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E Ink Unveils Color E-Reader Display
Kensai7 writes with news that E Ink, the company who builds the displays used in Amazon's Kindle, Barnes and Noble's Nook, and Sony's Reader, has launched a color version of their e-reader screens. It will first be used by a Chinese company called Hanvon Technology. Other companies will be watching and evaluating how well it works before integrating it into their own designs. Quoting:
"Unlike an LCD screen, the colors are muted, as if one were looking at a faded color photograph. In addition, E Ink cannot handle full-motion video. At best, it can show simple animations. These are reasons Amazon, Sony and the other major e-reader makers are not yet embracing it. Amazon says it will offer color E Ink when it is ready; the company sees color as useful in cookbooks and children’s books, and it offers these books in color through its Kindle application for LCD devices. Sony is also taking a wait-and-see approach."
It says the big US companies are waiting to see whether it will be useful for cookbooks and children's books, but wouldn't the color aspect of it have an immediate market with the magazines and periodicals that those same companies are pushing so hard to distribute on their devices?
Common Sense isn't as Common as people think...
..embracing color. Children's books and cookbooks? That's it? Really? What about textbooks? I can see significant increase in e-reader use for textbooks if they had color capability. Not every HS and college student is going to have the luxury of having a pad/slate device. Color provides an extra dimension of information without physical space, pretty useful IMO!
... they want to sell what they have on their shelves and it's way too early to make all the buyers go out and rebuy a planned-obsolescence upgrade. If they wait, they won't anger all their christmas customers with finicky "i'll wait for it" choices.. you know.. for the good of the product.
CS majors know the time/space tradeoff, but they never get taught the 3rd, crucial, tradeoff of the set: comprehension!
This just in to the /. news room; The TSA has announced that E Ink Color E-Reader Displays are now banned from domestic flights worldwide. The little electronic eInks might be related to toner in toner cartridges and thus a threat to the safety and sanity of the worldwide local traveling community, at large. A spokesman for the TSA had this to say; "I don't know what all is in there, but those colors could be made to look like a powerful explosion or some such thing, or another. Heck, I just don't like the look of that contraption. It looks like some sort of controller for human zombie robots or somethin'."
This is the NSA, we're gonna geet U h@x0r5! Also, what is a h@x0r5?
As far as I know, newer sony readers (PRS-350 and 650) do use pearl displays.
I've been waiting for years for color e-ink to mature enough to make a good digital picture frame. Something cheap, lightweight, with great viewing angles, daylight readable, non-reflective, awesome resolution, takes no power in between refreshes - heck, you could set it to only switch 1x day and run it for a year on a small battery.
Sounds like they are getting closer - keep at it, guys!
I like the idea of having a light weight e-Reader which I can carry reference books on. But most of my reference books have colour diagrams, illustrations and figures. They really don't work in black and white - or at least are not as visually appealing, which is important when you're reading something.
I'm not sure why the NYT thinks not being able to play FMV is a problem. I don't want to watch video on an E-Reader; I want to read books. I've already got devices which I can use for watching videos while on the move - though I seldom use them for that - but they suck for reading because of the glossy reflective displays. I just want a device for reading books on the move. In colour.
If Amazon were to bring out a new Kindle with a colour display I might actually buy the damn thing.
Yeah, I had a sig once; I got bored of it.