Sony reveals prototype 13.3-inch e-ink slate with stylus

[Feher]

What could be the possible problems in implementing frontlit in large screen ereaders? I haven't seen any large screen ereader having this feature yet.

The price should be somewhere between 500-700$
It cannot be less than 500$ because 9.7 inch ereaders sell for 350$. So the reader with new technology and 1.9 times the area should be placed at more than 500$. Pricing it beyond 700$ will be an economically unwise decision. The production cost should be around 300$ for this device.

One other point: Market for this reader will be spread equally throughout the world. More than half of the consumers will have to pay import taxes. This will add another 100$ to the end price. Even a 700$ price tag will not be give good results. But i think it will debut at high price.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by Feher

What could be the possible problems in implementing frontlit in large screen ereaders?

Casting even light over a large area. Same problem as in small readers.

[Feher]

Originally Posted by ApK

Casting even light over a large area. Same problem as in small readers.

Thanks for the reply

I was thinking along the same lines; i thought the increased length was causing the problem. Lights are placed at top of the bezel, they can move them to sides of the bezel.

I hope manufacturers try to implement this feature in 9.7 inch readers atleast.

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by Feher

What could be the possible problems in implementing frontlit in large screen ereaders? I haven't seen any large screen ereader having this feature yet.

The price should be somewhere between 500-700$
It cannot be less than 500$ because 9.7 inch ereaders sell for 350$. So the reader with new technology and 1.9 times the area should be placed at more than 500$. Pricing it beyond 700$ will be an economically unwise decision. The production cost should be around 300$ for this device.

One other point: Market for this reader will be spread equally throughout the world. More than half of the consumers will have to pay import taxes. This will add another 100$ to the end price. Even a 700$ price tag will not be give good results. But i think it will debut at high price.

You start from the price of devices which include tax, so after you scale the price to the size you don't need to add the tax again.

The companies that make the 9.7" devices that retail for $350 have 6" devices that are more expensive than the ones that Sony makes, which is why you shouldn't use them as the initial value for your calculations.

[petrucci]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

What kind of failure are you talking about? My devices have some capsules that remain permanently gray. Since a pixel is composed of hundreds of capsules it is not a problem.


Where do you get the 3.4 from? 34% is 0.34 if that is what you were going for, but you wouldn't multiply it like that.

The 2nd grade math goes like this:
$20x4x(0.9/0.66)=$109.09

And I still don't see what size dependent failure you are talking about.

Your math looks right.

I think that the rate of defects is related to the size of the screen. We may not be talking about a pixel failing. Instead we may be concerned with several contiguous capsules failing. However, it is still related to the size of the screen that is being produced. The more capsules that are produced, the greater the chance that there is a failure amongst them. Further, at 150 DPI like e-ink pearl, a capsule would not be any different in size than pixel on a high res screen. The pixels on Apple's retina displays would be smaller than the capsules.

[petrucci]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

You start from the price of devices which include tax, so after you scale the price to the size you don't need to add the tax again.

The companies that make the 9.7" devices that retail for $350 have 6" devices that are more expensive than the ones that Sony makes, which is why you shouldn't use them as the initial value for your calculations.

Well, we could use Amazon's Kindle Dx as a base price. It is $299 and was just re-released. (Amazon produces e-readers that cost less than Sony's.)

You are right, it is not accurate to simply double the cost of the Kindle Dx, as all of the features such as speakers are not doubled in the new device. However, there are other factors that will likely cost more than double, such as the screen, based on an increased defect rate because of its size. Also the Dx does not have a touch screen.

Given the lack of information, I think that doubling the cost will give us some kind of ballpark estimate of the low end price. It would put it at $600. I still expect it to cost 1,000 or more based on the new screen technology.

[ApK]

Originally Posted by Feher

Thanks for the reply

I was thinking along the same lines; i thought the increased length was causing the problem. Lights are placed at top of the bezel, they can move them to sides of the bezel.

I hope manufacturers try to implement this feature in 9.7 inch readers atleast.

Even on the 6" readers, it took manufacturers a while to get really good, even coverage. As you get larger, the inverse square law starts really making it difficult.
Add more light sources (say to cover the long side), and you add cost and power consumption.

[Feher]

Originally Posted by petrucci

It would put it at $600. I still expect it to cost 1,000 or more based on the new screen technology.

Price cannot be this high just for the new screen technology. Pocketbook launched the 8 inch color reader, having new triton 2 display with frontlight, at a decent price.


One more question: The thing that attracts me to Sony is that they implemented 1 bit black and white mode. In this mode we can turn pages very fast without having those annoying screen flashes. Does this mode apply to the whole operating system or just to book-reading in Sony ereaders?
Today i saw this amazing video here: http://www.the-digital-reader.com/20...r-at-computex/ Onyx is calling it a special refresh mode and this mode applies to the whole device. You can watch this mode at 0.37 and 7.31 in the video. When multitasking, there will be zero screen flashes in this mode.

[Feher]

Originally Posted by Sil_liS

You start from the price of devices which include tax, so after you scale the price to the size you don't need to add the tax again.

The companies that make the 9.7" devices that retail for $350 have 6" devices that are more expensive than the ones that Sony makes, which is why you shouldn't use them as the initial value for your calculations.

I was talking about M92 price in Europe without taxes (which is roughly 340$). But it is available at same price including taxes in US, so i see why there was slight misunderstanding.

Anyway, i understand that i shouldn't compare prices in this way. But Sony will still price it above the price of existing 9.7 inch readers.

[Dulin's Books]

Originally Posted by petrucci

Further, at 150 DPI like e-ink pearl, a capsule would not be any different in size than pixel on a high res screen. The pixels on Apple's retina displays would be smaller than the capsules.

no thats not the case. many eink capsules make up one pixel. microcapsules are about 100 microns across so there are roughly 100,000 in a square inch,or just under 320 microcapsules per inch.

edit- iphone retina is 32x ppi so in that case petrucci is correct. in ipad etc the ppi is less and so the pixels in those are larger than the microcapsule size.

[rkomar]

Speaking of front-lit ereaders, do any of them support writing with a stylus? I wonder if pressing on the screen with something that hard and pointy isn't asking for trouble with the light piping layer?

[Sil_liS]

Originally Posted by petrucci

Your math looks right.

I think that the rate of defects is related to the size of the screen. We may not be talking about a pixel failing. Instead we may be concerned with several contiguous capsules failing. However, it is still related to the size of the screen that is being produced. The more capsules that are produced, the greater the chance that there is a failure amongst them. Further, at 150 DPI like e-ink pearl, a capsule would not be any different in size than pixel on a high res screen. The pixels on Apple's retina displays would be smaller than the capsules.

Even if there are capsules that don't work, the screen will still get to the market. The contrast will be affected, but that is all. The fact that the screen is bigger doesn't mean that the number of damaged capsules per pixel is any different.

This is what vizplex looks like under the microscope. The sequence of images shows a page turn.

Originally Posted by petrucci

Well, we could use Amazon's Kindle Dx as a base price. It is $299 and was just re-released. (Amazon produces e-readers that cost less than Sony's.)

You are right, it is not accurate to simply double the cost of the Kindle Dx, as all of the features such as speakers are not doubled in the new device. However, there are other factors that will likely cost more than double, such as the screen, based on an increased defect rate because of its size. Also the Dx does not have a touch screen.

Given the lack of information, I think that doubling the cost will give us some kind of ballpark estimate of the low end price. It would put it at $600. I still expect it to cost 1,000 or more based on the new screen technology.

When the DX was released, the price was only 36% higher than that of the 6" device. The current larger difference is due to the fact that Amazon reduced the prices of the 6" readers in response to the competition. If there is competition for the DX, the prices will be reduced for it as well.

Originally Posted by Feher

I was talking about M92 price in Europe without taxes (which is roughly 340$). But it is available at same price including taxes in US, so i see why there was slight misunderstanding.

Anyway, i understand that i shouldn't compare prices in this way. But Sony will still price it above the price of existing 9.7 inch readers.

There are differences between the markets in Europe and the US. Devices are cheaper in the US.

The price of the device will depend on the functionality. An A4 ereader will cost more than an A4 digital notepad.

[j.p.s]

Originally Posted by petrucci

Given that Amazon just rereleased the Kindle DX for 299, I anticipate Sony's device will be very expensive. The DX does not even have the latest e-ink screen. At 299 it is not at all competitive with tablets. I think that Amazon would lower the price if they could.

They could trivially lower the price by substituting a wifi module for the 3G module. The wifi module itself is cheaper and no charges for data transfer.

[ghero]

I just thought some other features that I want to suggest to a device like this:

1. "Importance" list. Similar to bookmarking, when user reads the book/document, and he finds a page to be important, he can mark this page as important. And when he is in the book, he can invoke a list from menu to see what pages are important, and can quickly jump to there by clicking the item on the importance list. For a device as large as this, it will be nice to also allow user to input the reason for importance, and rate the importance, so the user will have more information to be displayed at the importance list, instead of just numbers of pages to jump to. (And importance list should also work with handwritten notebook too).

2. "Book binding". Occasionally, user may find pages from different books/documents to be useful for a single purpose, so he might want to put those pages together into one place, so he can access them collectively, smoothly and quickly. So a nice feature would be to have a program on the device called "book binder", and in book binder, people can create "custom book projects". When user is reading a document/book, he can insert pages into a specific book project. And when he wants to reproduce the book, he can open the book binder, access the specific book project, and invoke book producing, which will produce a document/book (probaly pdf) that holds all the pages that the user has so far inserted into (it should also allow the user to organize the order of pages inserted). Also it should also let user to insert pages from his hand written notebook pages. An extension of this feature can be also let user to insert html pages from web, to capture what he reads from online that is important.

In concerning to copyrights issues, a copy right protected document (DRM protected, or other sorts of digitally protected) or book (brought from online store) may be prevented from inserting pages to be reproduced in custom book, or to have a limit of x pages (10 pages etc.) to be able to insert.

An alternative way of dealing with copyright that is to give the user an option produce a "virtual book" (which allows user to produce virtual custom book that holds copyright content). Each page of the virtural book is simply a shortcut to the original page in the real document, and user cannot view a virtual page without having a correct document at a correct directory location.

That's all I can think for now.

[BoldlyDubious]

Ghero, I think your idea for a "book binding" feature is an excellent one. Moreover, you even proposed an implementation of it (the "virtual bookbinder" one, i.e. the one using shortcuts) that should not require authorization from the copyright holders.
I can easily see applications for your idea. For instance, a person could load into the ereader all the documents (technical manuals, textbooks, papers, personal notes, ...) she needs for her job, then define "virtual bookbinders" that allow quick access to collected information related to specific activities. It would make a great work tool!
Such a feature (added to the full-format screen) could even become the main reason why customers buy the device, and could help create a market for it.