Ever since smartphone bezels started shrinking, the race to create a reliable, working fingerprint sensor that lived under the display was on. At CES 2018, that vision came to reality, and now, the first smartphone with the technology is officially launching…
Biometric security has been a core part of our smartphones for the past several years, and fingerprint sensors have only been getting better over the years. Now, though, as a war mounts up against smartphone bezels, fingerprint sensors are losing out. That is, until they end up under the display, as Synaptics is doing with its new Clear ID sensor.
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Displays with minimal bezels were the biggest trend we saw in smartphones this year from the expensive to the affordable. However, providing these displays presented a challenge for some companies, forcing them to move the fingerprint sensor to the back or ditch it entirely, all because the technology to toss the sensor under the display simply wasn’t ready. Now, it is, thanks to Synaptics…
Synaptics has provided fingerprint sensors for a number of different smartphones, the HTC One Max among them, but Engadget says that it has a much sleeker version in the works.
Synaptics’ latest fingerprint sensor for mobile devices measures only 3.5 mm wide. It’s so thin and tiny, it can fit inside a volume rocker switch on the side of your smartphone or tablet.
The company says it has also found a way to prevent the use of fake fingerprints by a new algorithm that can distinguish live fingers from printed replicas.
We probably won’t be seeing the new reader make it into phones until next year, though, as Synaptics says mass-production isn’t due to start until the third quarter of this year. There’s as yet no word of which phone brands might be looking to include it.
We’re also expecting to see the company’s pressure-sensitive screens coming to some Android devices later this year.
Image for illustration only: 91mobiles.com
Following Synaptics’ announcement that it would be offering pressure-sensitive touchscreen controllers to allow Android manufacturers to offer features similar to 3D Touch on Apple’s latest iPhones, it appears that Xiaomi will be adopting the technology.
It has previously been suggested that Samsung plans to use the Synaptics system in next year’s flagship Galaxy handsets.
The report from a well-known Chinese tipster says that Xiaomi has patented a technology similar to 3D Touch, notes GforGames. It’s unclear whether Xiaomi plans to use the Synaptics controller or has created its own technology.
Synaptics has today announced the ClearPad 3700 force-sensing touchscreen controller, which the company hopes will be packed inside many a 2016 flagship Android smartphone. This comes just about a month after Apple’s September 9th event, at which the Cupertino company announced the iPhone 6s and 6s Plus, both packing “3D Touch” as a headline feature…
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