Nemoptic says our e-paper is better than others

[Azayzel]

Hmm, it will be interesting when we actually see this on the market. I am with the earlier comment about how toy'ish their demo product looks. I, for one, appreciate something that is sturdy, yet small/thin enough to be comfortable to carry around (and be seen with ). That whole thick bezel thing just looks plain gaudy; just add enough border to protect the screen from being stressed too much and stop there. Secondly, while competition is good for us as consumers; i.e., lower prices & possibly better products, if this company releases the product for the same price or higher, they're going to see a lot of people balking (even some of us "early adopters").

[yvanleterrible]

The roll up mechanisms will not be durable enough. They can't be, unless aided by gravity. Believe me I've tried. Having built roll-top doors for sailboat furniture for a long time, I've built numerous prototypes with all materials available, and so have many collegues of mine.

The main culprit in this application is the "squaring effect". If a user forces one hand up or down in the same plane there will be destroying forces. The only corrective is setting the display between aligning tracks, which totally defeats the roll in practicality.
Then there is the stress induced stop lock at the end of the roll when you get to the end of the motion. I give it no more than 100 roll-in roll-outs before it breaks. Unless the motion is motorized it won't work with careless people, meaning most everybody.
Then there is plastic aging provoking tearouts unless it is bonded to a canvas. (kevlar or natural fibre)
Then an unrolled sheet of plastic has a curvature effect that will be totally annoying. Even with the shape memory training that some materials have, over time they will bend.
I could go on and on...

To the subject of contrasts and lighting. After using eink for a while the only beef I have is making it brighter than the surroundings. Whatever lighting scheme you try, the background always pops out compared to the display itself, even your hands seem brighter(I'm thinking of wearing black gloves ). That makes it tiring after some time, specially if you have a burned spot in the focus center of your retina. One solution is having only the screen available to see. Reading in the dark with a tiny spotlight works best. Or total sunshine!

Eink definitely needs new inks!

[nekokami]

@yvan, good observations on the issues with rolling materials. This got me thinking about how to address at least the squaring and curvature issues. What if there were "rails" that rolled out at the same time as the screen, but the rails were coiled perpendicular to the curve of the screen?

Imagine you have the unit in your left hand, as shown in the illustration. At the top and bottom of the screen are "rails" which are more rigid than the screen itself. But the rails also roll up -- they are less rigid in one direction.

Now imagine that the screen is rolled up. The screen curvature is defined as "down." But the rails roll up "sideways". Their curvature is different from that of the screen, so the curvatures balance out when the screen is unrolled.

Can you picture what I mean?

[Anchoku]

Chuck, I agree with your concerns wholeheartedly but there are a variety of liquid crystal displays which have fairly wide viewing. The displays on the pump at gast stations, on calculators, PDAs like the Zaurus and, those new electronic shelf labels of Sharp's are just a few examples of LCDs that aren't quite as sensitive to viewing angle as the normal notebook panel.

On the other hand, E-Ink's display looks good because the eye focuses well on the image surface. With LCDs, the eye focuses on the reflective surface behind the display. Most LCDs are transparent. That's why the numbers on the gas pump may look like they stand out from the background. Notebooks and monitors have a light diffusion sheet directly behind the LCD to give your eye something to focus on. Otherwise, it would be like looking through colored glass.


NatCh, I think you've nailed it. Now, if only the rest of the computer could fit in that tube.

[yvanleterrible]

Originally Posted by nekokami

Imagine you have the unit in your left hand, as shown in the illustration. At the top and bottom of the screen are "rails" which are more rigid than the screen itself. But the rails also roll up -- they are less rigid in one direction.

Now imagine that the screen is rolled up. The screen curvature is defined as "down." But the rails roll up "sideways". Their curvature is different from that of the screen, so the curvatures balance out when the screen is unrolled.

Can you picture what I mean?

Totally! But you'd need to beef up the container's size to accomodate both opposite materials. I'd rather handle an 8" by 10" by 1/8" sheet or thinner. Everything in offices is already geared to this way of handling: suitcases, documents, filing etc. etc.

An other point suggested by NatCh has to be addressed.. Circuit board flexibility. The only reasons for the present way of doing things is mostly manufacturing and economics.

If you look at the flexible display's workings, there are current carrying grids that flex with the unit. Why can't it be the same with the electronics?
First there would have to be expensive machines built to accomodate this different concept and second the redrawing of all components in linear fashion.
But it is feasable! Sure it would be expensive but every extension of electronic markets would benefit of these advances. Eink is the first where electronics can be virtually printed. The rest can't be that far?

[NatCh]

I've heard/read/seen (somewhere -- Discovery Channel, maybe?) about circuit boards (the substrate, I mean) made out of carbon-based materials that were quite flexible, but they're not yet to the point of being manufacturable.

[nekokami]

I think that kind of flexible circuitboard is what Plastic Logic is aiming for. Displays are just one application.

The two applications I can think of where a rollable display would make sense are the very small and the very large. If something needs to be small enough to fit into a pocket, but large enough to read, a rollable display might be helpful. On the other extreme, just as blueprints are rolled up presently, very large images are more convenient to deal with if they can be stored in a smaller footprint.

But for most mid-range applications, I agree, I'd rather have a thin, relatively rigid screen. The flexible display still might be less fragile, though, and I think that would be a good idea.

[yvanleterrible]

Yeah! and it would be rigid enough for comfortable work with it.

[yvanleterrible]

I have a friend who makes high end speakers. I make his cabinets. The crossovers he makes for them are a mass of components joined with flexible wires and the whole setup drowned in opaque colored 1/2" silicone as to prevent copy. The whole thing is flexible.

[Anchoku]

I did a little searching because it bothered me my Picvue link was broken. It turns out it's not just the link.

Originally Posted by DigiTimes

Picvue announces auction of LCD glass subsidiary assets
Carrie Yu, DigiTimes.com, Taipei [Wednesday 8 November 2006]

Taiwan-based STN LCD maker Picvue Electronics on November 7 announced the opening of an auction for assets of its subsidiary Picvue Optoelectronics International (POI), a glass substrate maker, with the auction to end on November 14, according to a company filing with the Taiwan Stock Exchange (TSE).

The auction will include bids for equipment and precious metals at POI’s glass furnaces, with a guarantee fee set at NT$30 million (about US$913,938), the filing indicated.

The auction will be hosted by the Taiwan Cooperative Bank, which, along with six other banks, signed a NT$3 billion loan with POI on March, 2004, the filing said, adding that POI still has unpaid loans of NT$1.86 billion.

As of September, 31, 2006, Picvue had a 76.57% stake in PQI, the filing said.

In September, Picvue filed for reorganization with the Hsinchu District Court, according to a TSE filing by Picvue. Picvue also requested the court to issue temporary restrictions on fulfilling the company's obligations and considering claims against the company, according to the filing.

I wonder who Nemoptic is going to partner with in the future?

[Alexander Turcic]

This explains perhaps why the Picvue e-book reader which was announced some years ago by Nemoptic never made it to the public (or did it, without us noticing it?).