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Remember that Mirasol e-reader display Qualcomm was hoping to release this year? Yeah, it’s not happening. Speaking at a press briefing in San Diego yesterday, Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs confirmed that the 5.7-inch panel has been abandoned after failing to meet expectations. Instead, the company will devote its attention to the “next version” of the technology, which has Jacobs feeling optimistic:
“We have a really interesting roadmap — we’re starting out on e-readers because we figured having E Ink as a competing technology was a good way to get started. But if you think about the power consumption of the screens that are out now [on tablets], they’re very bright OLED screens that use up a lot of the power of the battery. We don’t today have as vibrant color as an OLED display – but we have a roadmap that gets us to a much brighter color.”
Presumably, this roadmap would include that low-power “converged e-reader” we heard about a few weeks ago, slated for release by the end of the year. Jacobs also mentioned that Qualcomm is planning to invest a billion dollars in its Taiwan Mirasol plant, which might help produce the kind of volume that, say, Amazon would demand for its Kindle displays. It’s all speculation, of course, but Qualcomm certainly seems to have some big plans in store for the rest of the year.
Qualcomm CEO confirms death of Mirasol e-reader display, looks forward to ‘next version’ originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 02 Jun 2011 13:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
Remember that Mirasol e-reader display Qualcomm was hoping to release this year? Yeah, it’s not happening. Speaking at a press briefing in San Diego yesterday, Qualcomm CEO Paul Jacobs confirmed that the 5.7-inch panel has been abandoned after failing to meet expectations. Instead, the company will devote its attention to the “next version” of the technology, which has Jacobs feeling optimistic:
“We have a really interesting roadmap — we’re starting out on e-readers because we figured having E Ink as a competing technology was a good way to get started. But if you think about the power consumption of the screens that are out now [on tablets], they’re very bright OLED screens that use up a lot of the power of the battery. We don’t today have as vibrant color as an OLED display – but we have a roadmap that gets us to a much brighter color.”
Presumably, this roadmap would include that low-power “converged e-reader” we heard about a few weeks ago, slated for release by the end of the year. Jacobs also mentioned that Qualcomm is planning to invest a billion dollars in its Taiwan Mirasol plant, which might help produce the kind of volume that, say, Amazon would demand for its Kindle displays. It’s all speculation, of course, but Qualcomm certainly seems to have some big plans in store for the rest of the year.
Qualcomm CEO confirms death of 5.7-inch Mirasol e-reader display, looks forward to ‘next version’ originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 02 Jun 2011 13:09:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
The Gripzila is a handy stand for almost anything
Gripzila might be the last phone/iPod/GPS/media-player stand you’ll need. It’s a tiny, spring-loaded vise grip that sits on your keychain until you need to stand your device up, and then it swings into action.
In its resting state, the Gripzila looks like a tiny pistol handle, a little contoured piece of plastic with a small ribbed protrusion. To use it, slide this protrusion up and the jaw opens, revealing a rubber-lined slot into which your gadget of choice can slide. Let go and it clamps shut, forming a solidly-joined appendage that works as a kickstand.
The designer, Kelvin Hulet, sent me a 3D-printed prototype to check out, and I like it. I can use it with my horrible Samsung phone, or iPod touch, and it can be clipped onto and gadget that is thinner than 0.8 inches thick. You won’t want to use it for tablets, though, as their weight and size mean they can topple over. Kelvin specifically says that it isn’t designed for such big gadgets, but I have a pair clamped onto my Kindle right now and they seem perfectly fine. The iPad (1 or 2) is way too heavy though.
It has other uses, too: Clamping wires to stop them sliding off the desk, working as a headphone-cord wrapper or even clamping stuff together when you glue it.
The Gripzila is a Kickstarter project, and needs $5,000 to make it into production. To get one, you’ll need to pitch $12, which seems like pretty good price.
Gripzila – A Super Simple Universal Smartphone Stand & More [Kickstarter. Thanks, Kelvin!]
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Nook WiFi and Kobo eReader Touch Edition assault the Amazon Kindle fortress: a chart originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 26 May 2011 17:17:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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B&N says the Nook's battery lasts twice as long as the Kindle's, and Amazon doesn't like it. Photo: Lena Groeger/Wired.com
Amazon and Barnes & Noble are duking it out over the respective battery lives of the Kindle and the new touch-screen Nook. The field of battle is the ghostly ground of press releases and promo-page blurb, and the last word seems to have been had by B&N.
After B&N laid out the specs for its new e-reader, Amazon took issue with the numbers, saying that B&N’s claim rested on usage tests of just a half hour of use per day, with wireless switched off. Amazon’s usage tests assume an hour of use per day, also with wireless switched off.
So what did Amazon do? It simply doubled the battery life on the product page to reflect a half-hour daily usage. Sneaky.
B&N countered with a very detailed statement, outlining the exact tests made. It also looks like the Kindle was also tested in the same way:
With up to two months on a single charge, the all-new Nook has the longest battery life in the industry and superior battery performance to Kindle 3. In our side-by-side tests, under the exact same conditions, continuous use of the device resulted in more than two times Kindle’s battery life.
While reading at one page a minute, the all-new Nook battery lasts for 150 hours, where the Kindle battery, using the same page-turn rate, lasts for only 56 hours (both with Wi-Fi off). We’ve also done a continuous page turn test and at one page turn per second, the all-new Nook offers more than 25,000 continuous page turns on a single charge.
I love that B&N calls 150 just “two times” 56, when it could easily say “almost three times.” That shows some confidence. However this works out, it’s certain that both e-readers have insane battery life compared to any other kind of gadget. And if you’re basing your decision on this spec alone, instead of depth of catalog and ease of use, then you’re probably looking in the wrong direction.
B&N fires back at Amazon over Kindle battery life [CNET]
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Wondering which electronic reader reigns supreme when it comes to extreme battery life? If you ask Amazon, it’s the Kindle, but Barnes & Noble begs to differ — and it has some numbers to back that up. Earlier today we received a statement from the company explaining just how thrifty the new Nook is when it comes to sipping from cells. With WiFi disabled on both devices, B&N says it managed 150 hours on the new Nook when turning a page every minute. The current-gen Kindle, meanwhile, petered out after 56. That’s almost three times as long and maybe, just maybe, enough to finally get you through Anna Karenina on one charge — or at least through the Cliffs Notes version. More details on the testing overview below, which we promise can be rather more rapidly ingested.
Continue reading Barnes & Noble clarifies battery life on new Nook, calls out Kindle
Barnes & Noble clarifies battery life on new Nook, calls out Kindle originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 May 2011 23:32:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Barnes & Noble’s new Nook Simple Touch has a touchscreen and promises better battery life. Photo: Lena Groeger/Wired.com.
Barnes & Noble on Tuesday unveiled a simplified touchscreen e-reader: the Simple Touch Reader. Designed for a “pure and simple” reading experience without buttons, keyboards or complexity, the new compact Nook will be available around June 10th in stores or online.
It’s got a 6-inch Pearl E Ink display and weighs in at just under 7.5 ounces, 35% lighter than the original Nook. It’s selling for $140, the same price as the Kindle 3, but not as cheap at the $114 Kindle with ads.
The first-generation Nook is available for a discount price of $120 (for WiFi only) and $170 (for WiFi/3G) until supplies run out.
CEO William Lynch announced at a New York press event that the Simple Touch would be the “easiest to use, most portable e-book reader ever.” He outlined several advantages to the new Nook over its Amazon rival.
The most impressive feature for avid readers is the device’s super long battery life: a whole two months at half an hour a day, or twice as long as the Kindle.
There is also 80% less flashing, or that annoying “ghosting” effect between pages, Lynch claimed.
As with previous models, readers will be able to browse entire e-books in the Barnes & Noble physical stores over Wi-Fi, and share recommendations with friends via Facebook and Twitter.
The display offers 50% more contrast than the first edition Nook, and has a “soft touch,” contoured back, presumably to make it comfier to hold. The Android-based device has 2 GB of memory (with an expandable memory slot that could boost it to 32GB).
While the touchscreen turns the new e-reader into more of a tablet than its predecessor, the new Nook does not offer apps or 3G. Those additions would interrupt the “straightforward reading experience,” said Lynch. The Simple Touch Reader will cater to a particular segment of the population: people who don’t salivate over newest generation apps and just want the basics, please.
For those who do itch for a little more, the company’s popular Nook Color recently got a software update, which includes new apps, support for Flash and built-in email. As it’s meant to be the “reader’s tablet for all forms of digital content and rich web browsing,” the Nook Color is second only to the iPad in tablet sales. More than a million apps have been downloaded since they became available in April.
With these two devices, the world’s largest brick-and-mortar bookseller is in a good position to vie with Apple and Amazon for the tablet and e-reading market. Barnes & Noble has already had surprising success since it launched its first Nook in 2009, and now accounts for 25 percent of the digital book market. No doubt this caught the eye of media billionaire John Malone of Liberty Media, who just offered $1billion for a 70% stake in the company.
The e-book market is growing rapidly: Amazon recently announced it is now selling more e-books than print books. Now it’s just a race for the best price.
It wasn’t that long ago that we were jonesing for a Nexus One on Verizon. What HTC gave us instead was the Droid Incredible, with the same 1GHz Snapdragon CPU and gorgeous 3.7-inch AMOLED display — not to mention a better camera (8 megapixel vs. five), 8GB of built-in flash storage, an optical trackpad, HTC’s Sense UI on top of Eclair, and a dash of funky industrial design. The Incredible was an impressive phone with a lovely camera, marred only by questionable battery life and lack of supply, forcing HTC to build a Super LCD-equipped model to satisfy demand. Judging by the popularity of the Incredible, it came as no surprise that following HTC’s announcement at MWC, the Incredible S eventually became Verizon’s Droid Incredible 2. With a 4-inch Super LCD display, global CDMA / GSM radio, front-facing camera, updated internals (including 768 MB of RAM), trick capacitive buttons, and a Froyo-flavored serving of Sense, the Incredible 2 seems like a worthy successor to last year’s Incredible. Does it live up to our expectations or is it just another fish in the crowded sea of Android? Does it significantly improve upon the original formula or is it merely a refresh? Hit the break for our review.
Gallery: Droid Incredible 2 review
Continue reading Droid Incredible 2 review
Droid Incredible 2 review originally appeared on Engadget on Wed, 25 May 2011 12:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.
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Now Kindle 3G buyers can also enjoy ads for soap and credit cards
This has been a pretty hot week for e-reader news, with new machines from Kobo and Barnes and Noble. It’s only Wednesday, yet there’s even more news. Amazon, not wanting to be left out, has announced an ad-supported 3G Kindle to its lineup, joining the already very successful ad-supported Wi-Fi Kindle.
Like the Wi-Fi-only version, opting to let Amazon serve ads to the Kindle’s screensaver will save you $25, dropping the price of the e-reader from $189 to $164 (the Wi-Fi versions are $139 and $114). By anecdotal accounts, the “Kindle with Special Offers” isn’t nearly as annoying as we originally thought it might be, with the ads restricted to static images that replace the usual author portraits when in standby, and banner ads on the book-listings pages.
I’m a pretty big fan of Amazon’s recommendations, especially for books. If these could be worked into the special offers, instead of serving ads for credit cards I’ll never want, I might jump with my next Kindle. Then again, a $25 saving is the price of a decent lunch, so maybe its not worth it.
Kindle 3G with Special Offers [Amazon]
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