Color Ereaders - An issue for though

[Kali Yuga]

Last I checked, a huge chunk of books still only print black letters on white pages.

I won't say color is superfluous, as some things benefit from color (e.g. children's books, education). But I don't think it is a big enough deal to produce a massive shift in the market.

[Jack Tingle]

Yawn! This has been beaten to death on both PDAs and smartphones. As soon as color functionality is almost as good and almost as cheap as B&W functionality, B&W disappears because there is a bigger demand for color. Economies of scale then degrade B&W's price advantage. My guess is that the break point is quite a few years away for eReaders. It's also probably inevitable.

Regards,
Jack Tingle

[elemenoP]

Agreed that color is inevitable. I don't need color but at some point it will cost the same as b&w so why not? I also think that in the future there will be no dedicated ereaders, only tablets of various sizes. Finally, the e-ink vs backlit issue will be solved by having e-ink (or something like it) with a backlight that you can turn on and off, depending on whether you need it.

When all these things come to pass, I will think back fondly on my old Sony 650.

eP

[screwballl]

Color readers right now is slowly crossing into that crossover aspect, increasing the functionality of a reader with adding a little color, without fully falling into a multi-function tablet device. I suspect we will see more of these, but I also believe there will still be a, expanding dedicated market for the plain non-color readers where their primary function is reading books, slowly replacing paper books as time wears on.

[MikeFromHC]

Originally Posted by THE TERMINATOR

An E-book that streams video would be cool, but the processor in a laptop is faster than and E-reader, and the pandigital is LCD isn't it?

Yes it is faster but that does not mean that slower processors can't stream video and as I said, there is at least one color e-ink in the lab that responds fast enough to stream.

[Elecman]

I think many people who appreciate their B&W e-ink readers may not necessarily feel they want or need a color reader until more of these color versions start to appear.

Color e-ink will be the next logical progression over grayscale. The colors may appear faded, but many newspapers' color ink has a faded look as well. Just imagine the possibilities of viewing magazines, brochures, color PDFs on an efficient e-ink screen. Personally I am looking forward to it.

[GeoffC]

A colour unit can always be set to be B&W ....

I can always find a use for colour in a reader - if only for the cover pages or art....

I just don't want all the 'fancy' add-ons, wi-fi, 3G, mp3 player, browser, coffee maker etc .....

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by jbcohen

What do you think is the effect of the introduction of color screen electronic readers on the market as a whole?

Colour screen electronic readers will eventually supplant black and white ones entirely, but not with current back-lit LCDs or even OLEDs.

I don't think they'll have much effect on the market as a whole. B&W readers are now sufficiently good to be a mass market item, and a colour screen is unlikely to be the feature the causes lots of people to get one.

[hidari]

Barring the disappearance of eink readers in the market due to LCD, OLED, Mirasol, or some other technology....Is eink really able to be improved in color so as to appease customers. I have heard that color eink is not an easy thing to attain....

As for Colour..No thanks... always been a fan of black and white, eink, tvs, pda... etc...

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by hidari

Barring the disappearance of eink readers in the market due to LCD, OLED, Mirasol, or some other technology....Is eink really able to be improved in color so as to appease customers. I have heard that color eink is not an easy thing to attain....

As for Colour..No thanks... always been a fan of black and white, eink, tvs, pda... etc...

I think it's a mistake to equate E-Ink with ereaders. E-Ink is currently the best low-power bi-stable reflective display technology available, but it's not going to be the only game in town forever.

On similar technology lines there already SiPix shipping, although that has yet to match the contrast of current E-Ink, and Bridgestone's AeroBee looks like it's going to provide much faster switch times, although they don't seem to be aiming at eReaders yet

Mirasol is the most near-to-market of the alternatives. We should see actual shipping products with Mirasol displays before the end of 2011.

http://www.epapercentral.com/epaper-technologies-guide seems to be an excellent summary of the state of the art.

[hidari]

Originally Posted by pdurrant

I think it's a mistake to equate E-Ink with ereaders. E-Ink is currently the best low-power bi-stable reflective display technology available, but it's not going to be the only game in town forever.

On similar technology lines there already SiPix shipping, although that has yet to match the contrast of current E-Ink, and Bridgestone's AeroBee looks like it's going to provide much faster switch times, although they don't seem to be aiming at eReaders yet

Mirasol is the most near-to-market of the alternatives. We should see actual shipping products with Mirasol displays before the end of 2011.

http://www.epapercentral.com/epaper-technologies-guide seems to be an excellent summary of the state of the art.

Maybe this article helps confirm the demise of eink:

Why nobody will buy a color e-ink ebook reader:

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/new...eply&p=1343483

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by hidari

Maybe this article helps confirm the demise of eink:

Why nobody will buy a color e-ink ebook reader:

Wrong link? Perhaps you meant this article:

http://www.fastcompany.com/1681052/w...k-ebook-reader

[hidari]

Ta ...For the correction...ugh.... long day...

[Belle2Be]

I don't have the need to color (or apps) when I read. I'm perfectly content with eInk I also can't read on LCD long.

[Belle2Be]

Originally Posted by Jack Tingle

Yawn! This has been beaten to death on both PDAs and smartphones. As soon as color functionality is almost as good and almost as cheap as B&W functionality, B&W disappears because there is a bigger demand for color. Economies of scale then degrade B&W's price advantage. My guess is that the break point is quite a few years away for eReaders. It's also probably inevitable.

Regards,
Jack Tingle

I just want to note, while it may be beaten to death to YOU, there are new people on this site every day, and there is sometimes new information/articles to contribute to the discussion.