There is not a ton of information about the KDDI R&D Laboratories Inc. “Portable Viewer System” but what has been revealed is exciting. It’s A4 and can wirelessly receive images from devices like a mobile phone. The screen can display up to 4,096 colors and refresh in 12 seconds. I’m not sure whether e-paper means it’s a derivative of eink or some other screen technology.
Strangely the device is nearly completely controlled by the handset. It doesn’t seem a very practical interface, but it is a prototype.
Via Gizmodo.
I hope they improve that refresh time before release. Twelve seconds is just ridiculous.
Agree about the refresh time–not practical for reading. Also not practical is requiring a cellphone for the interface. Still, there seems to be a continued demand for color–not sure whether this is just because people expect it or if there’s some positive value in color. Certainly in novel-style fiction, I don’t see a lot of benefit from color–and a lot of cost.
Rob Preece
Publisher, http://www.BooksForABuck.com
There is value in colour if you are going to be annotating what you’re reading. When was the last time you heard of someone using a *grey* highlighter to highlight a passage of text for a paper they were writing?