E Ink Gallery 3 Brings Color ePaper To Foldables And Rollables
Electronic book readers (ereaders) have never really gone out of fashion, but with the growing rise of digital comic books and other colorful materials, their limitations have become even more apparent. It wasn't too long ago that E Ink, the leader in the ePaper Display (EPD) market, started giving previously black and white screens a bit of color. Of course, these low-power displays aren't anywhere near the quality of even the grainiest LCDs found on the cheapest tablets. Things are quickly changing, however, and the line between ereaders and tablets has blurred.
E Ink is stepping up its game with a new color ePaper technology that is not only more colorful but also flexible. While Amazon's Kindle seems to be stuck in the early 2000s, the ereader market has tried to move on, leaving the pioneering brand in the dust. Many have adopted hardware and features that put them closer to Android tablets, while some still lean toward simplicity, but with added features. Kobo's recent Sage ereader, for example, also functions as a note-taking device thanks to its stylus support.
More importantly, however, many ereaders have started utilizing E Ink's Kaleido technology to bring a bit of color to magazines, comics, and even notes. Even with the latest Kaleido 3 iteration, however, colors still feel a bit muted and definitely less dense than their black and white counterparts. The number of colors the technology supports is a far cry from typical colored screens, and the way the technology works negatively affects even the regular black and white performance of the ePaper Display.
The future of ereaders is flexible
That is where E Ink's new Gallery 3 comes in, promising to finally solve all those problems in one fell swoop. The company boasts of a substantially wider range of colors with its latest tech — about 50,000 versus the previous 4,096 — and the new display reduces the color mode's update time to 1.5 seconds. Most importantly, the resolution of the screen's color mode is now on par with black and white at 300ppi, which is a big jump from the previous 150ppi.
If that weren't impressive enough, the Gallery 3 can actually be used on foldable and rollable devices. Given the structure and materials used for EPDs, it might actually be easier to have flexible screens like this compared to OLEDs like the ones found on smartphones. Of course, it's still a work in progress, but the mere possibilities may already have ereader fans excited about the future.
It might be a while, however, before we see devices that use the E Ink Gallery 3 hit the market. The new (slightly less impressive) Kaleido 3 might have its turn first, especially with what could be the largest 13.3-inch color ereader available. Regardless, the Gallery 3 could be a game-changer going forward. In fact, Amazon might even start taking note of this new trend and finally launch a Kindle with a color E Ink display of its own.