Amazon has launched its first ever ereader with a color display, in addition to the latest versions of the other models in its Kindle lineup. The company says it designed the Kindle Colorsoft Signature Edition to deliver “rich, paper-like color.” You’ll be able to see book covers, images, comics and graphic novels as authors intended on the device, and you’ll be able to highlight passages in colored markers instead of in the usual gray.
Since it is a Kindle, and you’re mostly going to use it to read, Amazon made sure that the device has a good color and a good black-and-white experience. It promises high contrast, high resolution and high clarity whether you’re looking at a full color image or a black-and-white page. Zooming in on images will not make them look pixelated, Amazon says. Based on what we’d seen at the company’s event for the new ereaders, the model does deliver accurate colors. The Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles’ green skin and different-colored eye masks looked accurate in the comic book we looked at, even under direct sunlight or the orange lights in the event.
The model is pretty much the new Paperwhite Signature Edition with a different display, and that one promises 25 percent faster page turns than the previous iteration. However, putting a color display on an ereader can slow it down, lessen its contrast ratio and drain its battery life faster. To make up for that, Amazon made some hardware and software changes, such as using nitrate LEDs that work with the company’s algorithm to enhance color and brightness without washing out images. Its custom coding focuses the light through each pixel so that colors don’t blend together on the screen.
The Colorsoft is the first Kindle with a color display, but it’s not the first color e-ink product. There’s the reMarkable Paper Pro, for instance, which you can write on in colored digital pens. You can’t write on the Colorsoft like you can on the Paper Pro (or the Kindle Scribe), but it is cheaper: It’s now available for pre-order for $280 and will start shipping on October 30.
Cherlynn Low / Engadget
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/tablets/amazons-kindle-colorsoft-is-its-first-color-ereader-130032884.html?src=rss
Seventeen years is an odd anniversary to call out. But at an event launching four new Kindles, Amazon’s head of devices and services Panos Panay reminded a group of media that “Kindle is 17 years in the making, almost to the day.” Panay added that the device is currently seeing its highest sales numbers, and that 20.8 billion pages are read each month on a Kindle. But people aren’t just reading on Kindles. Since the introduction of the Kindle Scribe in 2022, there has been even more development in e-paper writing tablets, with a notable recent product in the reMarkable Paper Pro. While that $580 device supports a color writing experience, Amazon’s Kindle Scribe still only works in black and white. But it might offer enough by way of software updates to make up for its monochrome manner.
Plus, being able to write on what’s already a popular ereader makes that book-like experience even more realistic, and the Kindle Scribe represents what Panay called the “fastest growing category” of Kindles. You could almost call it a 2-in-1, since it’s an ereader and writing tablet at once. “I have a lot of passion around 2-in-1s,” Panay said at his presentation, and he used that term repeatedly to describe the Kindle Scribe. I haven’t thought about it that way, but I was less worried about semantics and more about how the Kindle Scribe and its new features felt at a hand-on session yesterday.
I’m the sort of person that needs to physically write out something while I plan a project. Whether it’s lofty goals to get my life together or draft up a strategy for covering certain software releases at work, my hands grasp at the air for an imaginary pen and paper. For that reason, the Kindle Scribe and other writing tablets call out to me. I reviewed the original Kindle Scribe almost two years ago and since then Amazon has slowly expanded the feature set and made the device more useful.
With the original Scribe, Amazon got a lot of the basics right. The latency and smoothness of the writing experience were close to feeling like pen and paper, and the device felt sturdy and slick. The new Scribe felt very similar in that sense, with little noticeable difference in the way the stylus interacted with the screen, and I didn’t encounter any jarring lag in the brief time I had with it.
Where the Scribe left me wanting more was software, and that’s also the area Amazon appears to have focused on this year. Don’t get me wrong — it’s not like the company didn’t tweak the hardware. There are some refinements like new white borders, a smaller grip, different color options and an updated stylus with a soft-tip top that feels more like a conventional eraser.
Cherlynn Low for Engadget
But inside the device lie the more intriguing changes. Most significant in my opinion is the new Active Canvas. It directly addresses one of my biggest complaints in my review, which is that the writing experience within books and publications was a little wonky.
To quote myself, this was what I said in 2022: “You can also take down notes when you’re reading an e-book. But it’s not like you can scribble directly onto the words of your e-books. You can use the floating toolbox to create a sticky note, then draw within a designated rectangle. When you close the sticky note, a small symbol appears over the word it was attached to, but otherwise, your scribbles are hidden. No annotating in the margins here.”
All of that has changed with the new Kindle Scribe. When you’re in an e-book, you can now just start writing on the page, and a box will appear, containing your scribbles. You no longer need to first find the floating toolbox and select the sticky note tool. Just write. It’s so much simpler, and in the Kindle Scribe I played with it worked almost instantly. Not only is the box embedded within the text, with the book’s words rearranging and flowing to accommodate it, but you can also resize the rectangle to take up however much space you like. The rest of the page will reflow to make room as necessary. I was particularly impressed by how quickly this happened on the demo unit — it was more responsive than switching between notebooks on my existing Scribe.
Plus, the box containing your note will stay in place instead of being hidden and replaced by a small symbol. It’s clear that Amazon’s earlier implementation was a rudimentary workaround to allow people to write on fixed format media, whereas the new approach is more deeply integrated and thought out.
And unlike what I said two years ago, you can now annotate in a new collapsible margin. Tapping the top right corner brings up options to pull up the column, and you can choose from having it take up about a quarter of the width or spread out to about three quarters. Content in the margin will be scrollable, so you theoretically won’t run out of space.
Cherlynn Low for Engadget
Now, this isn’t a perfect replica of annotating on a real textbook, but it might be better since you won’t have to scrawl all around the borders or write upside down just to squeeze in your thoughts. I’m not sure yet, as I really need to spend more time with it to know, but I like that Amazon clearly has taken in feedback and thought about how to add these requested features.
The company also added the ability to use the Pen and directly highlight or underline within those books, and pretty much any Kindle title will support most of these features. They’d have to be content that allows for font resizing, to start, so things like PDFs, which are fixed, won’t work with the Active Canvas. Word documents are compatible as well.
I spend more time writing in blank notebooks than in actual books, and for those scenarios, Amazon is using generative AI in two new tools: Summarization and Refined Writing. The former is pretty straightforward. If you’ve handwritten 10 pages worth of brainstorming meeting notes, the system can scan all of it and collate just the highlights. You can have this be added as a page to the existing notebook as a summary, or save it as a separate document on its own.
Refined Writing, meanwhile, is like Apple’s Handwriting Assist on iPadOS 18 but on a larger scale. While Apple’s software feels like it’s about nipping and tucking stray words that are out of alignment, Amazon’s takes your entire handwritten page and converts it into text in a script-like font. This works best if you tend to write in a single column with clear indentations and paragraphs. I tend to draw random boxes all over the place for breakout thoughts, and the system will not perfectly replicate that. For example, a two-column shopping list I quickly drafted on a demo Scribe was merged into one, and the checkboxes I drew were interpreted as capital letter Ds that were inserted at the start of every bullet.
Amazon
It might not seem immediately useful, but if you’re the sort of person that’s shy about their handwriting, this could save you some shame. More importantly, it can make you writing more legible in case you need to share, say, your screenplay treatment with a production partner. Or if your scrawled shopping list just isn’t making sense to your partner. I also like that even after you’ve converted your notes into text, you can still erase them using the top of the pen and make edits. You’ll have to run Refined Writing again to regenerate a neatly formatted page. Oh, and I appreciate the flexibility you get here. You’ll have a few fonts and sizes to choose from, and can select the pages you want to reformat or have the entire book done up altogether.
None of the notebook features are destructive, meaning you’ll usually be able to retain your original written content and save the generated material as addendums. The AI work is done in the cloud, with your data being encrypted throughout the process. The Kindle Scribe also displays an animated page showing it’s busy with the generative AI task, which in my experience so far took at least 10 seconds. It might be different on the original Kindle Scribe, which will also be getting these software features either later this year or, in the case of the expandable margins, in early 2025 when it arrives on the new Kindle Scribe.
In its 17 years, the Kindle has done a lot to disrupt physical books, and since the introduction of the Scribe, it’s been poised to do the same for notebooks. As someone who’s relished being able to carry around the equivalent of a thousand books in a super thin device, the idea of replacing a bunch of notebooks with a Scribe is immensely intriguing. Amazon does find itself up against some stiff competition from reMarkable and Boox, but it has its sheer size and the power of its Kindle library in its favor. The Kindle Scribe will be available in December for a starting price of $400, and I hope to have a review unit in soon enough to see if I love or hate the new annotation and AI features.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/tablets/kindle-scribe-hands-on-you-can-scribble-on-your-books-130043335.html?src=rss
Amazon’s latest version of its popular Kindle Paperwhite has arrived, marking the sixth iteration if you’re keeping score at home. The new model is the thinnest Paperwhite yet and has a refreshed 7-inch screen that’s a touch larger than the previous model’s 6.8-inch display. It also has the highest contrast of any Kindle thanks to the oxide thin-film transistor display tech.
Amazon boosted the speed as well, promising 25 percent faster page turns. It’s waterproof as before but uses a new material with a premium soft touch grip. The Kindle Paperwhite comes with 16 GB of storage and is available in three colors, Raspberry, Jade and Black. It’s now available at Amazon for $160.
As before, the company also released a premium version with more bells and whistles, the Paperwhite Signature Editing. Storage doubles on that model to 32 GB and it features an auto-adjusting front light along with optional wireless charging. The Paperwhite Signature Edition comes in Metallic Raspberry, Metallic Jade and Metallic Black for $200.
Amazon
If it’s a budget reader you’re after, Amazon has refreshed the entry-level Kindle, too. The new 12th-generation model comes with an updated 6-inch screen, offering a higher contrast ratio for more legible text, plus a front light that’s 25 percent brighter at the maximum setting. It also gets a performance update that boosts page turning speeds. It comes in black or a new “Matcha” color and is now on sale for $110.
Along with those models, Amazon also unveiled its first color Kindle, the Colorsoft, that could be ideal for graphic novels and other digital color-oriented content. It promises “rich, paper-like color” using an oxide backplane display, plus high contrast on both color and black-and-white content. It’s now on pre-order for $280 with shipping set for October 30th. Finally, Amazon is releasing its second Kindle Scribe reader that doubles as a note-taking device (not unlike the reMarkable tablets). It’ll arrive on December 4, but you can pre-order it now for $400.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/tablets/amazons-new-kindle-paperwhite-reader-has-a-larger-screen-and-faster-page-turns-130050515.html?src=rss
Apple just announced the seventh-gen iPad mini, three years after its sixth-gen model. It has a faster A17 Pro chip, originally found in the iPhone 15 Pro, which means it’ll be able to handle Apple’s incoming AI features — although it’s not Apple’s most powerful mobile chip. There’s more RAM too.
Power aside, it has the same 8.3-inch screen as the previous model and an identical 2,266 x 1,488 resolution at 326 ppi. The refresh rate remains a modest 60Hz, in an era of 90Hz or higher. It’s not any bigger, wider or slimmer than its predecessor either.
It’s been a while since a new iPad mini, so we were overdue an update. However, this is a very mild update with no design changes. Also, while the size is smaller, no M-series chip. The new iPad mini arrives on October 23, starting at $499 for 128GB storage. It’ll arrive in blue, purple, starlight and space gray colors.
Don’t mention the disastrous app. Sonos announced the Arc Ultra and Sub 4, with the former replacing the $899 Arc as the company’s flagship home theater product. It’s the first Sonos soundbar to include its new Sound Motion technology, which apparently results in a much smaller product. The Arc Ultra can produce up to twice as much bass as its predecessor, according to Sonos. The new Sub 4 ($799) features more processing power, additional RAM, and a new Wi-Fi radio for improved connectivity. It’s also more efficient, with the company claiming an almost 50 percent reduction in idle power consumption. Both will go on sale October 29, so you can upgrade your sound system just before a Halloween movie marathon, I guess.
A nearly faultless drone that can fly in low light.
Engadget
DJI’s dual-camera Air 3S drone has some cutting-edge tech in the nose: a LiDAR sensor to provide extra crash protection at night. The Air 3S also has a new main camera with a larger sensor better suited for capturing video in low light. And it now comes with the company’s ActiveTrack 360, which it first introduced in the Mini 4 Pro, allowing the device to zoom all around your subject while tracking and filming them. See how those features fare in our review. (Of course, there’s video too.)
It’s been a bit of a wait for those who snapped up a new Pixel phone immediately, but Google is now starting to roll out Android 15 across eligible devices. While Google released the source code for the open source variant last month, the retail iteration of the mobile operating system is starting to hit phones and tablets.
As ever, Pixel devices are the first to get access to Android 15. The Pixel 9 lineup debuted in August and although Google typically deploys a major OS update alongside its latest flagship phones, that wasn’t the case this time. Android 15 will be available on eligible devices from other manufacturers in the coming months, but some phone and tablet makers will be using forked versions of the source code.
Security and privacy are major focus points for Android 15. Google says Theft Detection Lock employs AI to help protect your data. Extra layers of authentication for the likes of SIM removal and switching off Find My Device should help secure your device too. You’ll be able to set up a private space in Android 15 where sensitive apps (and any others you want to chuck in there) are all but invisible to others.
Other new features include an easy way to pin and unpin the taskbar on foldables and tablets for more customizable layouts and app access. An app pairing option is said to benefit multitasking. You’ll be able to save combinations of apps as app icons on the home screen and open them with a tap, which should make moving files between, say, Google Drive and Gmail a cinch.
Google is opening up more camera options to third-party apps, such as more granular control over the flash. You’ll be able to log into apps that use passkeys with a single tap. And, perhaps most significantly of all for some folks, carrier messaging apps will be able to support messaging via satellite when you’re out of range of cell and Wi-Fi networks.
In addition, Google is releasing a Pixel drop today, which includes support for Theft Detection Lock on devices running Android 10 and later.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/android-15-is-starting-to-roll-out-on-pixel-devices-160039591.html?src=rss
It’s been a bit of a wait for those who snapped up a new Pixel phone immediately, but Google is now starting to roll out Android 15 across eligible devices. While Google released the source code for the open source variant last month, the retail iteration of the mobile operating system is starting to hit phones and tablets.
As ever, Pixel devices are the first to get access to Android 15. The Pixel 9 lineup debuted in August and although Google typically deploys a major OS update alongside its latest flagship phones, that wasn’t the case this time. Android 15 will be available on eligible devices from other manufacturers in the coming months, but some phone and tablet makers will be using forked versions of the source code.
Security and privacy are major focus points for Android 15. Google says Theft Detection Lock employs AI to help protect your data. Extra layers of authentication for the likes of SIM removal and switching off Find My Device should help secure your device too. You’ll be able to set up a private space in Android 15 where sensitive apps (and any others you want to chuck in there) are all but invisible to others.
Other new features include an easy way to pin and unpin the taskbar on foldables and tablets for more customizable layouts and app access. An app pairing option is said to benefit multitasking. You’ll be able to save combinations of apps as app icons on the home screen and open them with a tap, which should make moving files between, say, Google Drive and Gmail a cinch.
Google is opening up more camera options to third-party apps, such as more granular control over the flash. You’ll be able to log into apps that use passkeys with a single tap. And, perhaps most significantly of all for some folks, carrier messaging apps will be able to support messaging via satellite when you’re out of range of cell and Wi-Fi networks.
In addition, Google is releasing a Pixel drop today, which includes support for Theft Detection Lock on devices running Android 10 and later.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/android-15-is-starting-to-roll-out-on-pixel-devices-160039591.html?src=rss
It’s been a bit of a wait for those who snapped up a new Pixel phone immediately, but Google is now starting to roll out Android 15 across eligible devices. While Google released the source code for the open source variant last month, the retail iteration of the mobile operating system is starting to hit phones and tablets.
As ever, Pixel devices are the first to get access to Android 15. The Pixel 9 lineup debuted in August and although Google typically deploys a major OS update alongside its latest flagship phones, that wasn’t the case this time. Android 15 will be available on eligible devices from other manufacturers in the coming months, but some phone and tablet makers will be using forked versions of the source code.
Security and privacy are major focus points for Android 15. Google says Theft Detection Lock employs AI to help protect your data. Extra layers of authentication for the likes of SIM removal and switching off Find My Device should help secure your device too. You’ll be able to set up a private space in Android 15 where sensitive apps (and any others you want to chuck in there) are all but invisible to others.
Other new features include an easy way to pin and unpin the taskbar on foldables and tablets for more customizable layouts and app access. An app pairing option is said to benefit multitasking. You’ll be able to save combinations of apps as app icons on the home screen and open them with a tap, which should make moving files between, say, Google Drive and Gmail a cinch.
Google is opening up more camera options to third-party apps, such as more granular control over the flash. You’ll be able to log into apps that use passkeys with a single tap. And, perhaps most significantly of all for some folks, carrier messaging apps will be able to support messaging via satellite when you’re out of range of cell and Wi-Fi networks.
In addition, Google is releasing a Pixel drop today, which includes support for Theft Detection Lock on devices running Android 10 and later.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/mobile/android-15-is-starting-to-roll-out-on-pixel-devices-160039591.html?src=rss
By now, most people know passkeys offer a better way to protect their online credentials than passwords. Nearly every tech company of note, including Apple, Google and Microsoft, supports the protocol. Moreover, despite a slow start, adoption has dramatically increased in the last year, with, for instance, password manager Dashlane recently noting a 400% increase in use since the beginning of 2024. Amazon, meanwhile, said today more than 175 million of its customers are using passkeys to protect their accounts. Still, not everyone knows they don’t need to rely on passwords to protect their online identity, and transferring your passkeys between platforms isn’t as easy as it should be.
That’s why the FIDO Alliance, the coalition of organizations behind the technology, is working to make it easier to do just that. On Tuesday, the group published draft specifications for the Credential Exchange Protocol (CXP) and Credential Exchange Format (CXF), two standards that, once adopted by the industry, will allow you to safely and seamlessly move all your passkeys and passwords between different apps and platforms.
With some of the biggest names in the industry collaborating on the effort (including Apple, Google, 1Password, Bitwarden, and Dashlane, to name a few), there’s a very good chance we’re looking at a future where your current password manager — particularly if you use one of the first-party ones offered by Apple or Google — won’t be the reason you can’t switch platforms. And that’s a very good thing.
“It is critical that users can choose the credential management platform they prefer, and switch credential providers securely and without burden,” the FIDO Alliance said. “Until now, there has been no standard for the secure movement of credentials, and often the movement of passwords or other credentials has been done in the clear.”
The CXP and CXF standards aren’t ready for prime time just yet. The FIDO Alliance plans to collect feedback before it publishes the final set of specifications and gives its members the go-ahead to implement the technology.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cybersecurity/youll-soon-be-able-to-safely-and-easily-move-your-passkeys-between-password-managers-161025573.html?src=rss
By now, most people know passkeys offer a better way to protect their online credentials than passwords. Nearly every tech company of note, including Apple, Google and Microsoft, supports the protocol. Moreover, despite a slow start, adoption has dramatically increased in the last year, with, for instance, password manager Dashlane recently noting a 400% increase in use since the beginning of 2024. Amazon, meanwhile, said today more than 175 million of its customers are using passkeys to protect their accounts. Still, not everyone knows they don’t need to rely on passwords to protect their online identity, and transferring your passkeys between platforms isn’t as easy as it should be.
That’s why the FIDO Alliance, the coalition of organizations behind the technology, is working to make it easier to do just that. On Tuesday, the group published draft specifications for the Credential Exchange Protocol (CXP) and Credential Exchange Format (CXF), two standards that, once adopted by the industry, will allow you to safely and seamlessly move all your passkeys and passwords between different apps and platforms.
With some of the biggest names in the industry collaborating on the effort (including Apple, Google, 1Password, Bitwarden, and Dashlane, to name a few), there’s a very good chance we’re looking at a future where your current password manager — particularly if you use one of the first-party ones offered by Apple or Google — won’t be the reason you can’t switch platforms. And that’s a very good thing.
“It is critical that users can choose the credential management platform they prefer, and switch credential providers securely and without burden,” the FIDO Alliance said. “Until now, there has been no standard for the secure movement of credentials, and often the movement of passwords or other credentials has been done in the clear.”
The CXP and CXF standards aren’t ready for prime time just yet. The FIDO Alliance plans to collect feedback before it publishes the final set of specifications and gives its members the go-ahead to implement the technology.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/cybersecurity/youll-soon-be-able-to-safely-and-easily-move-your-passkeys-between-password-managers-161025573.html?src=rss
Hilton has teamed up with Be My Eyes to make hotel stays more accessible for blind and low-vision guests. The free app links users with sighted volunteers and companies who can help them navigate spaces and complete tasks using video calls.
By going to the app’s service directory, selecting the “hotels” option then the name of the Hilton brand they’re staying at, Be My Eyes users will be connected to dedicated teams at the chain. Hilton staff members can talk users through actions such as finding and adjusting the thermostat in the room, making coffee, adjusting window coverings and moving to different areas of the hotel. The partnership covers brands including Waldorf Astoria, Conrad, DoubleTree by Hilton and Hampton by Hilton, though only in the US and Canada for now.
Hilton and Be My Eyes first got together last year to help train the latter’s Be My AI language model, which uses GPT-4. The aim was to improve the model’s ability to recognize objects in Hilton hotel rooms and how to traverse the spaces. Be My Eyes also uses AI to capture text from things like menus and toiletry bottles to help users understand what’s written on them.
This article originally appeared on Engadget at https://www.engadget.com/ai/hilton-and-be-my-eyes-team-up-to-make-hotels-more-accessible-for-blind-and-low-vision-users-162522626.html?src=rss
This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
