Quote:
Originally Posted by NatCh
Most of the cost of these things is the e-ink screen. Assuming that enough of the stuff gets made and sold that the cost of development is recovered, and economies of scale kick in, then, yeah, I see the prices of even the front-line devices dropping a lot closer to the $200 mark (perhaps lower if it gets really cheap to make). The ones below $200 will be the down-revved models (previous generation, I mean), but they'll be at least as good as what we have now. 
In any case, we're talking several years. |
Even if they e-ink technology drops it's prices, i doubt that an ebookreader with the quality of the Sony Reader will be lower than 200 dollar. There is a price to pay for development, marketing and packaging.
It is of course possible that there will be super lowbudget "readers" coming. With minimal features. Probably no more ultramobile size, brushed metal, builtin lithiumion-batteries, sounds, memorycardslot, etc.
Those could certainly be lower than 100 dollar, will you buy one of those? It's not something that's meant for us, the early adapters.
We require a certain degree of quality. Just like the MP3-players you can buy for 10 bucks, I've only bought one because I was on holiday and didn't want to bring my normal mp3-player with me. I gave that one away when I got home.
They're more for the common public.
Would you still buy a black and white TV nowadays?