Nokia LCDs in a commercial product? - Page 1
Forum section: electronics / projects

author: fenclu
author_rank: Regular Contributor
timestamp: August 16, 2015, 06:42:10 pm
content: A lot of people nowadays use old Nokia phone LCDs in their projects. They're cheap, good quality and pretty easy to use. But I'm curious - what are the realities in using one in a commercial product (like something that would go on Kickstarter)? Since this is not a typical electronic component sold by Digikey or Element14 and just a spare part for an old Nokia phone it seems like there could be some legal problems involved.

author: jeroen79
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 09:35:46 am
content: Unless you plan to steal your supply of LCDs I don't see any legal issues.And mentioning the fact that your type of LCDs was also used in Nokia phones would not be infringing on any intellectual property.Just don't call your product a Nokia product.I would be more concerned about finding a reliable source for this part.BTW, I'm not a real lawyer.

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 09:40:08 am
content: I've seen people using it in Nokia phones, a long time ago.But seriously, not only the alibaba sellers sell it, but also Sparkfun, so it should be ok to use them.

author: timofonic
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 09:48:09 am
content: Quote from: NANDBlog on August 17, 2015, 09:40:08 amAre they clones or salvaged from old phones?Why are they so popular?

author: daqq
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 10:06:52 am
content: I'd avoid something like that unless you can get a reliable supplier, or you know that you are gonna make N pieces of your system and buy N*1.5 parts in advance. Designing a product around a harvested part is not exactly wise as far as I'm concerned.Go look at the Electronic Assembly lineup of products - they have a lot of nice (if pricey) displays.

author: tszaboo
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 10:16:34 am
content: Quote from: Circuiteromalaguito on August 17, 2015, 09:48:09 amI think they are part old stock and part genuinely manufactured on the original equipment made for Nokia. There was give or take half billion phone sold with these screens, there must be huge manufacturing plants making these. If anyone put their hands on old equipment, they can create new screens.They are cheap, although a color LCD is almost the same price. You dont need lot of memory to drive the screen, and the interface is basically SPI. But I learned to hate them, having contrast issues, stupid blue backlight, and view angles are bad.

author: amyk
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 12:50:00 pm
content: Keep in mind that the original "Nokia LCD" was likely also picked from a manufacturer's catalogue, and not something Nokia themselves designed.

author: wraper
author_rank: Unknown
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 01:01:56 pm
content: Quote from: amyk on August 17, 2015, 12:50:00 pmNo designed by themselves but custom made for them regardless. Likely they even had a multiple suppliers of this part which was made to their specifications. At least with later phones there were at least 3 manufactures of the "same" LCD (not same actually, as they were different internally). Needless to say there were no any devices from different manufacturers who used the same LCDs.

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 01:38:32 pm
content: Quote from: amyk on August 17, 2015, 12:50:00 pmNonsense.Any LCD in a consumer product will have been custom made.They have only become commdity items due to widespread use in phones and demand for spares.The biggest issue for anything but a 1-off build of a product is continuity of reliable supply. The only way to completely cover this is to buy enough for all your envisaged future needs.Not only are there issues of parts no longer being available and variable quality, there are also things like changes in control IC .The old Nokia colour LCDs that were popular a few years ago had 2 different controllers and it was pot luck which you would get.

author: TheElectricChicken
author_rank: Frequent Contributor
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 01:54:47 pm
content: Quote from: mikeselectricstuff on August 17, 2015, 01:38:32 pmthat makes no business sense, re-inventing the wheel for every product is just burning profits up. the 4002 1602 0802 style LCDs are a good example of standard parts same as the 7805 is found in many products because people don't re-invent the power supply in every case.I just scrapped a printer and found awesome 5v 10amp, 12v 4amp and 24v 4amp power supplies in it. Interesting thing is there are data sheets and specs easily available for the power supplies which I found.http://www.sanken-ele.co.jp/en/prod/powersp/sw/swa/swa-100.htm

author: mikeselectricstuff
author_rank: Super Contributor
timestamp: August 17, 2015, 02:08:14 pm
content: Quote from: TheElectricChicken on August 17, 2015, 01:54:47 pmComponents are totally different to customer-facing parts like displays. When production volumes are in millions, you can afford to tool up for pretty much every part to get the result you need.You're going to be spending millions on development and tooling - why compromise the design by working round an off-the-shelf part, the design & tooling of which is only going to be tens of thousands.