Brightness compensation apparatus and application method thereof
AssigneeHoltek Semiconductor Inc.
InventorsTzong-Kwei Chen, Chun-Lin Shen, Yi-Chen Liu, Chen-Ting Kuan
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Abstract
For improving the brightness decay of a display due to its aging, a non-volatile memory such as Flash can be used to store a brightness accumulation value of each point of the display, and each point can be compensated for its brightness accordingly. However, the non-volatile memory suffers from incorrect write-in data or temporary power disconnection, and thus the error will exist all the time to make the display non-even. Hence, the present invention uses a multiple data backups and CRC error detection, plus new/old data comparison to protect data the non-volatile memory from incorrect brightness compensation value so as to uniform the brightness of the display.
Claims21
An brightness compensation apparatus in uniformity, for cooperating with a driver IC to drive a display, comprising:
- a volatile memory, for storing a color/brightness accumulation value of each pixel on the display;
- a non-volatile memory, for preventing a missing for the color/brightness accumulation value;
- a calculating unit, for accumulating the color/brightness accumulation value for the each pixel;
- and
- a detector means, coupled to the calculating unit and the non-volatile memory, for checking the color/brightness accumulation value outputted from the calculating unit with the color/brightness accumulation value stored in the non-volatile memory, wherein if the checking process appears to be correct, the detector means further allows the color/brightness accumulation value outputted from the calculating unit and the color/brightness accumulation value stored in the non-volatile memory are respectively written in the non-volatile memory and the volatile memory so as to uniform a brightness of the display,
- wherein the non-volatile memory is divided into a first area and a plurality of second areas, and a capacity of the first area is greater than an average capacity of the plurality of the second areas, and wherein the first area stores a data detecting code for checking if data obtained from the first area are correct;
- and
- wherein the detector means follows an equation of Y−X<K, and wherein Y is a new color brightness accumulation value for being written into the non-volatile memory, X is an original color brightness accumulation value in the non-volatile memory, and K is a maximum difference between two contiguous color brightness accumulation values in a specific time frame.
An brightness compensation apparatus in uniformity, for cooperating with a driver IC to drive a display, comprising:
- a volatile memory, for storing a color/brightness accumulation value of each pixel on the display;
- a non-volatile memory, for preventing a missing for the color/brightness accumulation value;
- a calculating unit, for accumulating the color/brightness accumulation value for the each pixel;
- and
- a detector means, coupled to the calculating unit and the non-volatile memory, for checking the color/brightness accumulation value outputted from the calculating unit with the color/brightness accumulation value stored in the non-volatile memory, wherein if the checking process appears to be correct, the detector means further allows the color/brightness accumulation value outputted from the calculating unit and the color/brightness accumulation value stored in the non-volatile memory are respectively written in the non-volatile memory and the volatile memory so as to uniform a brightness of the display,
- wherein the non-volatile memory is divided into a first area and a plurality of second areas, and a capacity of the first area is greater than an average capacity of the plurality of the second areas, and wherein the first area stores a data detecting code for checking if data obtained from the first area are correct;
- and
- wherein the detector means follows an equation of Y<X;
- and wherein Y is a new color brightness accumulation value for being written into the non-volatile memory, X is an original color brightness accumulation value in the non-volatile memory.
A method for enacting a color/brightness accumulation in unanimity in a writing-in or reading-out process, comprising steps of:
- (a) providing a brightness compensation apparatus having a non-volatile memory, said brightness compensation apparatus cooperates with an driver IC to drive a display;
- (b) dividing the non-volatile memory in the brightness compensation apparatus into at least a first area and a plurality of second areas 1˜n, where n is an integer greater than zero and the first area is for storing the color/brightness accumulation or high-bit data of the color/brightness accumulation, and the second area 1˜n are for storing low-bit data of the color/brightness accumulation;
- (c) writing the color/brightness accumulation or the high-bit data of the color/brightness accumulation in the first area;
- (d) writing the low-bit data of the color/brightness accumulation in the second areas;
- (e) judging if the display functions properly, if yes, go to s502 or s503;
- if no, awaiting the display re-boots;
- (f) after the display re-boots, obtaining the low-bit data of the color/brightness accumulation from a last write-in area such as a second area j where j is an integer between 1˜n, and meanwhile obtaining a complete data of the color/brightness accumulation or the high-bit data of the color/brightness accumulation;
- s506:
- judging if there exists errors in the low-bit data;
- and
- (g) if any error, obtaining the low-bit data of the color/brightness accumulation from the second area j−1.
Dependencies are inferred from the claim text.