News I'm happy this annoyingly popular watch display tech is dying a slow death

[AC News]

Fitness brands have used MIP displays for about a decade to deliver weeks of battery life. Now we're finally seeing AMOLED watches hitting the same benchmarks, which means these same brands can't use MIP as a crutch anymore.

I'm happy this annoyingly popular watch display tech is dying a slow death : Read more

 

[Lynx245]

Fitness brands have used MIP displays for about a decade to deliver weeks of battery life. Now we're finally seeing AMOLED watches hitting the same benchmarks, which means these same brands can't use MIP as a crutch anymore.

I'm happy this annoyingly popular watch display tech is dying a slow death : Read more

Think your missing the point of the MIP display. You don't gets weeks of battery life and always on display with AMOLED. You just want pretty. I think people such as yourself would do better with the tons of crappy Android Wear watches available. Sorry, function over pretty any day.

 

[biogon]

AMOLED battery life is for “raise to wake” mode. It drops considerably for always-on mode.

 

[Mooncatt]

Think your missing the point of the MIP display. You don't gets weeks of battery life and always on display with AMOLED. You just want pretty. I think people such as yourself would do better with the tons of crappy Android Wear watches available. Sorry, function over pretty any day.

Apparently the writer never looked at the manual for his Forerunner 955, or he would know that MIP watches have a backlight to make them readable indoors/low light. It can even be set to a gesture to automatically turn on when lifted. This seems odd in the context of the article he wrote only this past January and linked to in this one, which he rates 5 stars and praises the watch throughout the article. In it, he never once mentioned the display type, screen visibility, readability, etc. Less than 10 months later and suddenly MIP displays are trash?

Let's give him another 10 months on an AMOLED watch and see how he feels after massive burn in due to the largely static always on displays.

 

[fechhelm]

AMOLED displays are ridiculously hard to read in bright sunlight and virtually impossible with polarized sunglasses. My MIP display Garmin is easily read in all conditions. And no, AMOLED displays will never have as good of a battery life.

 

[Cornelius Puiulet1]

Hate to say it, but I also prefer a MIP display over AMOLED on a watch. Love amoled on a phone, but not on a watch. Too much like having a phone on your wrist when they slap that AMOLEd on it. Yeah, I’m about style, but MIP does the job pretty well and it doesn’t blind you indoors. If it wasn’t for maps, I’d even go LCD

 

[Michael L Hicks]

Apparently the writer never looked at the manual for his Forerunner 955, or he would know that MIP watches have a backlight to make them readable indoors/low light. It can even be set to a gesture to automatically turn on when lifted. This seems odd in the context of the article he wrote only this past January and linked to in this one, which he rates 5 stars and praises the watch throughout the article. In it, he never once mentioned the display type, screen visibility, readability, etc. Less than 10 months later and suddenly MIP displays are trash?

Let's give him another 10 months on an AMOLED watch and see how he feels after massive burn in due to the largely static always on displays.

Raise to wake makes MIPs visible, but not readable unless you're by a light source. Yes, you can boost the backlight, but it defeats the purpose of MIPs by using extra battery and gives your "black" background an unsightly colored tint, at least when I tried boosting it on my Instinct 2X Solar.

And yes, I loved the 955 for its software, and didn't mention the display type in the review because AMOLED running watches weren't a thing at that point and I'd learned to tolerate MIP rather than use inferior AMOLED watches. Now that the 965 is out, I realized these companies can offer the same software with a better display, so I reevaluated my stance on the 955 rather than remain static. You're implying I'm not allowed to change my viewpoint because it's "sudden", which I'm not sure I understand.

I don't use always-on displays, so it shouldn't be a problem for me!

 

[Michael L Hicks]

AMOLED displays are ridiculously hard to read in bright sunlight and virtually impossible with polarized sunglasses. My MIP display Garmin is easily read in all conditions. And no, AMOLED displays will never have as good of a battery life.

AMOLED definitely won't ever match MIP for battery, and I certainly didn't mean to make it sound like I thought that!

I guess this comes down to how much battery runners think they need. Mainline Garmin MIP watches just a few years ago tended to hit 2 weeks or less and 20 GPS hours or less. Now they hit twice that, while AMOLED models hit the old threshold for quality. My Forerunner 965 will last nearly two weeks with daily GPS-tracked runs or walks before I need to charge it, and that's enough for me; but if you want Instinct levels of battery, then yeah, an AMOLED will never give you what you need.

 

[Mooncatt]

You're implying I'm not allowed to change my viewpoint because it's "sudden", which I'm not sure I understand.

Usually when products are reviewed, it's customary to point out deficiencies even if there aren't many good alternatives to remedy it. In the smartphone world, visibility in direct sunlight was a huge complaint with LCD screens even before AMOLED was developed. When AMOLED became popular, it made sense when people praised it over LCD in that respect. So to see an article praising a watch without any mention of the drawbacks of the display followed by this one less than a year later slamming MIP as if it's now trash and making erroneous statements about visibility (omitting the backlight function as an option) does make the change of opinion suspect.

I get it. I have a Garmin watch with a MIP display, and my wife has a different brand with an AMOLED screen. I can see the obvious differences in displays, but I can still view mine just fine in any lighting condition. And not everyone needs/wants a phone display quality image on their watch. I rather like the muted look of mine, especially when in public. I wouldn't want a bright and vibrant screen lighting up like a beacon on my wrist when getting a notification or using it. Then again, I'd prefer to go back to an LCD phone screen too so I'm not dealing with burn in.

 

[fuzzylumpkin]

Usually when products are reviewed, it's customary to point out deficiencies even if there aren't many good alternatives to remedy it. In the smartphone world, visibility in direct sunlight was a huge complaint with LCD screens even before AMOLED was developed. When AMOLED became popular, it made sense when people praised it over LCD in that respect. So to see an article praising a watch without any mention of the drawbacks of the display followed by this one less than a year later slamming MIP as if it's now trash and making erroneous statements about visibility (omitting the backlight function as an option) does make the change of opinion suspect.

I get it. I have a Garmin watch with a MIP display, and my wife has a different brand with an AMOLED screen. I can see the obvious differences in displays, but I can still view mine just fine in any lighting condition. And not everyone needs/wants a phone display quality image on their watch. I rather like the muted look of mine, especially when in public. I wouldn't want a bright and vibrant screen lighting up like a beacon on my wrist when getting a notification or using it. Then again, I'd prefer to go back to an LCD phone screen too so I'm not dealing with burn in.

Have you actually had problems with burn in, or is it just something you worry about?