Two display stories caught our eye this morning, the new E Ink upgrade of the popular Vizplex display technology called "Pearl" that boosts contrast and moves e-Book readers (EBRs) from a "news print" look to printed ink—say in a paperback book with a boosted contrast, 16 gray levels of depth and 1 second refresh. The other, announced the availability and subsequent sell-out of the Pixel Qi (pronounced "Pixel Chi") 10.1-inch LCD transflective display, offered for sale ($275) in a DIY (do it yourself) kit from MAKE magazine’s MakerSHED web site.

Steve Sechrist
Senior Analyst and Editor

This hybrid transflective display won the coveted SID Display of the Year Gold Award in May, and claims the best of both worlds offering full color and LCD speeds (clocked in the milliseconds vs. the one second refresh of the new Pearl.) Better yet, the display claims full daylight readability, full motion video and full color—all in a 10.1-inch package just waiting for a netbook/ EBR maker to come along… but so far, none did.

So, like a politician going directly to the public for support, the company began offering its raw hybrid panel to the DIY community in much the same vein as "modders" changing both the software and hardware configuration to squeeze out a bit more performance in game play.

In this case, the Pixel Qi display can replace the current panel sold on both the Samsung N130 & Lenovo S10-2 netbooks both tested and certified by Pixel Qi (others may work and the "certified list" is bound to grow.) The company also reports that changing the display on a netbook is a "simple" 5-minute process—but comes with consequences. These include voiding one’s warranty, and a strong admonition about doing so "at your own risk" and that Pixel Qi and company "…are not liable for any damage that may occur."

But that’s just the point. Why are consumers, wanting the benefits of sunlight readability, fast refresh, color, and eco friendly display (consuming 80% less power in the reflective mode) have to stoop to a DIY solution?

Clearly the E-Ink Pearl display will go on to sell millions of panels in next generation EBRs like the new Kindle. The technology is well established and its bi-stable, consumes very low power, and offers clear readability - benefits that are in line with what the EBR market is all about. At the other end are the LCD-based, high bright displays like those found in the iPad. Here, you gain full color video performance but at the expense of sunlight readability and reduced battery life (many will argue that the 10 hours of the iPad is actually acceptable, however).

Displays offering sunlight readability in the common laptop / netbook are few and far between. Any sun worshiper (particularly those of us living in the rainy Pacific Northwest) jump at the chance of moving outdoors to work when the sun is shining; only to find the reflection in the common laptop display renders the device almost unusable. Yet the display pioneered by Pixel Qi that can solve this problem is still waiting for its chance in a mainstream product.

The company is now pinning its hopes on a ground swell of demand from a growing community of hackers/modders who know what they want and have begun taking product development matters into their own hands. Will this result in a product design win? Only time will tell…