Forget Kindle 2: Fujitsu?s E-Reader Screen is Bigger, and It?s in Color
In all the fuss about the new Amazon Kindle 2 yesterday, it was easy to forget that the “upgraded” device still has a relatively small paperback-sized screen and can only cope with greyscale imagery. And that’s where Fujitsu’s new e-reader triumphs: Its display uses full color e-ink and is way bigger–at least three times bigger, it seems.
Fujitsu’s e-reader is based on “FLEPia” technology from Fujitsu Frontera that incorporates the color screen with a wireless data management system. And that screen is about as large as the average magazine page–making it far more suitable than the Amazon device for browsing magazine-style info or even e-newspapers. That’s certainly why Mainichi Newspapers Co. Ltd. is involved in the trial of the e-papers currently underway in a Tokyo restaurant to see how the public accepts it.
The Termina Kinshicho Fujiya restaurant has a dedicated “BB Mobile Point” wireless LAN installed to serve content to the e-readers–this includes diverse stuff from newspapers to adverts to train timetables and weather reports.
Hardware-wise the e-reader is pretty sleek–it’s got a narrow bezel which makes the Kindle 2’s huge one look positively ugly, and still manages to be a relatively narrow 12mm deep. It also ditches the keyboard of the Kindle since it’s got a touch-sensitive screen. Inside there’s Wi-Fi and USB 2 for connectivity, an SD slot for memory expansion, stereo speakers, and the entire Windows CE5. And the device can go for 50 hours use on a single charge.
There seems to be just a single handicap to Fujitsu’s device, and that is its price. That larger screen, with color e-ink, and the whole slender-packaged design must, of course, make it a more expensive gizmo than the Kindle. But its price is apparently a whopping $900 or thereabouts, versus the Kindle’s $360. And that’s so high it means the e-readers are probably only commercially viable as an asset in restaurants and other establishments like cafes. Perhaps Futjitsu can achieve economies if the trial is successful and the e-paper goes into mass production–but the price would really have to drop for it to work as a consumer product and compete with physical copy newspapers and magazines.
Nevertheless, it looks like the future of e-readers/e-books may be a little closer than we may have supposed–perhaps an all-electronic The New York Times isn’t such a strange proposition after all.
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Forget Kindle 2: Fujitsu?s E-Reader Screen is Bigger, and It?s in Color
Not that it’s anything we think the New York Times Company should do, but we thought it was worth pointing out that it costs the Times about twice as much money to print and deliver the newspaper over a year as it would cost to send each of its subscribers a brand new Amazon Kindle instead.
