Kindle PW--About to give up.....

[DrunkenDonkey]

Originally Posted by miquele

I agree with HarryT concerning the color hue issue. What bothers me a bit is the font quality. I have the impression that once I use the dictionary or the menu, the type face is messed up and it looks like some words/lines are printed in bold as compared to others until I page forward. In general, the weight of the type face is less homogeneous what I have seen on my PW than on the K keyboard, but once the dictionary pop-up was used it visibly degrades. Am I the only one noticing this?

You are not the only one. I don't own pw, but have seen no less than 5 posts about this problem, and wasnt looking for them. Saw screenshots too, looks... funny. Restarting does not help.

[joehunt]

Originally Posted by miquele

I agree with HarryT concerning the color hue issue. What bothers me a bit is the font quality. I have the impression that once I use the dictionary or the menu, the type face is messed up and it looks like some words/lines are printed in bold as compared to others until I page forward. In general, the weight of the type face is less homogeneous what I have seen on my PW than on the K keyboard, but once the dictionary pop-up was used it visibly degrades. Am I the only one noticing this?

I haven't noticed this either, but have you updated your PW to software version 5.3? There are some font fixes which may solve your problem.

[miquele]

Tried all: Restarting does not work, it auto-upgraded to the latest firmware, and swapping fonts does not help either. (Besides, a uniform weight of the font across the screen shouldn't be dependent on a particular font anyway.) Thanks for your answers so far.
I need to check out the other posts to get to the bottom it, thanks for the pointer.

[xendula]

^ not all PWs have this issue, so it must be hardware related. The one I kept for myself doesn't, but I have seen it on some of the ones I returned.

[xendula]

Originally Posted by Jbthompson

So the newer ones are better? How long do I have to return it?

I love the idea of the paperwhite, I read mostly at night so it's nice.

Not better in terms of color blotches, but I have noticed a much improved contrast on the last three units I received. The fonts were crisper on those - but it could have been just a particularly good batch, since nobody else reported this.

[xendula]

Originally Posted by HarryT

I strongly suspect that if you're not happy with the PW, you never will be. The PW's screen is a diffraction grating - the effects you're seeing are inherent in it. You need to either accept that this is what it's like (and personally I think it's absolutely fine) or find an alternate solution.

Could you explain "diffracting grating"?
I agree that they all have color blotches at varying degrees of intensity, however, I am super happy with the PW I settled on. All the other features were worth the repeated replacements and cs calls in the end.

[HarryT]

A diffraction grating is basically an optical device for splitting up and spreading out light. In this case it's used to spread the light from the 4 LEDs at the bottom of the screen evenly across the whole screen. But as well as spreading light out, a diffraction grating also splits light up into its component parts - the "colours of the rainbow". I'm sure the PWs light diffuser will have been designed to minimise this effect, but it's bound to happen to some extent or other even so.

[xendula]

Harry, thanks for the clarification. So, you are saying that there is no possibility of a non-colorated PW? (Not that I thought there was, after seeing so many units.....)

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by xendula

Harry, thanks for the clarification. So, you are saying that there is no possibility of a non-colorated PW? (Not that I thought there was, after seeing so many units.....)

Yes, that's exactly what I'm saying. Some level of colour fringing is inherent in the technology they're using to diffuse the light. Personally I find it unobjectionable, but if you don't like it, I suspect you're not going to like any PW.

[l_macd]

As I've just posted in the other thread on the Paperwhite screen, if it's inherent in the design, unless Kobo are doing something different (and they've still got to use some kind of light guide), why does this not seem an issue at all on the Kobo Glo?

Sorry for the cross-posting on two thread, the information is helpful but I'd love to find a conclusive answer!

[sparklemotion]

Originally Posted by l_macd

As I've just posted in the other thread on the Paperwhite screen, if it's inherent in the design, unless Kobo are doing something different (and they've still got to use some kind of light guide), why does this not seem an issue at all on the Kobo Glo?

I'm curious about this too as the Kobo Glo does not suffer from the color hues at all.

[xendula]

I agree. It is a good question.
Harry, what's your opinion: why is this not an issue on the Kobo Glo or the Nook Glowlight?

[mobilewilier]

i recall that amazon said that it perforates the bottom side of the light sheet to make the light diffract downwards. If there are inaccuracies in execution this might lead to a non-uniform diffraction/distribution of light and also coloration.

Didn't the Sony PRS-505 have a more rudimentary lighting sheet which just has light shine through the sheet? Maybe Kobo glo and Nook Glowlight use a more basic approach, too? Just speculating.

[Kolenka]

Originally Posted by mobilewilier

i recall that amazon said that it perforates the bottom side of the light sheet to make the light diffract downwards. If there are inaccuracies in execution this might lead to a non-uniform diffraction/distribution of light and also coloration.

Didn't the Sony PRS-505 have a more rudimentary lighting sheet which just has light shine through the sheet? Maybe Kobo glo and Nook Glowlight use a more basic approach, too? Just speculating.

The approach does seem to be "simpler" in the Kobo Glo and the Nook Glowlight. The main visible difference is that the PW looks like the eInk page "glows" while the others look like they are being "lit" by a layer above the eInk. The effect of a glowing page with a front light is tricky. It's almost like looking at a backlit display with the paperwhite.

You still need diffraction grating or something similar to get it to work in both cases. But the imprinted design you choose is fairly important to get the effect you want. Different designs can look fairly different in practice. But I wouldn't be surprised at this point if some designs introduce chromatic aberration. It's not that uncommon to deal with it in optical design.

Inaccuracies may not even factor in, or be due to tolerances that are so tight that they are having problems scaling up manufacturing while still meeting those tolerances. The reality is in optics, you can't simply make everything perfect. Light will do what light will do, and as an optical engineer, you have to make the right set of trade-offs. For example, it's pretty much impossible to create a 1 or 2 lens refractor telescope that is "free" of chromatic aberration unless the focal length is very long.

[gers1978]

My only problem with my PW is the bright patches near the bottom. I'm on my 4th PW as I keep returning them for this reason. This one is better, but still not perfect.

To be honest my biggest complaint about this is they don't let you turn the light completely off, even at setting 0, and my eyes can still perceive the bright spots, even at light setting 0. Since I do most of my reading in lit rooms, I'd be happy to read with the light totally off (as I did on every other generation of Kindle) and simply put up with the bright spots during the limited length of time I actually *need* the light on.

Why oh why they can't put an option into the firmware to actually turn the light off, I'll never know.