Abstract: Particular embodiments described herein provide for an electronic device that includes a display panel that includes a segmented backlight and a display engine, where, for each segment in the segmented backlight, the display engine communicates to the display panel an identifier that indicates if a brightness value of the segment in a next frame in a video stream will change from a brightness value of the segment in a current frame in the video stream. The display panel can include a timing controller (TCON) and the TCON uses the identifier for each segment in the segmented backlight to determine if a brightness of a specific backlight segment for the next frame can be a same level as a brightness of the specific backlight segment for the current frame.

Abstract: Particular embodiments described herein provide for an electronic device that includes a liquid crystal display, a backlight for the liquid crystal display, a timing controller (TCON), and a display engine located outside of the TCON, where the display engine asynchronously sends image data to the TCON and backlight control data to the backlight.