E Ink - Page 40

Netronix is showing some new E Ink e-readers at Computex. There are several devices, ranging from 5" to 9.7" (using the same display as the Kindle DX). The 6" device comes with wireless and touchscreen...

Netronix is an ODM, so we will not see these devices under that brand... hopefully someone will pick them up and market them...

Amazon announced that the Kindle DX will start shipping on June 10th. It costs 489$, and currently available for pre-order. The Amazon Kindle DX is a wireless e-book reader. It got a large (9.7", 1200x824, at 150 ppi with 16 shades of gray) E Ink display, and Amazon is not just aiming this for books - but also for newspapers (they already signed up the NY Times, Wall street journal, The New Yorker and Time magazine).

Amazon kindle DX

The DX weights 535 grams, and the size is 10.4" x 7.2" x 0.38". It's got 4GB of internal memory (around 3.3Gb of which are available to the user). The modem is a EVDO 1xRTT (Sprint 3G).

CNet reports that Amazon's CEO, Jeff Bezos says that a color kindle is years away. Bezos says: "I've seen the color displays in the laboratory, and I can assure you they're not ready for prime time".

E Ink announced today that their segmented display product line is now called SURF. Over 15 million products with E Ink segmented display have been sold already, including the Samsung Alias 2 phone, the new Phosphor wristwatches, the Esquire magazine cover and the Lexmark jumpdrive.

SURF displays are ultra-thin, rugged and flexible. They are ideal for consumer electronics, medical devices, PC-accessory, display smartcards, capacity indicators, electronic shelf labels, signage and communications applications.

E Ink announced today that over 1 million E-Book readers with their displays are being used today. In fact almost all epaper readers use E Ink technology.

At SID 2009 (starting sunday), E Ink will showcase many such readers:

• Cybook Gen 3 by Bookeen
• Digital Reader 1000S by iRex
• eSlick by Foxit
• EZ Reader by Astak
• HandyBOOK N516 by Hanvon
• Hanlin eReader V3 & V8 by Tianjin Jinke Electronics
• iLiad 2nd Edition by iRex
• Kindle 2 by Amazon
• NUUT from Neolux
• Reader Digital Book PRS-505 & PRS-700 by Sony
• STAReBOOK STK-101 by Staretek

Update: We have posted our own review of these cool E Ink watches

Art Technology has released a new range of watches that has E Ink displays. They will be sold under the brand phosphor, and include 3 models (a curved watch, a curved 'calendar' watch, and an analog-digital style watch). The display is segmented (not active-matrix) - the total thickness is less than 400 microns, made entirely from plastic. Price will range from 175$ upwards...

Phosphor curved E Ink watches

Amazon has started to sell the eSlick reader from Foxit, for 290$. It has a 6" E Ink display (600x800, 4-level gray scale).

Foxit eSlick reader

The eSlick has 128MB of memory, SD card slot (it comes with a 2GB card), MP3 player, and weights 180 grams.

The kind folks at E Ink have sent me some demo displays. The first one is the Lexar Jumpdrive mercury. This is a USB drive that has a capacity meter. The E Ink displays needs refreshing only when it is connected to the computer anyway, so it's the perfect display. The display looks rather good, and it's a nice use for E Ink. The jumpdrive costs 9.99$ for the 2GB version.

Lexar jumpdrive mercury

The second thing I got is the Esquire magazine with the E Ink display. It's a big display on the cover. It basically consists of several words and photos, and the display just lights on or off in all sorts of sequences. It's not an active-matrix display, but a segmented one. Ir runs on batteries, and still goes on since October 2008 - much more than they originally anticipated...

Esquire magazine E Ink cover

There's actually a second E Ink in the first page of the magzine (sharing the electronics with the first display). This time it's an advertisement for ford. This display is really simple, just lighting up a third of the photograph each time. It's not very bright, and actually not so easy to notice.

Esquire ford ad E Ink

E Ink has released a new development kit (broadsheet AM-300) with the new 9.7" display, as used in Amazon's new Kindle DX. The kit includes the display, a X86 processor running Linux, API software and sample images and drivers. It also supports MMC cards, Bluetooth and USB. It will start to ship be the end of the month.

People often gets confused about E Ink, and the relation to 'generic' e-paper technology. I'm trying to sort things out in this post.

• E Ink is the name of the US company behind this specific technology. Notice that E Ink is used without a dash... Actually they do not like when people write 'E-Ink'. I personally like it better with a dash myself, but I'm not in charge.
• E Ink Vizplex^TM is the imaging film used in ePaper displays made by E Ink Corp. The Vizplex is the kind of display that is used by e-book readers such as Amazon's Kindle. They actually have other types of displays - more simple ones, such as segmented displays, etc.
• ePaper is a generic term for a display technology that makes paper like displays. E Ink Vizplex is an ePaper technology.
• Electrophoretic is the science behind the technology... discovered way back in 1807, and has to do with motion of particles under influence of electric field.

I hope this straightens things out. Apparently almost everyone is actually using "E-Ink" to describe the company, product and technology used in gadgets. Amazon are doing it in the Kindle description page, and so are the BBC in a recent article.