Macroblock

What is "NEW BASICS"?

Macroblock has always pride itself in its commitment to provide the highest quality LED driver IC solutions for customers through continuous technology innovation. In this year, Macroblock introduced a new concept - "NEW BASICS" for high-end LED displays, which will define the six elements that need to be present in any high-end LED display in order to meet the ever-rising market requirements for and expectations on such high-end displays. These six essential elements are closely related to LED driver ICs and they are - "Image Quality", "Minimum Gray", "HDR-Optimized", "Above 64 Scans", "Low Power" and "Highly-Integrated".

The Six Elements of "NEW BASICS"

1. Image Quality
The "Image Quality" requires an LED display to possess superior image and video quality. Macroblock's Hawkeye Solution provides LED driver ICs that can overcome the seven common image problems inherent to fine pitch LED displays enabling brilliant display performances. The seven common image problems are gradient dim line, ghosting effect, non-uniform at low grayscale, color shift at low grayscale, LED dead pixel, 1st scan dim line, and high contrast interference.

2. Minimum Gray
When an LED display is said to have the element of "Minimum Gray", it means that the display can render images with smooth and linear gradient grayscale when the brightness level is low. Driver ICs are the key components in an LED display as they are the deciding factor on whether the display's visual performance in terms of grayscale is superior. Take Macroblock's product MBI5359 as an example, from the comparison charts below, it can be clearly seen that the module embedded with MBI5359 displays image with more details at lowest brightness level than the module using the other brand's driver IC does.

3. HDR-Optimized
Two years ago, Macroblock successfully defined the meaning of "HDR-Optimized" for premium LED displays. This means that the specification of the said LED display, when designed with 32-scan (or above) LED driver ICs, is able to reach 16-bit grayscale and 4KHz refresh rate. Viewing the display, one will note that the image sharpness and color uniformity have been greatly enhanced. Please refer to the picture below. In this year, Macroblock has introduced two new products - MBI5264 and MBI5864 - to the market. Both the 64-scan LED driver ICs have the "PWM enhancement" function, which allow premium LED displays embedded with such driver ICs to be "HDR-Optimized".

4. Above 64 Scans 
Ultra-fine pitch LED displays have become the new industry trend. This development calls for the usage of high-scan LED driver ICs. High-scan driver ICs reduce the number of driver ICs required for a given number of pixels, providing more room on a PCB for layout design, so that module design and production become more flexible. Macroblock's latest products - MBI5254, MBI5754 and MBI5264 - all support a maximum of 64 scans.

5. Low Power
The element "Low Power" means that the LED displays maintain low surface temperature and power consumption at all times, which is key to enhanced user experience. Currently, there are three energy-saving methods. First, adopting common-cathode LED architecture. Second, using driver ICs equipped with Dynamic+ Power Saving function. Last but not least, using driver ICs that consume less power. The surface temperature of an LED display is highly important as high temperature may cause color distortion or occurrence of color blocks. Hence, the "Low Power" is not only related to utility costs, but also to image quality. It helps reducing "cyan blocks" to avoid color shifting issue in display modules.

6. Highly-Integrated
The definition of "Highly-Integrated" is that the driver IC, MOSFET and Logic IC are all embedded within "one chip". This is a smart solution for fine pitch LED displays. When the pixel pitch gets smaller for mini/micro LED applications, the size of display modules needs to be reduced at the same time. Therefore, Macroblock launches the "Highly-Integrated" driver IC – MBI5864, which solves the PCB space limitation issue.