The color e-ink screen will first appear in an e-reader by Chinese company Hanvon. The new screen can display 16 levels of greyscale and 4096 colors (4bit). E Ink says  as usual with e-ink the display will be full viewable in sunlight.

The new screen is said to have a 20% faster rendering time. It is to be launched in China as an 3G/WiFi version in March 2011 for about $440.

The contrast ration of the display is only 10:1 which will mean that the colors will be pretty muted.This is because of the fact, that underneath works a common grayscale e-ink display with a color filter on top. Conclusion: if you want an E-Ink like color e-reader better wait for PixelQi or Mirasol entering the market.

As expected a new, no two new Kindles just arrived at amazon.com and will ship from August 27th on.

You now can choose between a $139 WiFi only (available in graphite) and a $189 Free 3G + WiFi (availabele in graphite or bright-white) version of the 6 inch Kindle.

So, the Kindle got WiFi – finally, that is good news, but rises the question, why the more expensive Kindle DX did not get it?

Here are the new features:

• New, High-Contrast E-Ink Screen – 50% better contrast than any other e-reader. The clearest text and sharpest images.
• New and Improved Fonts – New crisper, darker fonts
  • Kindle now has three font styles -  standard Caecilia font, a condensed version of Caecilia, and a sans serif option
  • Support for New Characters -  Cyrillic (such as Russian), Japanese, Chinese (Traditional and Simplified), and Korean characters in addition to Latin and Greek scripts
• New Sleek Design – 21% smaller body while keeping the same 6″ size reading area
• 17% Lighter – Only 8.5 ounces, weighs less than a paperback
• Battery Life of Up to One Month – A single charge lasts up to one month with wireless off
• Built-In Wi-Fi – Shop and download books in less than 60 seconds
• 20% Faster Page Turns – Seamless reading
• Enhanced PDF Reader – With dictionary lookup, notes, and highlights
• New WebKit-Based Browser – Browse the web over Wi-Fi (experimental)

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EBOOK, CYBOOK OPUS EBOOK READER

from Bookeen

J&R Music and Computer World is selling the Cybook Opus eBook Reader for just $179.00 plus $3.99 shipping.

This pocket sized reader can be held in one hand and fits perfectly in any purse, briefcase or pocket! It is the lightest on the market. Over 1,000 books can be stored in its large 1 GB of internal storage memory. The Cybook Opus boasts an impressive 200dpi ePaper screen, which provides a paper like high contrast appearance and ultra-low power consumption on the revolutionary E-Ink technology. With its accelerometer – screen position can switch from portrait to landscape mode automatically.

• Resolution 600 x 800 – 200 dpi
• Black & White 4 levels grey-scale
• Daylight readable
• Portrait and landscape mode

Over at TheDigitalReader you find a fine review of the new Spring Design Alex eReader.

First the conclusion: the Alex e-reader is a fine device, which can bring you a lot of fun but is quite expensive with its price of $400.

• Browsing: You can browse with just the LCD screen or you can display a web page on both the LCD and e-ink screen. You can not interact with the page as shown on the epaper screen.

• Email:  The email client is not that good, and only works on the LCD screen.

• Apps: You can install third party apps on the Alex. Not all will work and you can only use them on the LCD screen so far. Some will not work, and you can’t use any of them on the epaper screen just like on an Android phone.

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