E Ink’s latest Kaleido 3 color ePaper display increases color saturation by 30 percent compared to the earlier Kaleido Plus color e-paper display, integrates E Ink ComfortGaze new front light technology engineered to reduce the amount of blue light reflected off the surface of the display, in order to provide further comfort while reading.
The new modules based on Kaleido 3 will be offered in various panel sizes including 7.8-inch, 10.3-inch, and 13.3-inch, support up to 16 levels of grayscale and 4096 colors, and target eReaders and eNote devices.
E Ink explains that Kaleido 3 relies on the company’s Print Color ePaper technology, “where a color filter array (CFA) is used in conjunction with E Ink’s Carta black and white ink film, creating a full-color device for a more fully realized eBook shopping and reading experience”. As I understand it that part has not changed, and it’s just the same as with Kaleido Plus which was introduced in early 2021, after the first 4096-color Kaleido e-paper display weres introduced in 2020, and found in products such as Onyx Boox Poke2 Color eReader.
ComfortGaze is said to reduce Blue Light Ratio (BLR) and Blue Light Toxicity Factor (BLTF) by up to 60 percent and 24 percent respectively compared to the front light design used in devices based on Kaleido Plus color e-paper displays. There were no specifics with regards to refresh rates, but E Ink claims the responsiveness of the ink enables the module to play animations and videos, noting that the 13.3-inch E Ink Kaleido 3 ePaper display can also be used as outdoor advertising signage.
I was unable to find extra details about Kaleido 3 on the company’s website, so for now, all the public information is provided via the press release. More details should become available at Touch Taiwan 2022 on April 27-29, 2022 where E Ink will demonstrate the new technology in booth #M802 on the 4th floor of Taipei Nangang Exhibition Center.
Thanks to TLS for the tip.
Jean-Luc started CNX Software in 2010 as a part-time endeavor, before quitting his job as a software engineering manager, and starting to write daily news, and reviews full time later in 2011.
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They’re starting to look really nice. The improvements made these last years on these technologies remind me when we were starting to see the first color LCDs 30 years ago, they were exhibiting colorful photos to impress us, and nowadays we would have said “pwah what horribly washed images” thanks to the progress made. I’m pretty sure that in the forthcoming years the progress will speed up on e-paper, to reach a point where it starts to rival printed photos.
For the things I’d use e-Ink, washed out colours would be totally a non-issue; just having some colours in the first place would be plenty! Alas, e-Ink is stupid-expensive and that doesn’t look to be changing anytime soon… Hell, at this rate, I’ll have died of old age before they reach any sort of reasonable prices for hobbyist use.
GoodDisplay has announced medium-size (6 to 10 inch or so) 7-Color displays quite a while ago, and they were presented at quite affordable prices on their retail site (buy-lcd.com) but they were never in stock and now they have removed them. Don’t know if they’re just delayed or abandoned.
There are also color reflective LCDs like the one used in the Bangle.is 2 which supposedly also have very low power consumption.
I’d be in for a large (+flexible?) color e-ink display with ~10-30 Hz refresh, for comics and PDFs with infinite smooth scrolling. ClearInk is one example but it has been vaporware. Battery life will suffer but if it ends up something like 10x better than an LCD/OLED tablet, that’s fine.