To Onyx: Stop using e-Ink! Use ClearInk instead!

[pdurrant]

Originally Posted by whopper

N10 years later after the first eink device, they haven't still breach the 500dpi to make it paper.

300dpi with 16 greyscales is plenty good enough to equal paperback print quality.

My gripe isn't with the resolution, but the refresh speed and lack of colour.

[mdp]

Originally Posted by whopper

No, just the video of the screens that are showing to sell from just few weeks ago that I linked.

I think that if they are still showing 100dpi screens as samples just months before entering production to supply the manufacturers, we can take for granted that those screens are what we are going to see in the final devices for the first generation

No, not sure. And, you can easily turn it the other way around: "they have shown 200dpi, so they do not have resolution as an obstacle as they step into the volume product process".
Also, they state the final product will be «school books»: it makes no sense to match that with the idea that they would ship 100dpi e-paper. The project would be a laughing stock.

EDIT: I am still focused on the latest news, and the «school books» concept, but the past news do not seem to me overridden:

CLEARink signs agreement with leading tablet maker to start supplying tablet displays for at least $10m in initial orders

Fremont, May 29 2018 – CLEARink Displays Inc, the leader in next-generation reflective displays, announced today that it has signed a partnership agreement with a leading tablet maker to supply CLEARink tablet displays beginning in 2019.

The CLEARink tablet displays will feature up to 50% larger form factors than conventional reflective tablets, high resolution, video and colour. The devices will be targeted at the large tablet market, where consumers today have to choose between the 1 day battery life of LCD based tablets, or the total absence of color and internet browsing capability of monochrome reflective tablets. CLEARink displays combine the best characteristics of LCD and reflective displays by offering color, video, low power, outdoor readability and low cost.

Originally Posted by whopper

That's the reason I think we are at least 2 or 3 years away (if not 5) until we can get 10/13" devices with +200 dpi for less than 1000€

If CLEARink succeeds with the first steps, it may happen in two years. 200dpi is there, I don't think size scaling is a problem there. May: it is not granted, because it may not be in the plan. Will the public "love" the effect? Will the investment efforts affordable? Where will be the focus, given that they state it is now set on "ultraportable"?

Originally Posted by whopper

the electronic paper industry seems to advance much more slower than any other. 10 years later after the first eink device, they haven't still breach the 500dpi to make it paper. They released 13" screens after 8 years

How many potential customers are interested in 500dpi? I have eagle eyes, all I could see in the first Apple-phones were huge grids with immense moats, I actually wrote Booxtor after having received the MaxCarta (slightly more than 200dpi) stating that something was wrong, the display was a checkerboard - and all this given, I do not think I am interested in 500dpi. 260dpi, yes, certainly, it's fantastic; 300dpi, well if you can yes please; 500dpi, why would you, preposterous.

What would be the cost disadvantage? The speed disadvantage? The power consumption disadvantage? The management resources requirements disadvantage?

13" screens are, like all the rest, a considerable investment cost that has to return, you do not do that just because you can. Those screens cost more than many full devices. It takes a bet on the market to start production, in a plan that fits a snapshot. You are presenting it as a matter of breakthrough... If you so believe - that at E-Ink they first struggled to produce big screens, instead of just not giving them priority: any proof?

ADDENDUM:

But high resolution on eSchoolbooks is a "nice-to-have", not a "must-have", and people do not want to pay a premium ... I highly doubt they would want to pay for more than 300dpi
Sri Peruvemba, Vice President of Marketing, CLEARink

Originally Posted by whopper

and they've been teasing color ereaders from 3 or 4 companies and all of them failed, including mirasol by qualcomm that was by far the one with more money invested. So, I'm not optimistic at all in this regards.

Unless some really big player like amazon starts pouring money towards color screens, I don't think it's going to advance fast enough to be useful as ereaders soon.

Even if more times the money is pumped in a technology with dubious results, the problem remains structural within the technology.
Currently, we are waiting for a technical idea that can yield satisfactory results. Maybe it's happening.

[plusz]

Yet, I cannot see any info about the weight to the displays. I love to use 13" inch but if it's going to be as heavy as an iPad, than no thank you.

[JSWolf]

500dpi is rather silly. 300dpi is more than enough for reading.

[mdp]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

500dpi is rather silly. 300dpi is more than enough for reading.

That kind of resolution was a usage requirement on specific technology implementation: AMOLED pentile, for example... But it came from a gross paradigmatic transition: the producer insisted in calling a pixel what instead was an incomplete, not-independent collection of subpixels - an improper terminology that could have been made illegal (those general-public technical descriptions were definitely tainted).
In other terms, some of us would agree that a "pixel" has to be an independent unit, for example, visually, able to represent all colours. Now, this is applicable, logically and in traditional practice, to a square containing Red, Green and Blue light emitters. But Samsung came out for some bad reason calling "pixels" one Red plus one Green subpixel, or a Blue plus one Green... And if laid out at traditional "pixel" densities, the result was a horrendous fishnet. A traditional 800x600 screen was made of 1'440'000 lights, a Samsung pentile of 960'000... Making the concept of resolution dummy.
Things change when a Samsung pentile pixel is considered made of eight lights instead of two - two Reds, four Greens and two Blues (↓): this restores the resolution definitions as we have always used it, makes the result a beautiful pixel, the rendering finally a good result, BUT the 500DPI of the distributed specifications is in reality, visually, somehow a 250DPI...
Now, for completeness: terming "pixels" those ugly chunklies of a pixel was in some way legitimate because they were independently controllable, which is a very good thing for definition - it is like a direct partial control of some subpixel entity. Nonetheless, one pixel made of two leds is not a pixel for perceptual purposes.

#-#- (↑)
-#-#
#-#-
-#-#
(That's a single perceptual pixel, but someone makes it count as four)

Likewise, in some subtractive filtering technologies used for example on EPD, and even on CLEARink, the original resolution "before applying colour" has to be exploited as a subpixel matrix to render the final image. So, the same display may be considered a 200DPI with relevance to the blacks, when the filtered dots remain dark, but is perceptually a 100DPI there where polychromy is rendered. And the whites, well, the effect has to be seen to be sure that talking about "whites" is proper.

EDIT: but I want to let it all out, and be even more schematic.
If you have a 800x600 display, 8''x6'' big, that is construed to be a 100DPI display.
If the subpixels are a matrix of Red, Green, Blue and White, well the subpixels collection is "200DPI".
If you can control the subpixels directly, the Saleshrewd can sell it for a 200DPI thing, but it is большойt, because visually it IS a 100DPI screen.
And if the visualization technology is made in some baroque way, the subpixel system density will HAVE to be huge, otherwise it will be like holding a Jumbotron as a newspaper...

[Matilo]

What does this mean:

https://twitter.com/onyxboox/status/1045313576112656384

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Matilo

What does this mean:

https://twitter.com/onyxboox/status/1045313576112656384

It means nothing at all. Triton is a failure.

[Matilo]

Last year I contacted Tolino and asked when we will see a color ereader. The answer sounded very complacent so that I got the impression that they will never ever push further to color ereaders. But the tweet from Onyx in this regard sounds very encouraging to me. They are eager to do it, if not with Triton then with another technology.

[mdp]

Originally Posted by Matilo

Last year I contacted Tolino and asked when we will see a color ereader. The answer sounded very complacent so that I got the impression that they will never ever push further to color ereaders. But the tweet from Onyx in this regard sounds very encouraging to me. They are eager to do it, if not with Triton then with another technology.

The matter of feasibility is hardly remotely a matter of intention from the producers. In fact, for the little I know about the market history shows the opposite: repairing to adding an offer for traditional displays after having pushed EPD.

When will Tesla mass produce the solar-powered microcopter? And the soda based jetpack, designed in the SIXTIES by Quino, how long will it take before somebody will finally overcome shyness and start filling some market?

[Matilo]

Something is going on:

https://youtu.be/GnyNEclmZlE?t=640

[mdp]

Originally Posted by Matilo

Something is going on:

https://youtu.be/GnyNEclmZlE?t=640

This is very interesting, but if it is «colour E-Ink», and it has «already launched», it must be Triton. Unless the /initiative/ has "launched", but not the implementations. Or maybe it is colour but not E-Ink...

[fgdas]

Originally Posted by Matilo

Something is going on:

https://youtu.be/GnyNEclmZlE?t=640

Booxtor already reported earlier on:

Originally Posted by Booxtor

We also talked about the devices with 10.7 "EINK color screens and built-in front light. These have been used in primary schools in China for about a year as part of an educational test project. Over 100,000 of these devices have been built so far. Unfortunately, the price of these devices is currently too high (even higher than the price of Max2), so it is initially not available in the form for the Western market. The actual problem was, for the software development for this project had been assigned about100 Onyx software engineers for several months, so we've had shortages of resources for our own projects lately. Now this project is finally completed and all resources are available again.

[Matilo]

Here a video of the 10.7 inch color eEreader:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=AsVdoi-j9GU

[mdp]

Originally Posted by Matilo

Here a video of the 10.7 inch color eEreader

I find it honestly jawdropping. Fantastic. EDIT: ...on video.

But: that does not seem to be a Triton, the whites are excellent, and the speed is high, comparable to normal E-Ink, so one may suspect a filter.
They say «10.7», which is not in the E-Ink (MIT/Taiwan) catalogue.
In fact, Plastic Logic Germany ( https://www.plasticlogic.com/ , https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Plastic_Logic ) develops 10.7'' EPD displays.

The display seems to be old, 2012.
An interesting review at designnews.com

For being filter-based, that looks great.

But the original screen being 150DPI, ( https://shopkits.eink.com/product/pl...isplay-700264/ ) with the filters it should look like something between 150DPI on blacks, and 75DPI on colour? That did not show in the video. The effect will probably be terrible in real life.

I guess they needed a much sturdier product for distribution to kids.


I do not understand the speech at around 0:30 : "... It's not ?ink-ata? ..." ?

[Matilo]

Originally Posted by mdp

I find it honestly jawdropping. Fantastic.

YES. They can do it!!

I think the final result is a 150 ppi display whether it is black/white or color.

at 0:30: eInk Carta