Variation in max screen brightness in PS Vita OLEDs

[andykara2003]

I just picked up a PS Vita (OLED) for the first time and although I love it, I find that there are some situations where the screen's not as bright as I'd like it to be. I realise that OLEDs tend not to be that bright - but looking at various forums, it seems some feel that their OLED Vitas are super-bright (in fact there's even a utility out to further dim it beyond lowest settings), and others say they feel the same way as me in that they'd prefer it to be brighter.

I'd like to stick with the OLED model - does anyone know if there are variations in max screen brightness among the OLED Vita models?

[BONKERS]

ABL??

Though I definitely would not be surprised if the actual light output varied panel to panel. How the panel is calibrated can affect that as well and since none of these kinds of things are, it makes sense that light output would potentially be significantly lower than another unit.

[andykara2003]

I think you're right - although I don't think it's just ABL (all scenes are of a similar brightness level), I do think there could well have been some variations in the manufacturing process.

I wonder if there could be another factor that could be pinned down however? i.e.any slight variation in the model numbers or country of origin that might be brighter than others. I'm considering getting a brand new unit at the moment - the OLED that's still readily avaiable is the Japanese PCH-1100AB01 model. I wonder if anyone has any knowledge of this one, and it might be brighter than others?


Another possibility I suppose is that the overall brightness of my screen has dimmed somewhat due to the unit's age & the shorter lifespan of OLED. In which case perhaps any new unit would see an improvement..

[Lord of Pirates]

My Vita reads from 40 - 145cd/m2 (min to max, give or take) and it's seen heavy usage. If wear and age have been factors I don't think they've affected mine much.

I'm sure there's variance panel to panel but it's probably not significant.

[andykara2003]

Thanks for that - I don't have a way to measure mine unfortunately. I think you might be right though, I would imagine that the variation isn't that much. I've read that the blue phosphors lose about 12% every 1000 hours and the others about 7-8%. I don't know how much my second hand unit's been used but I might see a slight bump by buying a new PCH-1000 which I'm considering..

[Ikaruga11]

This is why I'm hesitant to buy an OLED Vita. Not only is the brightness an issue, but I've heard that the OLED screens on the Vita have much shorter lifespans than the IPS screens.

[andykara2003]

Totally understandable - although my gaming time is quite limited in general and I have so many systems, a Vita probably wouldn't get much wear compared to most scenarios. I like to have all my retro & modern gaming kit in as new condition as possible so I've bought a new Japanese Vita PCH-1000 knowing that I'll never use it enough to wear down that lovely screen.

[Ikaruga11]

Right. Is there any reason to own an older Vita with an OLED screen as opposed to the newer ones with IPS screens? I heard the older ones can be hacked and you can use normal memory cards with them.

[bobrocks95]

Any Vita can be hacked if its firmware version is 3.60 or lower. In the US no new Vitas ever shipped with a firmware above 3.60- apparently in Japan they made later ones that shipped with a higher firmware.

[Ikaruga11]

Any Vita can be hacked if its firmware version is 3.60 or lower. In the US no new Vitas ever shipped with a firmware above 3.60- apparently in Japan they made later ones that shipped with a higher firmware.

Awesome. That's great to hear. I'll probably get an IPS model then

[andykara2003]

It's subjective of course but a lot of people prefer the OLED screen.

[Xer Xian]

Yeah, I have both and I definitely prefer the OLED Vita. As far as the screen goes, I don't care that much for the better black level and pixel response times, but the colors on the OLED pop out a lot more and that makes a real difference for colorful games. The PCH-2000 is better-looking and loads noticeably faster though.

[andykara2003]

I love those inky black levels. Although the Switch screen is lovely, I can't help noticing the lack of deep blacks when I go to it from the Vita.

[Chocograph]

Assuming you guys are running henkaku, I tried VitaQuake 2.6 with opengl. Neat. Only needed to fire it up and extend FOV a little bit and play.

[ZellSF]

When you get your new Vita please do report on any difference in brightness levels. Personally I think it would be insignificant.

The PCH-2000 is better-looking and loads noticeably faster though.

It has the same hardware. That shouldn't be the case.

[andykara2003]

Assuming you guys are running henkaku, I tried VitaQuake 2.6 with opengl. Neat. Only needed to fire it up and extend FOV a little bit and play.

Very nice! I see they have quake 2 working as well, which I love. I'm definitely going to update the console to 3.60 straight away but I haven't enough time or inclination right now to get into the whole henkaku thing. I'm not too bothered about emulators and I'm a collector so like to have physical copies - but when I get the time, hekaku will be a nice way to try out some official games to help decide which ones to add to my library.

When you get your new Vita please do report on any difference in brightness levels. Personally I think it would be insignificant.

Absolutely, will do. I hope to see at least some visible improvement but I accept that you might well be right. If that's the case, I'm OK with that - there are other factors that still make getting a new Vita worthwhile for me. And my daughter will be ecstatic when I give her the old one!

[Chocograph]

Not sure how you would update your vita to 3.60 now because Sony patched a bunch of stuff but I'm pretty sure you download the update.pup and copy it over through a PS3. You run the henkaku website once on your vita and it's a permanent installation that you can remove if you want to. It installs one of two programs that lets you connect to your pc with ftp or usb, vitashell or molecular shell - I forget which one. Then you just copy stuff over to the vpk folder which is the file format and install things. For a long time we'd have to either run the website once after boot or open an email that worked like an offline activation. Now it's called ENSO henkaku and is permanent and awesome. They just updated scummvm and I've only tried Monkey Island 3 but it runs perfect. Touch support in the update a few days ago. I never saw any headlines with Quake 2 working on openGL so I'll check that out. You can also install Adrenaline and play PSP games on it.

[andykara2003]

Thanks for that - I didn't know about Enso henkaku, that's much more convenient.

As it's a PCH-1000, I'm assuming the new Vita that's coming will have a low firmware out of the box - and It seems that they found a way to update to 3.60 just by setting your DNS to 212.47.229.76 and updating via Wifi which would make things super simple:

https://www.reddit.com/r/vitahacks/comm ... to_update/

This was posted just over a year ago so I hope it still works..

[Xer Xian]

The PCH-2000 is better-looking and loads noticeably faster though.

It has the same hardware. That shouldn't be the case.

Right, I've just tested them again and the difference is actually negligible - especially considering that loading times are not set in stone and have some degree of variability. I was probably thinking about loading times off the cartridge vs. memory card, in which case there's a sizeable difference, at least on the one game I tested (Wipeout 2048, which I have in both digital and physical version).

https://www.reddit.com/r/vitahacks/comm ... to_update/

This was posted just over a year ago so I hope it still works..

Yes, as of today it still works.

[andykara2003]

Yes, as of today it still works.

Thanks.

Just a thought - I know there's a hack to dim the screen further than minimum setting for playing in the dark, but I wonder if there's another to drive the brightness higher than max? Maybe that's not always advisable but it would be interesting to see. It'd be useful in games like the metal gear solid collection where the brightness limit is reduced by the developer, I assume to save on battery.

[Xer Xian]

Sorry I don't know. I guess such a hack would have to disable the ABL since there's no other way to increase the peak white level of a display (which is down to the display specs).

Why you care so much for this I don't fully realize though. Yes the IPS Vita is brighter, but still not nearly enough to play comfortably under direct sunlight. Wait till your new Vita is in your hands, no points in worrying before..hand

[andykara2003]

I agree - I'll wait until it turns up. If there's no improvement in the new unit I'll just play it in lower light conditions. Having thought about it, I won't necessarily want to artificially increase brightness beyond max so as to preserve the screen - but it would be nice to counteract the way some games further dim the screen in the higher processor speed mode. I think this might be a hardware limitation though.

Anyway I got express shipping so it should be with me within a few days. As soon as it turns up I'll get back here with my findings - and a photo if the new one is brighter..