Patent ID: 7283108

Claim:
An electro-optical device, comprising: a plurality of scanning lines; a plurality of data lines; a plurality of pixels correspondingly provided to intersections of the scanning lines and the data lines, the plurality of pixels forming a plurality of display area, each of the plurality of pixels having storing device that stores data, a driving element that sets a driving current in accordance with the data stored in the storing device, and an electro-optical element that emits light with a brightness corresponding to the set driving current, wherein, each of the pixels further having a control transistor provided in a current path of the driving current to be supplied to the electro-optical element; a scanning line driving circuit that selects the scanning line corresponding to a pixel in which data should be written, by outputting a scanning signal to the scanning lines; a data line driving circuit that cooperates with the scanning line driving circuit to output data to the data line corresponding to the pixel in which data should be written; and a drive mode selecting circuit that selects a drive mode of each of the plurality of pixels depending upon the display areas or in a unit of the scanning line, wherein, when a first drive mode is selected as the drive mode, the drive mode selecting circuit drives the electro-optical element for a first light emitting time period shorter than a time period from a time point at which the scanning line corresponding to the pixel in which data should be written is selected to a time point at which the scanning line is next selected, wherein, when a second drive mode other than the first drive mode is selected as the drive mode, the drive mode selecting circuit drives the electro-optical element for a second light emitting time period longer than the first light emitting time period in the time period from a time point at which the scanning line corresponding to the pixel in which data should be written is selected to a time point at which the scanning line is next selected, wherein, the drive mode selecting circuit driving the electro-optical element in the first drive mode and the electro-optical element in the second drive mode, by controlling an on/off state of the control transistor in the time period from a time point at which the scanning line corresponding to the pixel in which data should be written is selected to a time point at which the scanning line is next selected, and wherein, when the first drive mode is selected, the drive mode selecting circuit impulse-drives the electro-optical element by repeatedly cutting off the current path of the driving current using the control transistor in the time period from a time point at which the scanning line corresponding to the pixel in which data should be written is selected to a time point at which the scanning line is next selected.