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Awesome. Apple is a progressive company.

Progressive???!

Its a bulky reflector kit on the back of the screen! If it used ambient light without the reflector then yes, that would be progression!

Its like saying "With the new diesel genny you carry around the new macbook as 20 days use per gallon of fuel". Thats not progression!
 
I think I can see how it could be done without the reflector. You would probably want to put some kind of cover over the device when it was not running in sun mode. Color correction and balancing the light levels across the screen would not be that hard if you were to take a non traditional approach.

I think it is time for me to shut up now.
 
Wirelessly posted (Opera/9.80 (J2ME/MIDP; Opera Mini/5.0.17405/1092; U; en) Presto/2.4.15)

To have it equally backlight every pixel is near impossible.

What if the light collected was only UV?
Instead of white light LEDs also use UV LEDs.
Then have a phosphorescent screen that produces and even white colour calibrated glow.

Then the main illumination is going to be the glowing screen regardless of how it's powered and you can limit the amount of sunlight coming in. Even maybe use the LEDs to colour balance the screen if needs be.
 
This is not only a dumb idea, it's so colossally dumb it's astounding.

If I was Steve Jobs, I'd fire whoever filed this patent just for the bad publicity the public's knowledge of it brings. It makes Apple look like amateurish bozos. That they would think, for even a second, that this idea has any merit is just laughable IMO.
 
Now THIS would remedy the problem I, and others, have with the iPad: readability.

LCD... LED... nothing's as easy on the eyes as the printed word.

edit:

I'm an idiot... i got this story confusd w/ the Wired text 2.0 story.

Obviously... tired... :p
 
This is not only a dumb idea, it's so colossally dumb it's astounding.

If I was Steve Jobs, I'd fire whoever filed this patent just for the bad publicity the public's knowledge of it brings. It makes Apple look like amateurish bozos. That they would think, for even a second, that this idea has any merit is just laughable IMO.

Well yes if implemented exacted as shown on the oddly scale patent app.
But anything patent worthy is generally not implemented exactly as shown on the patent for all sorts of reasons.
 
I used to have an old 8086 laptop with a grey non-backlit LCD screen. It worked ok in most conditions but you could really see it well in sunlight!

I've noticed the displays in our MINI which are fluorescent are perfectly clear even when sun shines directly on them, though the orange color is lost -- much better than the ones in my parents' Prius which are completely invisible on sunny days. (do your own joke about prius speedometers)

anyways, my point is that this should be possible somehow.
 
I wonder when apple starts suing nintendo since they've been using a similar technique in the first gameboys already...
 
I wonder when apple starts suing nintendo since they've been using a similar technique in the first gameboys already...

1) Apple doesn't yet have the patent
2) The first gameboys didn't use a technique even close to similar to what Apple is trying to patent.
 
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