HUGE E-Ink Tablets!

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by BoldlyDubious

However, a 14" screen is overkill. 12" are sufficient to show A4 pdfs at 100% scale, in conjunction with an on-board cropping option to remove white borders.

12" is not sufficient for 100% scale of A4 pdfs, only if you trim the margins. You need 14" for 100%.

[BoldlyDubious]

That's what I said. To fit an A4 page into a 12" screen, you (or, very preferably, your ebook reader) have to remove the margins through cropping. However, I don't see any reason why this can be a problem.

[rkomar]

It's not the weight that is a problem so much as the torque. Something that is twice as heavy and 50% larger in dimensions will exert three times the torque. So, you have to keep pinching that much harder with your fingers to keep the device in place when you're holding it.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by BoldlyDubious

That's what I said. To fit an A4 page into a 12" screen, you (or, very preferably, your ebook reader) have to remove the margins through cropping. However, I don't see any reason why this can be a problem.

You are right you did mention the cropping. My reply was a little shorter than I was thinking. The cropping only works when the pdf is designed for print as well. I don't believe that it is required for pdf's to be printable. Even if a print-pdf is used as the source, for say an electronic school book, then the version for e-screens could be different from the pbook. Occasionally the margins could be used for annotations, or additional references or examples, or for you to make notes (if the e-reader allows you to "scribble" in your book). Margins also have the purpose to make it easier to read. Without margins you can get lost on the page - set your printer to print without margins (if it allows for that) and print a full page with text and you see how hard that is to read compared to having margins.

I also hope that a large screen e-reader will be A4 sized and not US-paper sized. Two A5 portrait pages next to each other is exactly a landscape A4 size, with the same height to width ratio. Now, don't try that with the US paper. I still don't like the paper here (in the US) for exactly that reason.

[BoldlyDubious]

To rkomar: you are right, it's the torque (more than the weight) that makes holding a heavy ereader wearing. However, if you make use of a supporting point (a table, your legs, ...) the problem vanishes. After all, it's the same issue that comes up when you read a thick magazine (most of those weigh 1kg or more).

To DuckieTigger: I usually eliminate the margins (leaving only a few millimetres of "white" all around) from my pdfs before copying them to my ereader, but did not experience any additional difficulty in reading because of that. Maybe this changes from person to person?

Finally: what I would really like to appear on the (non-Russian) market is something like this:
http://www.plasticlogic.com/news/pr_..._sep122011.php
Maybe some of you have any news about its actual availability, in Russia at least?

[rkomar]

Originally Posted by BoldlyDubious

To rkomar: you are right, it's the torque (more than the weight) that makes holding a heavy ereader wearing. However, if you make use of a supporting point (a table, your legs, ...) the problem vanishes. After all, it's the same issue that comes up when you read a thick magazine (most of those weigh 1kg or more).

I always read on my 902 with it balanced on something, because it would soon become torture otherwise. You're right that, the more balanced the reader is, the easier it is to hold. But in some positions, holding the device upright doesn't give the best angle for seeing. If you have to hold it at an angle, then the bigger and heavier the device is, the more work it becomes. This becomes even more true if you're using a touchscreen and have to hold it steady with one hand while poking it with the other.

I don't want to suggest that reading on my 902 is unpleasant, but I _did_ find it more tiring on my hands than I imagined it would be when I ordered it. I really didn't anticipate the problem the torque would be just on my 9.7" device when I read for an hour or more. Trying to hold something with twice the area would definitely be a problem for me.

The PlasticLogic reader would be a big improvement over the glass-substrate technology as far as comfort of handling goes. Let's hope they continue to improve their offerings.

[BoldlyDubious]

Did you see this thread?

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=173672

*Really* interesting news... (a flexible display can allow manufacturers to build large devices which don't break even if flexed a little!)

[Koda]

Toshiba 13.3" Excite tablet will ship in June starting at 650$ for the 32GB version and 750$ for the 64GB version:
http://www.techworld.com.au/article/...ndroid_tablet/

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by Koda

Toshiba 13.3" Excite tablet will ship in June starting at 650$ for the 32GB version and 750$ for the 64GB version:
http://www.techworld.com.au/article/...ndroid_tablet/

That sounds interesting. Even at 2.2 lbs it is still light enough to log around instead of text books. The only downside would be the screen as the tab sports a movie friendly 16x9 aspect ratio. Screen real estate is only about half inch wider than a 4x3 9.7 inch reader ( eg iPad or kindle dx). Granted it will be 4 inches longer (slightly larger than a normal piece of paper), but the width still makes it unsuiteable for full-size pdf support.

The new iPad with retina display at 264 dpi will have a huge advantage over the toshiba as a reader, imho. Even though the display alone won't make me get an iPad that runs on iOS (unacceptable to me personally). As a reader alone and forget about the tablet stuff, it would be too expensive.

p.s.: and of course, iPad and Excite both are slightly off-topic as they do not have e-ink or similar e-paper displays

[toronado]

Yeah it's going to be best used in landscape. Portrait mode is pretty useless on a 16x9.


Too bad it's not eInk.

[toronado]

Originally Posted by rkomar

It's not the weight that is a problem so much as the torque. Something that is twice as heavy and 50% larger in dimensions will exert three times the torque. So, you have to keep pinching that much harder with your fingers to keep the device in place when you're holding it.

You could rest it on a music stand to read it. You can do that with a real book too.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by toronado

Yeah it's going to be best used in landscape. Portrait mode is pretty useless on a 16x9.
[image removed]

Too bad it's not eInk.

Portrait is not necessary useless, might be even better than landscape when novels are beeing read.

[toronado]

Another problem is that the subpixel-ordering on color LCDs can only be optimized for either portrait or landscape, not both. Probably most folks don't notice this, but I do.

Possibly the new iPad has a high enough resolution that this becomes a non-issue, but I haven't seen a new iPad yet, so can't say for sure.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by toronado

Another problem is that the subpixel-ordering on color LCDs can only be optimized for either portrait or landscape, not both. Probably most folks don't notice this, but I do.

No offence, but if you require subpixel rendering for text to look good, than you are using a screen with too low resolution or with the wrong technology.

[toronado]

Originally Posted by DuckieTigger

No offence, but if you require subpixel rendering for text to look good, than you are using a screen with too low resolution or with the wrong technology.

No offense taken. I don't use sub-pixel rendering unless the OS doesn't allow me to disable it.

It occurs to me that I don't fully understand the phenomenon, so I will wait until I learn more about it to comment further.