Video Electronics Standards Association (VESA) has announced a new version of the Embedded DisplayPort standard (eDP) version 1.2 that includes several enhancements defined by the DisplayPort v1.2 standard released in January 2010. In particular, the eDP 1.2 sports higher bandwidth, which will allow to support screens with enhanced colours or stereoscopic 3D technology.

VESA member companies developed eDP as the eventual replacement for LVDS which has been used in notebook PCs for over 10 years. eDP-enabled mobile PCs went into production this year, and will account for approximately 11% of the 2010 mobile PC market, according to In-Stat. Mobile PCs using the new eDP v1.2 will be in production the first half of 2011. Industry market trends indicate eDP will have largely replaced LVDS by 2013.

The new eDP 1.2 sports many enhancements, including new panel and backlight control capabilities using the DisplayPort bi-directional AUX Channel. It also adds support for the higher 5.4Gbps link rate defined by the DisplayPort v1.2 standard released in January 2010, enabling high performance Stereo 3D at Full HD, 1080p60 per eye, and support for Field Sequential Color (FSC) panels. eDP v1.2 further reduces wire count and adds new LCD panel control and backlight capabilities using the bidirectional AUX Channel. Such capabilities include backlight brightness and modulation frequency control, enabling of dynamic backlight control, color engine operation, dithering, self-test mode, and more. The new 5.4Gb/s link rate option doubles the data bandwidth of the video data channel(s).

“eDP provides a significant advantage for integrated GPU architectures. It would be difficult to support LVDS directly from the CPU, which now includes the GPU, due to the number of pins and high voltage required. eDP uses a physical interface similar to PCI Express which simplifies the design process,” said Craig Wiley, as VESA board vice-chairman and the eDP editor.

Tags: VESA, DisplayPort