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Pixel Qi screens will turn netbooks into e-readers
May 29, 2009 | 9:09 am
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By Chris Meadows
PC World has a report on the screens from Pixel Qi, the company founded by former OLPC CTO Mary Lou Jepsen. (See pictures of the screens in this TeleRead story.) The article promises that Pixel Qi’s new three-mode, low-power-consumption displays will be in netbooks by the end of the year, magically turning them into e-book readers fit to compete with Kindle, Sony, and others.
"What you’re looking at is a screen that’s entirely reflective," said [John Ryan, chief operating officer at Pixel Qi], at Pixel Qi’s temporary office in Taipei. "It’s just running like e-paper so that it’s running on the ambient light. It’s not fighting the office light , it’s not fighting the sunlight. That makes it better for reading but it also cuts the power consumption. The backlight in the screen is typically the largest power drain in any notebook computer."
Pixel Qi suggests that netbooks designed to take advantage of this will have the familiar OLPC-style display that swivels around and caps the keyboard for an e-book capable tablet mode.
This is certainly a reason to get excited about the near future. If I were given the choice between a $400 Sony PRS-700, and a $400 netbook that was as easy or easier to read, I know which one I’d pick. (Assuming I had the $400 to spend, anyway.)
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Comments:
Since a (two mode?) similar screen is already available in the OLPC and since that is a small and cheap netbook, why hasn’t anyone bothered to turn it into the ultimate e-reader?
Just curious!
Regarding the question about using the OLPC screen in an eReader… I would say it needed some refinement.
But since I first saw the screen of the OLPC I thought there were possibilities there. I even had a discussion with a computer engineer to exlore what development would entail.
I have been keeping an eye on Pixel Qi for quite some time now and really hope they will succeed. The eReader market is suddenly filled with entries, but eInk has some limitations and reader designers in general do not seem to be particularly thoughtful regarding design.
The cheap eReader may not be too far in our future. Unfortunately, no lessons have been learned from the RIAA and MPAA, so we are going to struggle with DRM.
I am wondering about the refresh rate in eInk mode? Anybody has any idea about that?
Refresh rate should be just fine in eInk mode. After all, it is an LCD, not eInk. I’m not anti-eInk but I need backlighting. Pixel Qi with eInk mode, which is really just an enhanced LCD reflective mode, along with backlit mode would suit me fine. They need to get the cost down quickly.