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LG.Philips Develops World's First Color E-Paper
An anonymous reader writes "LG.Philips LCD has announced it has developed the world's first 14.1-inch flexible color E-paper display, equivalent in size to an A4 sheet of paper. The 14.1-inch flexible color E-paper uses electronic ink from E-Ink Corp. to produce a maximum of 4,096 colors. It can be viewed from a full 180 degrees, so that images always appear crisp, even when the display is bent."
http://www.lgphilips-lcd.com/homeContain/jsp/eng/i nv/inv101_j_e.jsp?BOARD_IDX=1280&languageSec=E&kin ds=IN1
includes a picture, and a little tiny bit more info.
It's TFT LCD on a flexible plastic substrate instead of glass.
Motorola is selling a cellphone sporting E-Ink display - it's rather crude, as the display is not dot-matrix but a segmented display (not unlike LCDs) sporting some assorted graphical icons. The kicker is that the phone sells well under 50 bucks unlocked and it's 9mm thick. Apparently, the E-Ink display is way cheaper than LCD displays to mass produce, and, since it doesn't need glass nor polarizer substrates it allows the phone to be this thin.
As for the device itself, it's a nice barebones phone, which feels very study. The display looks great, and i only wish they used a finer dot matrix display, as SMSs can be rather hard to read on it. I've been considering getting one for myself lately.
No, it's not an LCD, as it uses E-Ink (little black and white capsules) - that's what makes it e-paper. It does use TFTs to rotate those capsules and change the color, however.
Ewige Blumenkraft.
There are two commercial black & white e-paper devices available to my knowledge. I happen to have one.d er/
The iRex iLiad http://www.irextechnologies.com/ is the one I have, but Sony also makes one http://www.learningcenter.sony.us/assets/itpd/rea
The quality of these b&w displays is phenomenal. The difference with colour or b&w LCDs is striking, especially outside and in full sunlight.
One reason they're not so popular might be that E-Ink is prohibitely expensive; they have a monopoly on the digital ink liquid.
Also a lot of people tend to think colour is very important, neglecting the fact that 99.9% of their book library is monochrome.