Why E-ink innovation is so slow

Why E-ink innovation is so slow




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46 Comments

  1. It looks like Amazon is going to push writable screens looking at the Scribe. I can see the Oasis model being replaced with a "Scribe Mini". I recently upgraded my ancient Kindle (4th Gen, only 2 gigs of storage! from 2011) with a Paperwhite with 16 gigs. I like the idea of the Scribe but it is too large and too pricey for my liking.

  2. I like my Garmin Instinct Solar, b&w screen, 20 days of battery, just like I like the e-reader. But yes, the majority of consumers want a color lcd screen so they can watch mindless TikTok videos. In my opinion the market for e -readers is not the same market as Main Street.

  3. You think thats bad i swear tvs have went backwards 10 years ago 1080p 32 inch crap brand for 200 some of the modern ones 720-1080p and 600+ wtf 😅

  4. One big advantage of e-paper is that, as far as my experience goes, once you read text on it, you kinda get addicted to how comfortable it feels for your eyes.

  5. In Poland, nobody use kindle, we have our own store – Legimi and our own devices grom multiple producents, like Pockey books or Inkbook. This is only a funfact here, but its shows, that Amazon has competitors.

  6. I just use my old Samsung S3, and use the text to speech to read out my books, I have had multiple e-ink devices over the years but this is much more convenient for me.

  7. If I had an ad-free e-ink tablet that used a good stylus and could handle CAD I would buy one in a heartbeat

  8. I would love a very good book reading device that mimics as close to exactly the experience of reading a paperback. A paperback has page margins, but no bezels. There's a difference. Bezels: no. Page margins: yes.

    This is what I want: little to or preferably no bezels and a big narrow screen in the same dimensions and aspect ratio as a typical paperback, which is technically 10.1" outside of the US ('digest' size). One of the keys to getting away with this size reader for the reading of novels and lessening the device weight is the elimination of bezels. Take the Kindle Scribe entire device size, for example, if you remove the bezels from this device the device is now about 1/3 smaller and 1/3 lighter. Remember also, the Scribe is a wider aspect ratio than a paperback novel, I want the narrower aspect ratio.

    If I was told that in the current state of e-ink technology to make the book reading device I am describing it would near-impossible (nothing is impossible) to give it a backlight, I would still want this device. Heck, people could add on a simple book light if they wanted to read in lower light. When it coms to e-ink book readers I dislike device bezels that much. I don't want device bezels with big company logos on them. I want no bezels. I wan an ultra-simplified reader that features the pages of the book in all of their glory with the typical left and right page margins you see on paperbacks and the header and footer margins.

    I'm old fashioned in this regard, but I want page numbers. Simply tell me the current page "36". Tapping this number could switch to showing various pieces of info, such as how many pages total in the book, or percentage of book read thus far. I would always want to switch back to simple elegant page numbers. Like I have said, I wish to mimic a paperback. I want to get lost in a book and get rid of everything in my way.

    There are two options I see for pagination. One is swiping across the display and the other is a pressure-sensitive squeeze wherever your hand is resting. Both could be there. I would opt to use the latter, holding the 'book' how I wish to hold it and turning the page without having to move a finger.

    Go build it.

  9. I'm looking at my first product i 8-11. I'm not very scholarly but i look for festures that would allow a novelist/student to type and create *linkable heading/subheading, linkable contents page, internal/external hyperlink by marking a word or section of pg.
    *i used to do voice pick, and you would train words so the machine registered it (you could even say something else for that word). so i if there is a program to make your personal writing near 100% translatable
    So yeh. If the software is there to do that. I can see it being used by many many.

  10. Like many others, I don't see these "downsides" of eReaders as downsides. Big bezels are great, I can actually hold the device comfortably. The "slow scrolling" is fine, you don't scroll when reading a book and don't need a high refresh rate. I don't miss the keyboard, I'm using the device to read, not type. I'm fine with plastic, I want the device to be lightweight and durable and plastic can do that just fine. And while expandable storage via an SD card slot would be nice, I even went with an 8GB model instead of 16GB because that's still thousands of books.

    I would agree that it'd be nice for the headphone jack to come back for audio books though. And the ad lock screen is more annoying on the newer Kindles. I had an old one and you could unlock it immediately, almost no need to see the ad. But on a newer model, suddenly it takes several seconds to "wake up" before you can unlock, but the ad is present on screen during this time. Hmm, somehow a newer device with faster hardware is slower? Or did they just make it take longer to unlock so you have to look at the ad first? Obviously they made it take longer on purpose.

  11. Man, if they could get a full color large e-ink display to a respectable cost for a consumer, something with vibrant colors, that would be amazing for like say, wall art. Or like as a replacement for those LCD "picture frames" that used to be all the rage. Because really the biggest downside of an LCD panel used to just display "art" is the power draw, it doesnt make a lot of sense. But e-ink sips power and doesn't really need to use power once the display refreshes.

  12. It's always funny when tech reviewers treat e-readers like underperforming tablets. There are certainly other uses for e-ink (and I am excited to see what they are), but e-readers don't need thinner bezels or more interactivity. They're made for people who enjoy reading. What a concept! I recommend it.

  13. I have a Kindle Oasis and it's great, but it is the last Kindle I will own. The Onyx Boox lineup is much better and more flexible. They are full Android devices that support the Google Playstore. Some have color, all have selectable refresh rates that makes the devices usable for even watching many videos. Most Android apps can be installed, including web browsers and any e-reader app, including the Kindle app. This video does a disservice by showing the display using the slowest refresh rate (which Kindles have) that is seldom used. The faster refresh rates of the Boox devices are quite impressive though still far from an LCD.

  14. I think way too many people confuse the predicate of the debate around e-ink. For example, one such confusion is the idea of mistaking the e-ink display technology for the idea of an e-reader (the minimalist device in itself)

    With the bottom line being this: E-Ink does not have to be circumscribed to E-readers.

    I for one, can only hope e-ink will continue to evolve infinitely, to the point it can literally be used on laptops if needed. And the reason for that is very simple for me: Eyecare and eye health. There's no greater joy than being able to look for hours at a display, do your work, and not feel any eyestrain at all. The other is for example, being able to take your laptop/tablet outside on a bright sunny day, and do whatever you have to do.

    I really wish there were e-ink tablets that had the full features (or near full features) of a tablet, and would allow us for — for example — use some fully featured piece of software, like MS Word, Notion or Obsidian anywhere. At least for me, it would be a huge revolution.

  15. I don't understand why companies haven't tried using MIP displays for an ebook display, like those on the old Pebble watches and nowadays Garmins.

  16. Pointless complaints. Only 16gb of storage? That's enough for more books than the average human will be able to read in a decade. Every one that supports audiobooks tends to have 32gb or more. Bezels are almost required otherwise you're going to be holding onto the screen and constantly turning pages and wouldn't have a frontlight. 10 years of no competition? Didn't feel like mentioning Pocketbook or Kobo who have been releasing devices for well over a decade? This whole video seems to be someone moaning that an ereader isn't a tablet and that's because tablets already exist and there's no point trying to replicate them with inferior technology. Ereaders as a tool for reading books don't need much more innovation than they have already, if you want to draw and read full HD colour magazines just use a tablet.

  17. Honestly I recently got a drawing tablet just so I can use it for note taking because I like the feeling of writing stuff down but then with digital I also get the benifit that I can just store those notes more effieciently in terms of physical space used if I had heard about some of these other things I might have just got one of the writing tablets you showed.

  18. Surprised there was no mention of foldable e ink that was shown off a few months ago! It's really neat. The idea of an e-reader that can be properly adjusted with multiple pages like a true book is super interesting.

  19. Honestly just having books, notes and maybe a calender sounds perfect alternative to your phone as a way to be able to study anywhere without the distractions. My books are heavy as shit and I often have times when I have to for example wait for a delayed train when I have a lot of time I could use productively but just fill by being distracted on my phone

  20. Why are they made of cheap plastic ? Because they need to be light, lighter than even phones. Why the big bezels ? Because you need to hold on the thing for hours at a time, and no bezels means you rest it on your fingers, and it hurts. Why 16GB of storage ? Most ebooks are ~1MB, so that's 16 000 books you can store on it, one book a day for 43 years, probably more books than one can read in a lifetime. Why increase the storage if it only raises the price, and not the usability ?

  21. Decades of patent protection feels wrong, this stagnation showed that, if the patent holder is not licensing out, then it's "see ya later" innovation is not even coming for a while. I would think 6 or 7 years is already plenty. Decades no longer apply to our fast paced society.

  22. There would be a pretty big opening in the music industry if someone could make basically a large reMarkable display that reads and writes on PDFs and picture files. EVERY musician has had nightmares about forgetting the one sheet of music they need which would be eliminated with a good eInk device as long as it can refresh the entire display WITHOUT the annoying whole screen blink thing and it would have to update in < 0.1s instead of the 0.5-1.5s that most displays are advertised with.

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