels.

Claims

1. A multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver comprising:

a multi-primary-color converter which performs a multi-primary-color conversion to convert the grayscale levels of an input video signal in each of a plurality of vertical scanning periods into grayscale levels of four or more primary colors;

an overdrive circuit which receives four or more color signals corresponding to the four or more primary colors and which sets, based on the grayscale levels that have been subjected to the multi-primary-color conversion in one vertical scanning period and on the grayscale levels that have been subjected to the multi-primary-color conversion in another vertical scanning period that is earlier than the one vertical scanning period by at least one period, the grayscale levels of the four or more primary colors in that one vertical scanning period;

an input terminal, through which the input video signal, which contains three or more color signals corresponding to only some of the four or more primary colors, is input; and

four or more bypass paths which respectively correspond to the four or more primary colors and which connect the input terminal to the overdrive circuit without passing through the multi-primary-color converter;

wherein

two of the four or more bypass paths are electrically connected together.

2. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, wherein the overdrive circuit includes a plurality of grayscale level setting circuits which are provided for the four or more primary colors.

3. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, further comprising:

a first circuit chip in which the multi-primary-color converter is built; and

a second circuit chip in which the overdrive circuit is built.

4. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, further comprising at least one additional input terminal in addition to the input terminal,

wherein at least one of the four or more bypass paths connect the input terminal and the additional input terminal to the overdrive circuit.

5. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, further comprising a switching element that selectively connects one of the multi-primary-color converter and the four or more bypass paths to the overdrive circuit.

6. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, further comprising a circuit chip in which the multi-primary-color converter and the overdrive circuit are integrated together.

7. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, wherein the multi-primary-color converter includes:

a color component extracting section which extracts color components from the grayscale levels of the input video signal; and

a grayscale level allocating section which allocates the color components to the grayscale levels of the four or more primary colors.

8. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, wherein the multi-primary-color converter converts the grayscale levels of the input video signal into the grayscale levels of the colors red, green, blue and yellow.

9. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, wherein if any of the grayscale levels that have been subjected to the multi-primary-color conversion changes from a first grayscale level corresponding to a first effective voltage into a second grayscale level corresponding to a second effective voltage, which is higher than the first effective voltage, and then remains the second grayscale level for multiple vertical scanning periods, the overdrive circuit changes the grayscale level into a one corresponding to a higher effective voltage than the second grayscale level'"'"'s in a vertical scanning period in which the first grayscale level has changed into the second grayscale level and then sets the grayscale level to be the second grayscale level in the vertical scanning periods in which the second grayscale level is maintained.

10. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, wherein if any of the grayscale levels that have been subjected to the multi-primary-color conversion changes from a third grayscale level corresponding to a third effective voltage into a fourth grayscale level corresponding to a fourth effective voltage, which is lower than the third effective voltage, and then remains the fourth grayscale level for multiple vertical scanning periods, the overdrive circuit changes the grayscale level into a one corresponding to a lower effective voltage than the fourth grayscale level'"'"'s in a vertical scanning period in which the third grayscale level has changed into the fourth grayscale level and then sets the grayscale level to be the fourth grayscale level in the vertical scanning periods in which the fourth grayscale level is maintained.

11. A liquid crystal display device comprising:

a multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel; and

the multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1 which drives the multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel.

13. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, wherein two of the grayscale levels of the four or more primary colors have a same magnitude.

14. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, wherein the grayscale levels of the four or more primary colors include a yellow value and a green value which have a same magnitude.

15. The multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver of claim 1, wherein the four or more bypass paths include a bypass path which corresponds to yellow and a bypass path which corresponds to green, the bypass path which corresponds to yellow and the bypass path which corresponds to green are connected together.

12. An overdrive driving setting method comprising the steps of:

providing a liquid crystal display device which includes a multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel and a multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel driver to drive the multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel, the liquid crystal panel driver including a multi-primary-color converter and an overdrive circuit;

making measurement on the display of the multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel while adjusting overdrive driving for the overdrive circuit by inputting four or more grayscale level adjustable test signals to the overdrive circuit without the four or more grayscale level adjustable test signals first passing through the multi-primary-color converter; and

setting a mode of the overdrive driving to get done by the overdrive circuit based on a result of the measurement on the multi-primary-color liquid crystal panel;

wherein

two of the four or more grayscale level adjustable test signals have a same magnitude.