Irobot, vacuum robot. The next generation
August 22, 2007
WOOHOO, as the proud owner of the 2nd generation Irobot vacuum, I’ve won a lot of time and a clean floor for a year or two already.
But now, Irobot has come up with the 3rd generation, totally revamped vacuum robot!
iRobot® Roomba® Vacuum Cleaning Robots
Maintain cleaner floors every day!
Transfer books to the Sony Reader PRS500, the fast way.
June 24, 2007
Some owners of the Sony Reader PRS500 might have noticed already, using the Connect Software from Sony, you can transfer books to the Sony Reader. While transferring, the Connect Software will preformat the book so the Sony Reader only needs to load it in.
If you’re using a cardreader and transfer the ebooks directly into a SD-card, it’s much faster. But when loaded into the Sony Reader, the Reader needs to format the book. This could take a very long time if you have a book with thousands of pages.
A very useful tip that I wished I’ve found out sooner (6GB of files transferring sooner to be exact)
If you have a cardreader, throw your card in the cardreader instead of the Sony Reader. Then use the connect-software to throw books directly on the cardreader. The books will be preformatted directly into the card. Yet, it’s much faster than transferring the books directly into the reader with the Connect Software. I guess that’s because a dedicated cardreader is much faster than the Sony Reader’s USB-interface.
Note: this seems only to work on SD-cards. Memorysticks are seen as normal drives (I prefer to use my highspeed SD-cards anyway, memory sticks tend to be slower)
Does Vizplex opens the road for the 2nd generation E-ink readers?
June 22, 2007
2007 seems to be the year of the dedicated Ebook readers , where in the end of 2006, the Sony Reader got introduced and gained momentum in the beginning of 2007, soon to be followed by the Irex Iliad. Now a new reader, the cybook is on the horizon which incorporates the 2nd generation E-ink technology: Vizplex.
Now we simply can’t ignore this new screen as it’s definately an improvement to the first generation film. And to make our future articles and reviews on readers which incorporates the E-ink technology more understandable, we’re featuring a litlte quote from the creators of this exciting technology:
Introducing Vizplex, the latest generation of E Ink’s microencapsulated ink imaging film. The new Vizplex imaging film is designed for high performance with new black and white electronic ink pigment formulations. Compared with the previous generation active matrix imaging film, it offers key improvements of being brighter and faster response time. In addition, the new Vizplex imaging film can be manufactured in significantly larger volumes, promoting more widespread availability and product variety. At launch, five different FPL sizes will be offered as standard products: 1.9″, 5″, 6″, 8″ and 9.7″, compared with only 6″ available in the previous imaging film generation.
|
Previous Generation Imaging Film |
Vizplex Imaging Film |
|
| Typical Switch Speed |
1200 ms |
740 ms |
| Peak Switch Speed (monochrome) |
500 ms |
260 ms |
| Brightness (typical reflectance) |
32-35% |
40% |
| Supported Grayscale Levels |
4 levels (2-bit) |
8 levels (3-bit) |
To create Vizplex, E Ink produces microencapsulated electronic ink and has it coated onto an ITO-coated plastic substrate in a fast, efficient roll-to-roll process. The resulting ink film is combined with a thin adhesive and a plastic release sheet to form the Vizplex imaging film. The film is then converted into individual sheets and packaged for shipment to the TFT display manufacturer.
Vizplex leverages the existing infrastructure used in the manufacture of conventional active matrix liquid crystal displays (AMLCDs), but the E Ink process flow for display cell assembly is much simpler. The process used to attach the Vizplex imaging film to the TFT panel is similar to polarizer lamination for AMLCDs, and uses similar equipment. Other steps, such as the scribe and break process, are identical to processes for the AMLCDs. The simplified process to assemble electronic ink displays eliminates several steps and costly materials from the AMLCD manufacturing process, including alignment layer deposition and rubbing, cell spacing and filling, polarizer lamination and the integration of optical enhancement films.
