Almost all the high-end and even mid-range smartphones now come with OLED displays. This type of panels offers better colors and contrasts compared to LCD panels. The phones with such display come with a feature called DC Dimming, which is essential to reduce flickering at lower brightness levels. Turns out, despite being a modern handset with an OLED display, the OnePlus 8T does not ship with this mush-have useful feature.

OnePlus has been using OLED displays on its smartphones starting with the OnePlus 3. The company only recently re-introduced LCD panels for its budget offerings – Nord 10 5G and Nord N100. The last flagship from the brand with an LCD panel was the OnePlus 2.

However, the company began to provide the DC Dimming feature only after the launch of the OnePlus 7 and OnePlus 7 Pro. All the OLED panel-equipped OnePlus handsets that have been released after this duo include this feature, except for the OnePlus 8T.

That said, the option to turn on DC Dimming is present under the OnePlus laboratory in the Settings app on OnePlus smartphones. According to a thread on OnePlus Community (via PiunikaWeb), the newly launched Oneplus 8T does not even come with the OnePlus Laboratory section in the Settings app.

EDITOR’S PICK: What is DC Dimming & Why it’s Important for AMOLED Smartphones?

Hence, users cannot enable this feature even though the phone’s software supports it. As per a user in the same thread, as of now, DC Dimming can be only enabled on OnePlus 8T by running the following ADB command.

am start-activity -a oneplus.intent.action.ONEPLUS_LAB_FEATURE_DETAILS -e oneplus_lab_feature_key oneplus_dc_dimming_value

But this workaround is not suitable for all users. Thankfully, a moderator on OnePlus Community has acknowledged the missing of DC Dimming in OnePlus 8T but he is not sure if it will be added in future updates. Nevertheless, he requests users to wait for subsequent software builds.

Hence, if you own a OnePlus 8T or planning to buy one, keep in mind that this phone does not come with DC Dimming but may get it in the coming days.

UP NEXT: Oneplus 8T Review: Is it the Best OnePlus Phone of 2020?

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Huawei’s 2018 flagship, the Mate 20 Pro is still a hot-selling model and an awesome device in all aspect. The company has been consistent in pushing update to the phone and that isn’t expected to stop soon. The Mate 20 Pro started receiving the much-touted  EMUI 9.1 update at the end of June. EMUI 9.1 was announced with lots of fanfare, projected as packing several stunning features such as the new EROFS file system, GPU Turbo 3.0, and Moon mode for the camera.

DC dimming wasn’t one of the features the new update brought but right now, the Huawei Mate 20 Pro has started getting another update that brings this feature. DC dimming is gaining widespread popularity with each passing month especially among the Chinese smartphone makers. Most of them have already pushed updates or included DC dimming on their models  sporting an OLED screens. The Huawei P30 Pro had earlier gotten its update ushering DC dimming earlier in June. The Mate 30 Pro update delivers the firmware version EMUI 9.1.0.135 and is currently on the China ROM. When it starts rolling out globally, you can enable it on your Mate 20 Pro by going to Settings > Display > Eye comfort > Enable Flicker reduction.

DC dimming essentially controls the brightness of the display by varying the power supplied to the circuit. There are two methods to control the screen’s brightness — Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) Dimming and DC Dimming. In PWM, the width of the light pulse is varied to control the brightness of the display panel while in DC dimming, the power supplied to the circuit is varied to control the brightness. You can read more about DC dimming from our article here.

UP NEXT: Huawei AR/VR Glasses gets trademarked, could get launched at IFA 2019

(source)

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Huawei is rolling out a new update for Huawei P30 Pro with several new features and improvements. It also debuts much awaited DC dimming feature which prevents AMOLED screen flickering at low brightness. The update also brings ultra-low latency Bluetooth technology to improve the sound-quality without any audio and video lag.

The update also incorporates several camera fixes to improve the overall photo quality. A new fix is aimed to make photos more natural and authentic. It even cures the abnormal display of videos recorded by the front camera. The on-screen fingerprint sensor is also optimized with the latest update. The EMUI 9.1.0.178 firmware update makes the experience more stable. Here’s the list of other changes in the official changelog:

• Adds the option to enroll a second face.
• Optimizes fingerprint authentication. Re-enroll your fingerprints for an improved user experience
• Fixes the issue where the display colors are abnormal in certain scenarios.
• Allows for messages and notifications to display on a locked screen with live wallpaper.
• Fixes the issue where the screen does not turn off automatically in certain scenarios. Optimizes system stability, for smoother overall performance.

DC dimming has become an essential feature for the new devices featuring AMOLED displays. It eliminates the AMOLED pulsation at low brightness, relieving eyes from strain in low light.

It is a significant update enhancing the overall performance of the device. It makes the operations on the device more stable and smoother. Huawei is rolling out the update in a staged manner on the Huawei P30 Pro units globally. It may take a few days to reach every unit.

Up Next: Huawei P30 Pro (VOG-AL00m) new TENAA listing reveals its 6 GB and 12 GB RAM variants are coming soon

(via)

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DC Dimming is one of the phrases being thrown around in the mobile industry this year. We talked about it here. The feature has been rolling out to a lot more phones that have OLED displays. OnePlus already included it in the updates it released for its new flagships and Huawei has confirmed that its P30 series will also get it. In China, the Mi 9 has now gotten DC Dimming via a new MIUI update.

Rolling out as MIUI 10.2.27.0PFACNXM, the update brings DC Dimming to the Xiaomi flagship. After the update, users will be able to turn it on via a toggle under Display settings.

The update also optimizes the lock screen, updates the security patch to May 2019, improves stability, and brings a new power optimization feature.

DC Dimming was promised for the Mi 9 back in March and was available in beta to those running the developer version of MIUI. Now that it is out of beta and rolling out in China, we expect it to also make it to global users in the next stable update.

(Via)

UP NEXT: This store says the Mi 9T will sell for €359 in Poland

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The OnePlus 7 is already available for purchase in India, the UK, and China. If you already have the phone, then you should be receiving a new update right when you are done setting up the device.

The update is rolling out as OxygenOS 9.5.4 and it brings some of the features that were announced at the launch as well as some optimizations. Below is the complete changelog:

System

• Updated Android security patch to 2019.4 (April).
• Added DC Dimming (Settings-Utilities-OnePlus Laboratory).
• Improved smooth-scrolling experience.
• Optimized algorithm for fingerprint unlock.
• General bug fixes and improvements.

Gaming Mode

• Added Fnatic mode (Settings-Utilities-Gaming mode).

Camera

• Optimized photo quality.

If you don’t get a notification for the update, you can go to System updates under Settings (System) to check for the update.

The OnePlus 7 starts at £499/₹32,999. It has a 6.41-inch AMOLED display with a waterdrop notch at the top. It is powered by the Snapdragon 855 processor with 6GB/8GB of RAM and 128GB/256GB of storage.

The phone has a 48MP f/1.7 primary camera paired with a 5MP depth sensor on the back while the front houses a 16MP f/2.0 camera. There is an in-display fingerprint scanner, support for Face Unlock, and stereo speakers with Dolby Atmos. The OnePlus 7 packs a 3700mAh battery with support for 20W fast charging. It is available in Mirror Gray and Red.

(Via)

UP NEXT: These are the OnePlus 7 features coming to older OnePlus phones

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Flagship smartphones launching this year comes with support for DC Dimming feature. It has come to a point where if the phone is a flagship device, people expect the smartphone to come with DC Dimming.

Looking at this, Huawei has now confirmed that the DC Dimming feature will come to the Huawei P30 series smartphones. For those who are unaware, DC dimming essentially controls the brightness of the display by varying the power supplied to the circuit.

A user of the P30 series flagship smartphone in China has shared a screenshot of the smartphone’s newly received update which reveals that the DC Dimming feature has been introduced in this series.

There are two methods to control the screen’s brightness — Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) Dimming and DC Dimming. In PWM, the width of the light pulse is varied to control the brightness of the display panel while in DC dimming, the power supplied to the circuit is varied to control the brightness.

To know more about the DC Dimming as well as the PWM Dimming and why this is important for smartphones featuring an AMOLED display, head over to our detailed article about this by clicking here.

When the Black Shark 2 smartphone was launched with the DC Dimming feature, the company made it a point to let users know about this and made sure to include this in the phone’s marketing.

Later, many smartphone manufacturers started adopting this DC Dimming feature. As manufacturers are moving ahead from LCD to AMOLED panels, it has become a major selling point to include DC dimming.

Coming to the specifications, the flagship smartphone — Huawei P30 Pro features a 6.47-inch Full HD+ curved OLED display. The phone doesn’t have an earpiece, instead, it uses Acoustic Display Technology which emits sounds through the display using magnetic levitation.

Under the hood, the device is powered by the company’s own HiSilicon Kirin 980 octa-core processor along with 8GB of RAM and up to 512GB of internal storage. There is support for storage expansion using Huawei’s NM Card.

In terms of the camera configuration, the P30 Pro has four camera sensors on the back panel – a 20MP f/2.2 ultra wide angle lens, a 40MP f/1.6 wide-angle lens, an 8MP f/3.4 5X telephoto, and a ToF depth-sensing camera. For taking selfies, the phone comes with a 32MP sensor with AI HDR+.

Read More: Huawei’s upcoming Mate 30 smartphone series is likely to arrive with Kirin 985 and HongMeng OS

The IP68 rated smartphone also comes with an in-display fingerprint scanner which is claimed by the company to be 30% faster than that of the previous generation. The P30 Pro runs Android 9 Pie-based EMUI 9.1 custom interface and is powered by a 4,200mAh battery with support for 40W fast-charging and support for 15W wireless fast charging.

You can check out our review of the Honor P30 Pro here.

(Source)

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DC dimming is gradually gaining popularity in the smartphone industry especially as there is a shift to AMOLED displays. Always striving to be at the forefront of emerging trends, Xiaomi earlier disclosed that it would implement DC dimming on the Mi 9 before May 1. The company has kept to its promise as the Mi 9 has gotten an update that ushers DC dimming on the device.

Zhang Guoquan, director of Xiaomi’s mobile phone system software department announced the new DC dimming on the Mi 9 Development version only. He hinted that the stable version will become available on other MIUI versions after May 1, all things being equal. The DC dimming mode will be turned on under low brightness. He also disclosed that the new DC dimming feature would be included on all its OLED display-packing phones. Xiaomi’s hasn’t got a whole lot of them, just the Mi 9, Mi Mix 3, Redmi Pro, Mi 8 Pro and a few more. So the rollout may not get delayed for too long.

Related: What is DC Dimming & Why it’s Important for AMOLED Smartphones?

With the rise of LED technology, DC dimming control has been gaining a lot of attention as a more effective way of controlling the light output of an LED fixture. The technology uses a DC voltage between 0 and 10 to control the light output of the LED fixture. As the voltage goes up or down, the corresponding 0-10V dimmable driver matches the light output of the fixture to increase or decrease up to a certain percentage. DC dimming is one of the simplest and most popular dynamic lighting controls used in offices, retail spaces, and homes but the feature is just gaining traction in smartphones. Apart from the Mi 9, OPPO’s latest Reno also comes with DC dimming. However, we must point out that those of the Mi 9 and Reno are not hardware DC dimming but a software pattern to reduce the low-brightness strobe. Xiaomi is reportedly still developing a new pure hardware DC dimming. In the future, Xiaomi Mi 9 will also switch to this new solution, which will bring users no visual fatigue at low brightness.

(via)

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OLED panels have a lot of advantages. They have better color accuracy and contrasts (including better blacks) and are thinner and brighter than traditional LCD panels. So, it’s no surprise that smartphone manufacturers are shifting to OLED panels for their smartphones. Even the mid-range ones (like Mi 9 SE / Galaxy J6 Plus) have started getting this relatively expensive display panels. But there’s one disadvantage associated with OLED displays and it pertains to the way the panel handles low levels of brightness.

Most OLED panels use a technique called Pulse Width Modulation (PWM) for dimming its brightness. This is different from DC dimming, which has been used by LCD panels to control its brightness levels. Most users won’t be able to differentiate between PWM dimming vs DC dimming, however, there’s a very small section of the population who are affected by the former technique. As OLEDs trickle down to mid-rangers and sometimes even budget smartphones, its user base is growing quickly. With a significant increase in AMOLED consumption in the past few years, you would often end up seeing comments like this on the internet.

In order to understand DC dimming, we need to first learn about PWM dimming and how it can make some users uncomfortable.

How does PWM Dimming work?

PWM stands for Pulse Width Modulation. As the name suggests, in this technique, you vary the width of the light pulse to control the brightness of the display panel. Simply put, you play with the amount of time the screen stays on or off. When you lower the brightness, the screen stays off longer than it stays on, which is perceived as lower brightness.

After reading that, you must be wondering — Wait a second, the screen goes off when the brightness is low? I have never noticed that!

That’s because the frequency of pulses is very high (usually over 200Hz), so the human eye won’t be able to notice individual pulses. Instead, the human eye averages out the amount of light from these pulses. So, it’s the ratio of the panel’s on and off state that decides the perceived brightness.

This following diagram shows how PWM dimming works.

At 100% brightness, you can see that the light is always on. When you lower the brightness to 50%, the panel alternates between on and off at equal intervals. However, when you further lower the brightness, the screen stays off for a longer time than it stays on. So, at extremely low levels of brightness, there’s a considerable flicker effect.

What’s so bad about PWM Dimming and its flickering?

Usually, even at low brightness levels, the average human eye won’t be able to see the flickering from PWM dimming. But that doesn’t mean it won’t affect you in any way. Some people are more sensitive to this flicker. And in these people, PWM dimming can lead to eye strain, headaches, and migraines if exposed for long periods of time. This is especially true when the ambient lighting is low.

What is DC Dimming?

DC dimming essentially controls the brightness by varying the power supplied to the circuit. Since Power = Voltage x Current, increasing or decreasing either of these inputs will vary the power supplied to the display panel, and thereby its brightness.

Sounds pretty simple right? So why aren’t manufacturers using DC dimming in your AMOLED smartphone?

Well, smartphone manufacturers have been using DC dimming on LCDs for years, but it was only recently that they started to add it on AMOLED smartphones. This is because DC dimming has a big drawback. At low levels of brightness, the colors often come out skewed on OLED panels. In OLED panels, a change in voltage could change the emitted colors. So, at lower levels of voltage, the perceived quality of the smartphone display could go down significantly.

So what is the solution?

Smartphone manufacturers have become increasingly aware of the possible health issues associated with PWM dimming. However, considering how only a selective group of people are actually affected by PWM flickering and the drawback associated with DC dimming on AMOLED panels, recent smartphone manufacturers are opting to provide it as an add on feature. OnePlus has already confirmed that it’s testing DC dimming on its smartphones. The feature could be added via a future update. In fact, Chinese smartphone companies seem to be all in for this feature. Xiaomi, Vivo, OPPO, and even Meizu have come forward and confirmed DC dimming on its existing or upcoming smartphones.

Despite the fact that PWM dimming can cause discomfort in some users, most people won’t feel the difference. So, it’s very important to know that your sensitivity to the flicker effect decides how it will affect you.

Therefore, if you are having an eye strain or headache from being hooked on your smartphone screen for far too long, don’t blame PWM dimming just yet. Try to build good smartphone habits, which includes setting your display brightness to comfortable levels (instead of at 100% at all times) and keeping a decent distance between you and your smartphone screen.

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With the usage of OLED panels increasing in smartphones, DC dimming control has been gaining a lot of attention because of being a more effective way of controlling the light output of an LED fixture. Recently, Oppo showcased the DC Dimming feature which will be present in the company’s upcoming ‘Reno’ lineup.

Now, Chinese smartphone maker OnePlus has said that it will soon roll out DC Dimming feature which will be available for users who are willing to test the feature early. It is expected to be available in the lab or in the developer preview version. The company has reportedly completed testing the DC dimming feature with its engineering demo.

The DC Dimming technology uses a DC voltage between 0 and 10 to control the light output of the LED fixture. As the voltage goes up or down, the corresponding 0-10V dimmable driver matches the light output of the fixture to increase or decrease up to a certain percentage.

Basically, DC dimming is a feature that automatically adjusts and dims the brightness of the phone’s display according to the ambient environment. It is one of the simplest and most popular dynamic lighting controls used in offices, retail spaces, and homes but the feature is just gaining traction in smartphones.

Read More: OnePlus 3 and OnePlus 3T closed beta registrations begin, Android Pie update coming soon

The feature is already available in Xiaomi Black Shark 2 gaming smartphone. The Xiaomi Mi 9 has already received the support for this feature in a new MIUI 10 beta update. Companies like Meizu, Oppo, and Vivo’s IQOO have already confirmed that their new phones will support this DC Dimming feature.

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