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E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

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Re: E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

#11

Post by buro9 »

mtgx wrote: post #3

It could be useful in India or African countries with not much access to energy. But I doubt people from developed nations would want this. It most likely offers nowhere near the experience of an LCD device. Remember, besides the lack of color issue, e-ink devices work best when the on-screen image is static, and not changing often.

I go on cycle tours every now and then, camping some of the time. I'd love a backup phone for use during tours that could hold a usable charge for 4 or 5 days.

My father does motorcycle touring and would love the same.

I have an old Sony Ericsson M600i symbian phone ( http://www.gsmarena.com/sony_ericsson_m600-1425.php ) I dig out for when I go travelling. The battery is still good for 10 days stand-by. It's such a pain to resync contacts, mail, etc... that all I really do is move the SIM over and use a travel email account.

If I could have the battery life of the old phone with the functionality of a new smart phone, then I'm very willing to sacrifice the screen quality to achieve it.

Re: E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

#12

Post by Nursie »

mtgx wrote: post #3

It could be useful in India or African countries with not much access to energy. But I doubt people from developed nations would want this. It most likely offers nowhere near the experience of an LCD device. Remember, besides the lack of color issue, e-ink devices work best when the on-screen image is static, and not changing often.

It's not a video consumption device, no.

Doesn't mean it can't be a great device for web surfing, listening to music and reading on, as well as a phone that lasts a week. If the colour aspect gets fixed I'd be tempted.

Re: E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

#13

Post by stinos »

dfxm12 wrote: post #2

Is "week long battery life" really a killer feature? As long as a phone has enough battery to make it through the 16 hours per day most of us are awake, anything more is just gold plating. Just how big is the "week long battery life" niche?

for me this is a feature: not having to think about or doing the effort of putting the phone in the charger every single day? I'll sign for that. (it's also marginally cheaper since you don't waste elektricity if using the charger only once a week vs every day. And it makes it useful in countries not having power everywhere)

Re: E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

#14

Post by columbo »

borplk wrote: post #6

I have been thinking about a responsive e-ink for some time. What I would love is a responsive e-ink screen to use for text editing, Imagine a large responsive e-ink screen that you can use for coding, reading, etc... Although for coding it would also need some basic colours.

Here's an example of vim running on an eink device (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdmX52SCpG0). A lightweight, long battery life eink-coder would be a fantastic thing to have when travelling.

Grayscale vim would be good enough for me: http://sstallion.blogspot.com/2010/10/newsprintvim-pleasant-...

Re: E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

#15

Post by netcan »

Nursie wrote: post #12
mtgx wrote: post #3

It could be useful in India or African countries with not much access to energy. But I doubt people from developed nations would want this. It most likely offers nowhere near the experience of an LCD device. Remember, besides the lack of color issue, e-ink devices work best when the on-screen image is static, and not changing often.

It's not a video consumption device, no. Doesn't mean it can't be a great device for web surfing, listening to music and reading on, as well as a phone that lasts a week. If the colour aspect gets fixed I'd be tempted.

Web surfing on an e-ink isn't fun. It's not an inherent problem (ie, you could have an optimized site that worked fine) but sites on the web now have scrolling and moving parts. On phone size screens you also have zooming. With e-ink you want to move cleanly between static screens.

Re: E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

#16

Post by Adirael »

buro9 wrote: post #11
mtgx wrote: post #3

It could be useful in India or African countries with not much access to energy. But I doubt people from developed nations would want this. It most likely offers nowhere near the experience of an LCD device. Remember, besides the lack of color issue, e-ink devices work best when the on-screen image is static, and not changing often.

I go on cycle tours every now and then, camping some of the time. I'd love a backup phone for use during tours that could hold a usable charge for 4 or 5 days. My father does motorcycle touring and would love the same. I have an old Sony Ericsson M600i symbian phone ( http://www.gsmarena.com/sony_ericsson_m600-1425.php ) I dig out for when I go travelling. The battery is still good for 10 days stand-by. It's such a p…

I have a 12V plug on my motorcycle (fused, regulated. I installed it for like 10 bucks). I also have a couple of solar chargers, they hold 2 AA batteries. They take about 8 hours of sunlight to fully charge and can put an iPhone into the 70% range.

Re: E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

#17

Post by Lexarius »

dfxm12 wrote: post #2

Is "week long battery life" really a killer feature? As long as a phone has enough battery to make it through the 16 hours per day most of us are awake, anything more is just gold plating. Just how big is the "week long battery life" niche?

Anyone without reliable access to electricity, or who want to stay connected if it's lost. Hikers and other outdoorsmen. Survivalists. People who live in areas prone to natural disasters that can knock out electricity. People living in countries with poor infrastructure.

When I was in college, a hurricane knocked out electricity on my block for about a week. By careful rationing of my UPS battery I was able to briefly use the internet a few times a day, just enough to check my e-mail and get updates on the situation. I think keeping a few low-power "backup" devices (and a portable solar panel or hand crank) seems like a decent investment.

Re: E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

#19

Post by fmstephe »

cleverjake wrote: post #5
mtgx wrote: post #3

It could be useful in India or African countries with not much access to energy. But I doubt people from developed nations would want this. It most likely offers nowhere near the experience of an LCD device. Remember, besides the lack of color issue, e-ink devices work best when the on-screen image is static, and not changing often.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CPdXAyvWZdI

This is very exciting to me. I very strongly desire an E-Ink display to work on. I find the LCD displays are a horror on my eyes after a full day at work and hacking in the evening.

I don't want to watch videos but a terminal colour that refreshes as fast as I type would be fantastic. I plan on buying one of these at the earliest opportunity.

Re: E-Ink Android phone promises a week long battery life

#20

Post by freehunter »

columbo wrote: post #14
borplk wrote: post #6

I have been thinking about a responsive e-ink for some time. What I would love is a responsive e-ink screen to use for text editing, Imagine a large responsive e-ink screen that you can use for coding, reading, etc... Although for coding it would also need some basic colours.

Here's an example of vim running on an eink device ( http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FdmX52SCpG0 ). A lightweight, long battery life eink-coder would be a fantastic thing to have when travelling. Grayscale vim would be good enough for me: http://sstallion.blogspot.com/2010/10/newsprintvim-pleasant-...

I'm still waiting on my Raspberry Pi (if it ever gets here, I've been waiting 6 months) with the dreams of turning it into a small, Radio Shack-style Vim machine. Building a case with a keyboard, a small display screen, a command line, and a huge battery. When it's connected to the Internet, it would push the changes up, but when it's not it would cache it locally.

Sometimes I like to go camping while I work, for the peace of mind of sitting in nature away from everyone. Really lets me focus. My Thinkpad gets 10 hours of battery life, but that's not always enough. Charging it in my car isn't really congruent with getting away from it all.

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