The Kindle Paperwhite is a pivotal step forward for the technology of ereaders. It makes previous generations feel like a pulpy paperback held up next to an ornately illustrated tome. In short: this is the best ereader you can buy. More »
B&N has dropped the price of the Nook Simple Touch With GlowLight to $119 to match the Kindle Paperwhite (with “special offers”). No sales figures have come out of either camp, but it makes sense for B&N to head Amazon off at the pass, especially since the Paperwhite is shipping on October 1 and could put a dent in Nook sales.
The new Paperwhite has a glowing, frontlit screen that turns the traditional grey drab of an e-ink device into a bright white page. The Nook with GlowLight looks nearly as good and is also a solid device. At this point it basically comes down to which company you’ve already trusted with your e-library.
The e-reader wars are now about platform popularity. It’s the company that can grab the most readers in the shortest amount of time that wins and this price drop is evidence of the high stakes both companies are facing.
With the new Kindle Paperwhite on the horizon, Barnes and Noble is making a move to try and keep its backlit e-ink reader relevant. In order to do that, they’ve dropped its price to $119, the same as the ad-supported Kindle Paperwhite. More »
We know first-hand that the new Kindle Paperwhite is a stunning little device, but how did it get so good? The Amazon employee’s who developed the reader have gotten together to explain. Interestingly enough, they cite the ultimate goal as being able to make a device that sort of “disappears” as you use it. That’s going to be tough with a screen that pretty. [Slashgear] More »
Amazon has released a video showing their team of engineers that’ve worked on the Amazon Kindle Paperwhite explaining the technology that makes it a top of the line device in the e-reader universe today. What you’ve got here is sharpness and brightness enough to view in many conditions – but it’s more than that. Because it’s not optimal to look at a book with the area around the letters shining brightly directly into your eyes, the Kindle crew here has turned the whole show on its head, shining light from the side of the screen across it, down toward the display through a reflecting film layer just 0.5mm thin.
The light you’ve got here around the rim of the display is captured and reflected across the face of the area you’re looking at. This area is called the Light Guide – it’s nanoimprinted and acts like a fiber-optic cable, blasting light through itself and down towards the capacitive touch screen instead of up at your eye. The best LEDs the group could find for the job were chosen, the construction of the Light Guide was adjusted from tight to loose so that one light source could be used in an even manner, and the whole device was tweaked to perfection over the course of 8 years.
The 8 years timeframe has been mentioned several times, including by CEO Jeff Bezos, this being the amount of time that the company has researched and developed the Paperwhite technology. This reader is getting ready to hit the market early next month, our Kindle Paperwhite hands-on prepping you for the big drop coming up quick. This device takes what you know about e-ink and the ease in reading you’ve experienced in Kindle devices in the past and bumps the quality to a new generation.
This new technology works to keep your battery life long, the entire product is extremely light, and the whole product is taking on the e-reading universe in a completely different way than the Kindle Fire HD. Stay tuned for the final device review we’ll have right here on SlashGear before you know it! Have a peek at the timeline below for more information on the Kindle Paperwhite and get pumped for the final release in just weeks!
Kindle Paperwhite technology explained by Amazon in simple video is written by Chris Burns & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Amazon’s certainly not the first company to deliver an illuminated e-reader, but the mega-retailer’s psyched about its new Kindle Paperwhite nonetheless, and after playing around with the device a bit, it’s easy to see why. According to CEO Jeff Bezos, R&D’s been working on the technology for years now, attempting to get the perfect balance of brightness and battery life, all while ensuring an even distribution across the display. How does it achieve this? We’ve heard the technology described as an optical cable laid flat across the display. The company goes into a bit more detail on the technology that powers the reader, via a few Beautiful Mind-esque shots in the video after the break. It’ll give you something to do while you wait for your reader to ship early next month.
Continue reading Amazon breaks down its Kindle Paperwhite light technology (video)
Filed under: Amazon
Amazon breaks down its Kindle Paperwhite light technology (video) originally appeared on Engadget on Fri, 28 Sep 2012 13:41:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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JK Rowling’s new book The Casual Vacancy—her first for adults—is a pretty big deal in the publishing world. So is the Kindle. And that is why it is so very funny and great that the Kindle version of the ebook seems to be a woefully misshapen train wreck. More »
Amazon‘s new Kindle Fire HD tablet has only been available commercially for the better part of a week, and new reports are already coming out showing just how stiff their competition will be against Google’s Nexus 7. The popular ad tracking and analysis firm Chitika just released some new data showing the Fire’s already taking 11% of all Kindle Fire web share, but that the Nexus 7 is much higher.
They state that ad impressions for the new Kindle Fire HD is already taking over 11% of all Kindle devices, meaning the adoption rate and sales are obviously doing quite well compared to the other Kindles. Considering the original has been available for more than a year shows the HD has some serious room to grow, and dominate.
However, according to TheNextWeb Chitika then compares the Kindle Fire HD (or the original for that matter) to ASUS and Google’s popular Nexus 7 and the hill is looking pretty steep. With Chitika calculating the Android Jelly Bean powered tablet accounts for a 68.5% of the web share when compared to the Kindle Fire and the new Kindle Fire HD. That’s a different story indeed!
Obviously there’s a few things to consider here though. For one the Nexus 7 has been available for the better part of the summer and a few months now, while the Fire HD just launched a few weeks ago. Another thing could be the simple fact that more Kindle users are reading books and watching Amazon Prime content, while Nexus 7 users are browsing the web — so that could slightly skew the numbers. Either way both tablets appear to be doing quite well but only time will tell how the HD does overall. Be sure to take a peek at our Kindle Fire HD review, as well as our Nexus 7 review.
[via Chitika]
Kindle Fire HD faces stiff competition from Nexus 7 according to reports is written by Cory Gunther & originally posted on SlashGear.
© 2005 – 2012, SlashGear. All right reserved.
Amazon’s celebrating its new line of Kindle Fires with the announcement of Device Targeting, a feature aimed at helping developers create apps across its tablet line. Using the new program, app makers can offers up APKs for specific devices like the old Kindle Fire and Kindle Fire HD (different screen sizes included), without displaying “confusing” multiple versions of the app for consumers. The new feature ensures that customers who download an app get the proper version delivered to the right devices. More info on the program — including an FAQ for curious parties — can be found in the source link below.
Filed under: Tablets
Amazon intros Device Targeting to help developers with new Kindle Fires originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 24 Sep 2012 08:18:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Thought that the optional $49 4G data plan for a year that Amazon announced with the Kindle Fire HD was tood good to be true? You’re not the only one. An interested Kindle owner called up Amazon and asked what happens when the first year is over. He shared his results with ZDNet, and it sounds like Kindle Fire owners are going to get a nasty rate increase after a year. From Amazon:
The $49.99 data package is only available for the first year of service. The data plans after one year will change accordingly to the plans offered by the service provider AT&T.
At this time, there are no special data plans offered by AT&T for Kindle Fire HD 8.9″ after the first year. AT&T provides their own data plans and all this information has been updated in the AT&T website.
By Ubergizmo. Related articles: Kindle Fire HD Hands-On, Wal-Mart quits selling Kindle tablets,
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