Also why are all the android ereaders running Android 4?
Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
21–30 of 56 posts
Re: Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
#22I’m guessing, but I have to imagine production volume has something to do with it. Little e-reader screens for cheap devices like the 6” kindle are where the volume is.
In any case, I’m kind of bummed that the e-ink/ereader market has sort of settled on the current state of affairs.
What I’d really like to see is good e-ink laptops. First, because of battery life. I also think they could be great “focus machines.” A laptop you can use to write, code, read emails and maybe articles but without the full blown “multimedia PC experience” we were sold back in the early 90s.
A little “kindle PC” designed for writers as the canonical user could be a great contribution, and right up amazon’s alley. Way more interesting than the kindle-fire stuff. I guess content for kindle fire looks like a juicier market, but… no one is making e-ink laptops! We have plenty of app stores, music services and online video stores.
On the reader front, I was really hoping amazon would do more to change the business of publishing. When magazines or paperbacks became mass market, publishing changed. The type of stuff that got published changed. e-readers, a lot less.
Amazon seemed to be focused on making big publishers happy, and they were focused on keeping the industry’s structure intact. I wanted more of a shake-up.
Publishing could be more democratic. The writer-reader relationship could be more disintermediated. We could have more short stories by authors in their prime, maybe as trailers for novels. We could have more short/concise nonfiction, without the need to fill out a “whole book.” Some parts of journalism could have been changed. I know of no better platform for “micro payments” to writers than kindle's…. It feels like they left the job half done.
So, I’m with you on big readers. I’ll raise you one laptop and a small-to-medium publishing revolution.
Re: Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
#23Not sure if there's something specific about e-paper technology that makes it expensive despite being seemingly primitive compared to a typical tablet. But it's worth pointing out that none of the most expensive e-readers are more expensive than the cheapest iPads ($400 for the iPad Mini with 128-GB and a 7.9 inch screen), which most definitely have sophisticated screens (Retina, multitouch). I'm a longtime iPad user…
Small ereaders are much more affordable than the larger size the parent is looking for. A few examples at this size class are remarkable[1], sony dpt-rp1[2] and good ereader[3] and all cost at least 700 USD
[1] https://remarkable.com/store/reMarkable-and-marker
[2] https://www.sony.com/electronics/digital-paper-notepads/dpt-...
[3] https://goodereader.com/blog/product/good-e-reader-13-3-e-re...
Re: Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
#24Not sure if there's something specific about e-paper technology that makes it expensive despite being seemingly primitive compared to a typical tablet. But it's worth pointing out that none of the most expensive e-readers are more expensive than the cheapest iPads ($400 for the iPad Mini with 128-GB and a 7.9 inch screen), which most definitely have sophisticated screens (Retina, multitouch). I'm a longtime iPad user…
Small ereaders are much more affordable than the larger size the parent is looking for. A few examples at this size class are remarkable[1], sony dpt-rp1[2] and good ereader[3] and all cost at least 700 USD [1] https://remarkable.com/store/reMarkable-and-marker [2] https://www.sony.com/electronics/digital-paper-notepads/dpt-... [3] https://goodereader.com/blog/product/good-e-reader-13-3-e-re...
Worth pointing out that all of those products feature writing functionality. And the non-Sony ones come from small startups that likely don't benefit from economies of scale.
Re: Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
#25Is anyone else looking for an inexpensive, 13-inch, read-only e-ink tablet for reading pdfs? If this exists can someone point me in the right direction? I feel like I can't be the only one who's been looking for this.
Checked out the reMarkable? https://remarkable.com/
Re: Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
#26I’m guessing, but I have to imagine production volume has something to do with it. Little e-reader screens for cheap devices like the 6” kindle are where the volume is. In any case, I’m kind of bummed that the e-ink/ereader market has sort of settled on the current state of affairs. What I’d really like to see is good e-ink laptops. First, because of battery life. I also think they could be great “focus machines.” A…
I don’t think they’d sell well at all in laptops. I don’t think the tech is far enough. The ~1 FPS performance and occasionally needing to flash the entire screen to clear artifacts are really poor selling points for productive work.
Things like for example scrolling a document or moving a mouse pointer would be quite painful and streaky.
Re: Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
#27I’m guessing, but I have to imagine production volume has something to do with it. Little e-reader screens for cheap devices like the 6” kindle are where the volume is. In any case, I’m kind of bummed that the e-ink/ereader market has sort of settled on the current state of affairs. What I’d really like to see is good e-ink laptops. First, because of battery life. I also think they could be great “focus machines.” A…
You can hack one together at https://www.raspberrypi.org/blog/kindleberry-pi-the-second/
.
It allows you to ssh into raspberry pi.
Re: Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
#28I remember KindleDX since you can get A4 (or US Letter) w/o zooming in/out. But... DX is phased out and has no replacement. Also most eReaders are slow - due display. There is no needs for something super-fast but there is needs to be energy efficient. And mine Kindle Touch (ver. 5 i think) battery lasts few weeks (between 2-3).
Bought a DX for reading PDFs, I would have loved my DX too, but they hadn’t and said they likely wouldn’t update the software to support the kindle document cloud, so I had to manually email all my PDFs to it, or move them via USB.
Ended up returning it.
Re: Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
#29I believe mass manufacturing drives down the prices. Book owners like to read something that is handheld ~6inches. Book readers won't buy large eink devices. I don't think the eink screens are that costly. It may have something to do with the demand. This is ridiculously expensive https://remarkable.com And the Sony Digital Paper is expensive too. I would love to see more phone cases with eink screens.
A typical B-format, medium sized paperback is 7.8 inches by 5.1. Hardbacks are often signicantly larger.
So I think to say that readers wouldn’t prefer larger screens to match typical paperback or hardback books is false, it is just expense that puts them off.
Re: Ask HN: Why are larger e-readers much more expensive than tablets?
#30I believe mass manufacturing drives down the prices. Book owners like to read something that is handheld ~6inches. Book readers won't buy large eink devices. I don't think the eink screens are that costly. It may have something to do with the demand. This is ridiculously expensive https://remarkable.com And the Sony Digital Paper is expensive too. I would love to see more phone cases with eink screens.
I see EUR 629 at https://remarkable.com/store/reMarkable-and-marker
Not cheap, but for that niche it seems a good iteration on the Kindle DX. I don't know how much better/faster the screen is, but the weight reduction looks good ... (226 dpi, 350 grams vs. 150 dpi, 535 grams)