A new Android-powered color epaper tablet recently turned up on Kickstarter called the Reinkstone R1, and it’s the first device to use a new type of color epaper display technology (DES).
I’ve been hesitant to bring attention to the Reinkstone R1 because whenever a new ereader turns up on Kickstarter it almost always ends up being a shameless money grab for a product with underdeveloped software and untested hardware.
Frankly, the Reinkstone R1 raises a lot of red flags and looks like it could fall into that category as well, especially after seeing the video below.
The Reinkstone R1 Kickstarter campaign has now ended, but they did manage to raise over 1 million dollars with 2424 backers.
I’m not going to go into specifics about the device itself because it’s unlikely to ever be a viable product, but you can read the campaign details if you want.
The real news here is the new type of epaper screen technology they’re using called DES. It has higher resolution and better color than E Ink’s current products, but from the video it still looks like the technology has a long way to go.
A lot of alternate display technologies have come and gone over the years and none have been able to take a bite out of E Ink’s market. It will be interesting to see how DES evolves moving forward but it’s going to take a lot of work to iron the bugs out.
It seems like these companies that launch ereaders on Kickstarter think they can just throw an Android operating system on the device and be done with minimal work, but it’s never that easy, especially when you’re working with a new unproven type of display technology.
I’m surprised they would even send out pre-production review units of a product that runs this poorly, with a seemingly defective screen to boot. It’s going to be nearly impossible to fully develop the software and get things running smoothly in 4 months when they are supposed to start shipping to backers.
That one reminds me of the Notion Ink Tablet I backed a decade ago. It was a tablet and yes the display was ok, but not well enough for using it as a real Android device and absolutely good enough as an ebook reader besides the power consumpition.
Yeah, I bought one of those too with the Pixel Qi display, but they didn’t implement it right. It never came close to living up to the hype.
FLOP! I noticed how none of the images are of real scenes, just comics with washed out colors. I have yet to see an image of a color e-reader that would make me take me sit up and take notice. This seems to be true for all the e-readers I’ve seen.
I don’t understand why anyone would spend $430 for this e reader with it’s sup-par color when an Amazon Fire HD10 Plus is $180 w/ 4GB of RAM and 32 GB of on board memory? Another option is the Samsung 10.4″ Galaxy A7 for $249 w/3GB RAM & 64 GB onboard storage.
“I don’t understand why anyone would spend $430 for this e reader with it’s sup-par color when an Amazon Fire HD10 Plus is $180 w/ 4GB of RAM and 32 GB of on board memory?”
What good is a full-blown colour screen if you can’t see it properly because you are sitting outside in the sun?
If you have sit inside anyway, then you can simply use any display, beit a laptop, a tablet, etc.