Technical / Research - Page 4

Texas Instruments plans to enter the e-reader market, and offer new processors and software for e-reader makers, together with E Ink.

The new chips integrate E Ink's e-paper displays with TI power management ICs and OMAP 3 processors - in the world's first power management integrated circuit for E Ink displays. TI has also developed a new software-based display controller.

The companies says that this will result in smaller silicon footprint and cheaper hardware that are more energy efficient than before.

Update: there's some new info on the Mirasol display. Qualcomm claims 6X power advantage over E Ink (even with color and video), they have a way to light the display, and it can be paired with a touchscreen.

Currently, all Kindle devices use E Ink displays. But now Qualcomm are readying their own efficient, fast, colorful, and cheap displays called Mirasol, and there are rumors that future Kindles might use this new kind of display. The current prototypes are 5.7" large, and should be ready by autumn.

Via E-Ink-Info

Liquavista is showing their color e-paper display at CES. They say they expect product announcements in 2010/2011. Here's a nice video showing how it compares to an E Ink display in a Sony e-reader:

Via E-Ink-Info.com

An Israeli hacker claims to have broken the copyright-protection (DRM) on Amazon's Kindle - and allow e-books on the Kindle to be transferred as PDF files to other devices. 

Via BBC news

Taiwan has created a new group, called the Taiwan's e-Reading Industry Promotion Alliance. They want to boost development of e-readers related industries. Initial members (there are over 200 of those) include H/W and S/W makers, content creators and publishers.

Via Digitimes

As we reported a couple of days ago, the Nook has been updated to v1.1. Engadget reports that the page-refresh is now a bit faster and the page-numbering issues has been fixed. The update starts automatically when the Nook is rebooted.

The Nook is available from Barnes & Noble's site, for 259$.

Bonnier (magazine publisher, including the Popular Science) has created a new concept for magazine e-readers, with a new kind of user-interaction:

Via Engadget