Yesterday I wrote a post about the rumours that Amazon were about to launch a Kindle with a splendid patented front lighting system, and said how good that would be.  Blow me, if Barnes and Noble haven’t beaten Amazon to the draw here and have just announced the launch of their own front lit version of their Simple Touch Nook ereader, splendidly and memorably named (hang on while I go and check that name again….)  The Simple Touch Nook with GlowLight (now that is a name that flows,isn’t it?).

As you will see when you watch the video they have made (see below) extolling the virtues of this ereader, it is actually rather good, with very little Hot Spot Syndrome trouble, merely a slightly brighter wash of light at the top of the screen, reasonably enough, as that is where the LED’s are placed.

The main specs of this version of their latest ereader are almost the same as the standard Simple Touch Nook, except it is about 1 ounce lighter, which  is a rather  good achievement I feel.  By the way, they claim that you can go about 1 month between battery charges if you keep the WiFi turned off, try that with a Tablet!

As I commented in my post about the rumour of the front lit Kindle, Sony had a similar system on one of their earlier ereaders, (about 3 years ago),  which worked very well by and large.  The main difference being that the Sony front lights were either on,or off, no graduation possible.  Unlike this system from B &  N,which has a virtual slider on the screen that allows you to adjust the brightness of the lights from zero,to full blast.

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Devin Goldewey of TechCrunch has written a post in which he describes a prototype of a Kindle with some form of front light built into it, which he says, is rather beautiful.

Currently if we own a standard monochrome e-ink screened ereader, we need to have some form of external lighting should we wish to read it in anything other than a reasonable lighting level, exactly as with an old fashioned paper book. This normally means having some form of clip on light attached to the ereader. These mostly work reasonably well, but all of them suffer from the dreaded Hot Spot Syndrome, which can be intensely irritating, as it frequently entails moving either one’s head, or the ereader when we use such a light to move the Hot Spot away from the section of the page we want to read.

Not this.... But you get the idea

It would seem that this new idea from Amazon will do away with this problem…..   We hope!

Apparently Amazon bought up a Finnish company called Oy Modilis who specialise in inventing and developing all manner of lighting systems for devices such as ereaders and have now built themselves a prototype Kindle with one of their lighting systems in (on?) it.

Just a cardboard box for now……

Currently it is apparently no more than a simple cardboard mock up Kindle, with this lighting system installed.

A film over the screen:

It is a sort of film that is placed over the actual screen of the Kindle, and using edge lighting, spreads the illumination from some LEDs evenly across the screen of the ereader, giving a pleasing blue/white light he reports.

Intensity fully controllable:

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The web is full of rumours of a possible colour screen version of the Kindle ereader as a result of a leak to a Chinese Newspaper.

Note added later:

As you will see from the link that Nate of the Digital Reader, has posted in the comments section below, it would seem that this is an unfounded rumour…  Not unusual in the world of electronic gadgets.

So I am glad I posed the title to this post in the form of a question….   As Nate so succinctly puts it…………..  Nope.

Now read on…. and enjoy the rumour for what it is worth.   remains a nice idea I feel, even if untrue.

According to a report in the Chinese paper, the Economic Daily News, e-Ink, the company who make the majority of the screens on our various ereaders, including their newest colour screen the Triton screen, have received a large order from Amazon to supply their 6 inch version of the Triton screen, with – it is claimed – a follow up order for up to 3 million units a month thereafter.

So far Amazon themselves have said nothing about this rumour, but it seems a logical step for Amazon to take I feel.

Dedicated ereader:

This would be a dedicated ereader apparently, not simply a smaller screened version of their tablet, the Fire, and would fill the gap in the ereader world for those who want to read magazines, text books and children’s books on their ereaders, all media that need colour to be pleasurable to read.

This screen is also a touch screen, so it fits neatly into Amazon’s collection of devices on which to read ebooks, and in fact fills that one gap that so far they have not yet attacked.

The point of using this screen technology, rather than as with the majority of Tablets, an LCD screen, is that it offers all the advantages of the current generation of monochrome ereader screens, long battery life, ease of reading in bright light, easy on the eyes if you read a lot.  Against these advantages, is the fact that the colours are nothing like as vibrant as those on an LCD screen, nor is the screen refresh rate fast enough to watch videos with.  So this is truly a dedicated ereader, not merely a Tablet with slightly different screen technology.

Kindles are always cheap:

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There are a huge number of online ereader and tablet sellers based in China, who tend to advertise on sites such as Alibaba, DHgate, EC21, Made-in-China and TradeKey, some of which I have looked at earlier in this blog.

In general I have liked what I have seen on these sites, provided you realize they are selling bottom of the line, cheap and unreliable products… which might or might not work.

Back in the days when a “real” ereader would cost you several hundred dollars, a cheap Chinese one for $60 was interesting, but no more, now that kindles can be had for as little as $70.

One thing they all have in common is the relatively low prices they are asking for their products, (cheap components and labour), but until recently they have all been honest enough in their ads.

Image source: http://arstechnica.com

The Knock-offs are coming:

But this is changing; I have noticed an increase in ads on these sites for cheap ereaders that claim to be Kindles, or Sonys or whatever.

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Now here is a truly useful accessory for your Kindle, the SolarKindle Cover; this is not only a rather smart cover to protect your Kindle from the knocks and bashes of everyday life, but also contains a LED reading light.   OK, so far not too special you will think, but it comes with a really useful extra, and as far as I know, a first in the ereader world – a built in battery and solar charger as well.

The idea is that the built in battery which gets charged by the sun is chiefly intended to power the LED reading light, but can also be used to charge the Kindle’s own battery if needed.   So basically, provided you expose the cover to as much sunlight as possible you will probably never have to charge your Kindle via a computer or special Kindle charger ever again.

You can also charge its internal battery from your computer or Kindle 220 volt charger, simply plug your Kindle via its USB cable into the cover, and then connect the cover to your normal charging system and both the kindle and the light will be charged.

They claim that 8 hours exposure to direct sunlight is enough to charge its internal battery, which is apparently good for 50 hours use of your LED reading light.  Good eh?

Here is an extract from their blurb about this cover, sort of tells it all I feel………

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In a case of David against Goliath, the relatively small company of M-Edge (about 50 employees)who make accessories for ereaders, take Amazon (Thousands of employees), makers of the Kindle range of ereaders, to court in an attempt to  prove that Amazon is basically abusing its powerful market position to M-Edge’s disadvantage.

As always in cases where two parties find themselves fighting over what one party considers to be a breach of contract, this is complex, so I shall quote from an article in the Wall Street Journal to show the main problem between them both:

M-Edge Accessories LLC, in a lawsuit filed Thursday in a Maryland federal court, said Amazon extorted higher-than-negotiated commissions from the company, threatened to make M-Edge products less visible on Amazon’s marketplace and made a competing Kindle case that infringed on M-Edge’s patent.

M-Edge’s 15-page complaint accuses Amazon of unfair competition, patent infringement, false advertising and illegally interfering with M-Edge’s relations with customers. It seeks unspecified damages and injunctions barring Amazon from continuing the alleged practices. A lawyer for the company, Paul Vickrey, called Amazon’s actions “punishment” for M-Edge’s refusal to go along with the retailer’s “increasingly outrageous demands.”

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