The Electronic Book...

E-Books A presentation by Max Pearce Director Technology Assessment

What is an E-Book?
A portable device that can display text and images stored in internal memory, thereby mimicking the conventional book. E-Books potentially offer the user additional features not possible with the conventional printed page, including notetaking and dictionary capabilities. Can you think of others?

Similar Technologies...
Notebook and palm-top computers incorporate the types of technology necessary to build E-Books. Devices like the Casio Cassiopeia and 3-Com Palm Pilot PDAs have essentially identical architectures to the E-Book products currently on offer.

The PDA...
One E-Book manufacturer claims that it is possible to use a Palm Pilot or Windows CE PDA to read electronic titles. Presumable this would require special applications software within the PDA. Most PDAs have small screens and are probably not an ideal E-Book platform.

The Cassiopeia...
The Casio Cassiopeia is a Windows CE based personal digital assistant device with 8 Mbytes of memory. It retails in Australia for around $750.

E-Book Technology Enablers...

Display technology Packaging technology Battery Technology Integrated Circuit Technology The Internet Technological Convergence

E-Book Architecture...
Display Unit Navigation Controls Communications Interface Microprocessor controller and OS Memory Power supply

Currently available hardware...

4

1. RocketeBook 2. EB: Dedicated Reader 3. SoftBook 4. Millennium E-Reader

RocketeBook...
Manufacturer: NuvoMedia Price: About US$500 Capacity: 4000 pages Weight: 570 gm Dimensions: 19 (h) x 12.5 (w) x 3.5 (d) cm Screen: 14 cm diagonal Battery life: 17 hr back-light, 33 hr without

RocketeBook...

SoftBook...

SoftBook...
Manufacturer: SoftBook Press
Price: US$299 + $19.95/mth minimum purchase Capacity: up to 100,000 pages text & gray-scale

Weight: 1.3 kg Dimensions: 28 (h) x 21.6 (w) x 2.5 (d) cm Screen: 24 cm diagonal Battery Life: Six hours.

RocketeBook...

SoftBook...

The SoftBook
The SoftBook does not require a computer to download titles. The SoftBook incorporates a dial-up modem and internal software to allow the download of the selected title(s). If a title is deleted from the SoftBook it can be retrieved at no charge.

EB: Dedicated Reader...

Manufacturer: Everybook Price: US$1400 to US$1600 Capacity: 500,000 colour pages Weight: 1.68 kg Dimensions: 30 (h) x 24 (w) x 4.6 (d) cm Screen: Two screens, 33.8 cm diagonal Battery life: Four to six hours

EB: Dedicated reader...

Millennium E-Reader...
Manufacturer: Librius Price: US$199 Capacity: 8000 pages Weight: 0.34 kg Dimensions: unknown Screen: 480 x 320 pixels Battery Life: 22 hours

Millennium E-Reader...
The Millennium E-Reader is expected in US Summer 1999. Librius indicate that the electronic titles can be read on Palm Pilot or Windows CE devices. An E-Reader is therefore not necessary if you own an existing palm computer device.

The printed page...

A typical page of text from a printed book is both high resolution and very high contrast. White paper and black ink are difficult to duplicate with conventional display technologies. Printing costs are very low, typically less than a couple of dollars for a paperback.

The electronic future...

The world-wide book market has been reported at some US$72 billion/year. Publishers are naturally cautious, however it is assumed that they appreciate the potential implications of technological convergence and the printed page. A high-performance, low-cost E-book would be an interesting development.

E-Book Building Blocks...

The technology necessary to build E-Books is available now. Microprocessors, memory and related components are here today. Unfortunately, there is no currently available display technology that can offer high contrast, high resolution, low cost, low power consumption and able to operate in a hostile environment.

Display Technology
E-books currently offer Liquid Crystal Display panels; some are touch sensitive. LCDs require back-lights for use in dull lighting conditions, have limited viewing angles, suffer from low contrast, can exhibit slow response in cold conditions are mechanically fragile and consume considerable power.

LCDs...
High performance LCD display panels have been developed and are now used in laptop and personal computers. These new displays still however suffer from viewing angle restrictions, excessive power consumption, limited contrast range in daylight and mechanical fragility.

New display technologies...

While thin film transistor (TFT) LCD devices are currently the display of choice for laptop PC applications, alternative technologies are under development. Two new developments are:
Field Emission Displays (FEDs) Light Emitting Polymer displays (LEPs)

FEDs...
FEDs should compete with existing LCD panels and may allow the development of flat-panel home cinema - perhaps one day. Their power consumption is claimed to be about 50% of a comparable LCD panel. FEDs are still fabricated using glass and are have similar fragility properties to LCDs.

Typical FED construction...

FED Display View Angle...

LCD

FED

Light Emitting Polymers...

Cambridge Display Technology (CDT) have developed the concept of the Light Emitting Polymer. LEP is a substance that can be deposited onto a substrate and made to emit light when connected to a source of electric current.

LEPs...
The chemical is known as: Poly(p-xylenealpha-tetrahydrothiophenium bromide)
LEPs can be fabricated on flexible substrates, thereby increasing display ruggedness.

LEPs potentially offer...

A low-cost high-performance display solution for a variety of applications including electronic books. CDT and Seiko-Epson are currently collaborating to develop the Plastic Television - a full colour LEP video display. Prototype was due in late 1998!

The CIE triangle

A LEP Display - a first attempt...

A LEP E-Book...
LEP display technology is probably fundamental to the development of low cost E-Books. Once the manufacturing is mastered it is expected that rugged low cost, low power, high contrast, wide viewing angle displays will be readily available. But dont hold your breath!

In summary...
Practical E-Books depend on the availability of better display technology like Light Emitting Polymers. Despite the current technological limitations, E-Books are seeing the light of day. The RocketeBook is a good example.

RocketeBook...
The RocketeBook is produced by NuvoMedia and is assembled in Taiwan Barnes & Noble provides the book titles via their Internet Web site You need a PC with Win95/98 and an Internet connection with a spare serial port for connection to the RocketeBook

RocketeBook security...
Each RocketeBook must be registered with NuvoMedia via the web. The Registration process loads a secure Rocket Certificate (A Rocket Key and Rocket ID) into the RocketeBook. When you order an electronic title, the book file is encrypted for use with your RocketeBook only.

RocketeBook...
E-Book titles are available at the Barnes and Noble Web site [www.barnesandnoble.com] An account is established using a suitable Credit Card (MC, Visa or Amex). An e-commerce system allows the user to select and buy RocketEditions. An e-mail is sent to the buyer with Web details to allow downloading of selected titles.

RocketeBook Memory...
Total memory 4096 kbytes Operating System 664 kbytes User memory 3432 kbytes Necromancer text is about 200 k characters. Necromancer E-Book files is 166 kbytes Memory would hold about 20 similar titles

RocketeBook title costs...

Necromancer [Gordon R. Dickson] ISBN 0-812-54530-3 US$5.99 paperback Necromancer E-Book US$4.95. Other titles checked indicate a similar discount of about 10 - 15% for the E-Book title over the paper product.

Some RocketeBook features...

Touch screen control Four-way display Last page memory Hyperlinks (selected titles) Page navigation bar Bookmarking Shortcuts IR communications port Large/Small fonts Note annotation Text search/Dictionary

E-Book WWW addresses...

www.softbook.com [SoftBook] www.nuvomedia.com [RocketeBook] www.everybk.com [EB: Dedicated Reader] www.librius.com [Millennium E-Reader]

The Rocket Demonstration...

Any Questions...

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E-Books...

The End