Novels would possibly simply be the Kindle Colorsoft’s greatest weak spot

Earlier this week, Amazon made a small however essential change to its Kindle FAQ web page (as noticed by Good E-Reader), all-but-confirming what many E-Reader fanatics have identified for a while: Studying on coloration units does not fairly hit the identical because it does in black and white. The up to date textual content on the FAQ web page says, partly,

The Kindle Scribe Colorsoft is designed to supply a high-quality studying and writing expertise in each coloration and black and white. You could discover that the feel or brightness of the show appears totally different than the Kindle Scribe show. That’s due to the colour filter layer that creates the straightforward on the eyes coloration studying expertise on Kindle Scribe Colorsoft. In case you are on the lookout for a barely crisper black and white studying expertise, you might wish to take a look at Kindle Scribe.

Although many on the web had been fast to say that that is Amazon admitting that its commonplace Colorsoft mannequin and its upcoming Scribe Colorsoft aren’t as much as the duty of normal text-based studying and writing, I do not suppose that is precisely what’s occurring right here, and a fast understanding of how E Ink expertise for coloration fashions would possibly assist clarify why text-only novels look totally different whenever you transfer from a typical or Paperwhite Kindle to a Colorsoft mannequin.

• Storage

  32GB

  Model

  Kindle

  Display screen Measurement

  7-inch Colorsoft Show (300ppi BW, 150ppi coloration)

  Connections

  USB-C

  Measurement

  5 x 7 x 0.3-inches

  Weight

  7.7oz (219g)

  Amazon’s first-ever Kindle e-reader with a 7-inch coloration E Ink show, excellent for studying magazines, comedian books or graphic novels.

  
  

• 

  Storage

  16GB

  Battery

  As much as 12 weeks

  Ports

  USB-C

  Show sort

  Amazon’s 7-inch Paperwhite show expertise with built-in mild, 300 ppi, optimized font expertise, 16-level grey scale.

  Connectivity

  Helps 2.4 GHz and 5.0 GHz networks

  Measurements

  7 x 5 x 0.3-inch

  The latest technology of the Kindle Paperwhite is available in an ultra-thin design with a glare-free display that is bigger than its predecessors. With as much as 12 weeks of battery life, waterproof security, and free cloud storage, this e-reader can go wherever you do and take your complete library there as properly. 

  
  

Filtering in coloration

There’s one thing in between you and your textual content

The expertise that powers virtually all fashionable coloration E Ink shows is known as Kaleido 3, which makes use of an RGB Coloration Filter Array to current colours on the display. This coloration filter sits on prime of the black E Ink and mixes crimson, inexperienced, and blue with the underlying black and white to create a complete of 4,096 colours. The expertise, whereas it does not produce colours as vibrant as one thing you’d see on an iPad, works very properly for many who learn coloration content material like comics or manga, and the impact of the colour filter on prime of the black and white appears much like that of an old-school newspaper’s Sunday coloration web page.

Whereas this expertise helps deliver coloration content material to life on an E Ink show, it does put extra distance between the viewers’ eyes and the textual content on the display. This impact is especially notable in E Ink Tablets just like the Boox Note Max and Tab 4C which emphasize their writing capabilities. Having the extra coloration filter between your stylus and the display can produce small delays and a unique writing really feel, which might result in those that use these units for drafting, drawing or taking detailed notes to desire black and white over coloration.

And whereas the writing downsides of Kaleido expertise are one thing I’ve written about before, this replace from Kindle does accurately level out one thing that I’ve roughly ignored in my time with each coloration and black and white tablets: textual content sharpness.

Is the Kindle Colorsoft actually worse than the usual Kindle for studying?

It is all about your utilization and luxury

As you would possibly count on, including a filter on prime of an present E Ink show does hamper how clearly you’ll be able to see textual content on a display. Although it’s one thing my eyes adjusted to relatively rapidly, if that is one thing that would hamper your enjoyment of studying a purely text-based novel, it’s value contemplating if you’re on the fence about selecting a Colorsoft mannequin of Kindle, or actually any color-enhanced E Ink system over one with a black and white show.

As a result of I learn a mixture of comics, manga, and novels, I typically preserve my Colorsoft as my “most important” Kindle system. I am unable to say that the discount in textual content sharpness has ever actually hampered my enjoyment of a text-based novel on the system, however as with something, your mileage might fluctuate. In my review of the Kindle ColorsoftI stated that in case you solely learn novels, this system in all probability is not for you, and I feel that is in all probability true for actually any color-enhanced E Ink pill. Not solely do black and white E Ink tablets have extra textual content sharpness, however they’re typically a lot inexpensive as properly.

I do not suppose that studying novels on the Kindle Colorsoft (or any coloration E Reader for that matter) is essentially a foul expertise, but when studying textual content is your one and solely purpose, I feel the Kindle Paperwhite and even simply the standard Kindle may be your greatest guess in case you’re on the lookout for a brand new E Reader, as you are assured to get the perfect studying expertise out there, with the one concession actually being color cover screensavers. And in case you ask me, that single characteristic is not value paying a further $100 (or extra) for within the first place.