[FJames]

The touch screen technology everyone else is using (Sony, Nook, Kobo) doesn't reduce screen contrast because there's nothing on top of the screen. It uses infrared beams from the bezel surrounding the screen. It does make the screen very slightly more recessed into the bezel, increasing the bezel shadow slightly at the screen edge when the ambient light is coming from the side. It's quite accurate and sensitive - almost on par with the capacitive touch screens on the iPad or iPhone.

Making the processor faster won't increase the screen resolution. The current 6-inch 600 x 800 resolution is the physical resolution of the eInk Pearl display screen. We'll have to wait for eInk to introduce a new screen, which will then presumably start to show up in new models from all the major vendors along with faster processors to handle the extra pixels. (I think iRiver's Google reader has a new 6" 1024 x 768 eInk screen)