Skiff Reader is largest yet, will be hitting a Sprint Store near you
By Tim Stevens 
posted January 4th 2010 12:46PM
posted January 4th 2010 12:46PM
Amazon's Kindle DX may be big, but it's not the biggest any more. The Skiff Reader is here to take that crown -- despite being a mere quarter inch thick. It packs a 1600 x 1200 11.5-inch touchscreen (finger and stylus) that, as you can see from the above screenshot, should do much better justice to magazine and newspaper layouts than we've yet seen from an e-ink-based reader. That's exactly the sort of advance Hearst was promising when it first mentioned the device last month. Skiff includes 4GB of on-board storage (just over 3GB is available for content) with SD card expansion, and there's a 3.5mm headphone jack for tunes and, hopefully, text-to-speech. Content can be side-loaded over a mini USB jack or delivered via WiFi but, more importantly, 3G is also on offer thanks to Sprint, who will also dedicate some space in its retail stores to sell the thing when it launches sometime this year. Price? That we don't know.
Impressive specs, now on your next version make that screen come to the borders of the device, no bezels, and it will be near perfect. Please?
@kitsune - think about it for a second. No bezel means there's no place to hold it without covering the screen. Why would you want to pay for a (pretty expensive) bigger screen if you don't really benefit from it?
@NewL You've got a point, thought on that kind of flexible screen it could be possible, just like a regular newspaper, except it's a flexible screen instead of paper
@NewL
well what about when you read a book, newspaper or a magazine, your hand is going to be covering part of the page at least a little bit. I think getting rid of the bezel and having the screen go to the edge of the device would be more realistic.
@Balboa
The books and magazines you read don't have margins?
Wow! For once an e-Reader that looks like a newspaper! For the first time, I'm interested in one! Good job Skiff! For once Amazon is not the king.
lol...you just know this is going to be like 600 dollars.
How much is the DX again?
I rest my case.
@NeoXY
I have a feeling the Kindle DX was priced a bit too high because it does not have any direct competition. It will drop.
Furthermore, don't expect this to cost $600.
@NeoXY It'll be closer to 1,000.
@BigD145 - considering that it's a publishing company (joint-venture?) behind it and the fact that they've got to move those things fast to avoid total domination of the Kindle, I think they'll price it a little more reasonable. Very likely subsidized by a mandatory 2 year or so newspaper/magazine subscription or something similar?
Yeah, I guess I worded it wrong because if it can display color and with a 32GB MicroSD card it could be possible to watch 1080p video on it right?
@GTYellowJacket9 - which part of Skiff *READER* don't you understand again?
Nice. I wonder how long it takes Sony or somebody else to offer something similar world-wide, because I very much doubt that we'll see the Skiff itself in Europe.
Also, what's up with companies choosing godawful names for their eReader? I mean, Kindle, ok, but Nook? Skiff?
http://www.urbandictionary.com/define.php?term=skiff *blech*
@NewL Skiff is the name of the e-publishing company, and this is their first device.
@arc - ah, thanks for the heads-up. Then the company name is godawful :D
You can read the whole press release on Gizmodo:
http://gizmodo.com/5439734/skiff-reader-the-largest-yet-thinnest-ebook-reader-to-date
"The Skiff Reader is designed not just for sleekness but also for durability. It is the first consumer product to feature the next-generation of e-paper display – one based on a thin, flexible sheet of stainless-steel foil. This contrasts with the fragile glass that is the foundation of almost every electronic screen – and a primary source of vulnerability and breakage risk in the devices that incorporate them. Skiff has worked closely with LG Display (NYSE: LPL), one of the world's leading display manufacturers and the innovator of the foil-display technology, to optimize and implement this first-of-its-kind non-glass display uniquely for the Skiff Reader."
Is the iSlate slated for failure due to this device?
@bob e
I doubt it, the iSlate will be more video/music centric.
What I think Apple may have a hard time doing though is convincing people that reading books/magazines, any text, is better on their LCD screen device as opposed to the e-ink screens most of the e-readers have.
@MikeWard1701
Personally, I prefer reading from a backlit LCD screen. But I'm partially sighted, so my preferred reading experience may not match the populace.
I got a chance to dissect the e-ink display in the Esquire magazine quite awhile back.
My guess as to how the flexibility part works is this:
You have the screen itself which is flexible. Then you have your frame/power/whatever around the edges as seen in the screenshots. The frame powers the thing and tells the e-ink display how to arrange itself. You can change pages, etc etc.... But if you want, you can remove the screen and still have the last page still displayed. That's how e-ink works. No electricity is required to maintain an image on an e-ink screen.
Just my guess.
It's a nice looking tablet but E-Ink sucks...
unless you really need long battery life why would you use it?
ugly. slow. hard to read. gray on gray. yech... bleah...
@(Unverified) - hard to read? I take it you've never even seen an eInk display in real life then.
@Hearst ... you're doing it wrong.
This is not the future of print, this is just a stand in. The future of print is HD, interactive and in color. It's time to start evolving, not translating.
I'm holding out for what Apple may or may not offer or whatever CES may hold.
this is useless. nobody is going to want to carry around that big of a device
@varcsscotty
And yet people carry; newspapers, broadsheets, A4/letter/legal pads (even hardbacked ones).
@cherryboom - oh, troll MOAR!
Thank you for yet another device we will never see elsewhere thanks to iffy exclusive deals. So sick of it.
This is lovely, but one has to question why anyone is going to opt for a large mono screen to read the news (& even books) when one can own an iPhone, iPod Touch with MiFi, DROID or other pocketable device and download one of the many excellent news / text reading apps?
Where these DO have a market is in vertical markets like research libraries, aerospace design & production, law offices and others where an easy to read large format portable document reader would be practical.
But for consumers and even mobile professionals, I don't see this being more than something a few gadget lovers will buy simply because it is cool.
Now if it was colour and based on an OS or 'Web'OS, we would be talking. But that market is about to be sown up by our favourite fruit company. Allegedly...
" GrandPa, what did you do during the e-reader wars?"
@joelaf
"Watched Xtube mostly."
The e-ink display itself is bendable but the entire ereader itself is not. You pretty much gather that from the first picture.
The comments on this post are surprisingly stupid
-It's not color
-It's not a slate, it's an e-book reader. Essentially a larger Kindle
-It's not OLED
-The display is flexible to resist impact/shock damage, the entire device is not flexible
-It will not play 1080p video, e-books and newspapers are not videos
-When you make your "case" based on a number you made up, you don't actually have a "case" to rest
do they have their own rival service?
Good bye Kindle.
Hello Skiff.
this sure looks sweet.. but its success will depend on the availability of publications and ebooks on it... the skiff store needs to be on par with B&N and Amazon; which I don't think is likely for a new entrant.
@doobster
Remember the Skiff reader is for Hearst which is a pretty large media house.
@COCOViper
True, but whether they can get the same or most books like B&N or Amazon is going to be the make or break on this one. If they try bundling solely with news/magazine subs, I don't see a big pickup rate, and of course blogs are almost entirely a no-go for fee - they've gotta be thinking of providing those as ad-supported content so they can sell ads.
In fact, the Skiff website linked has an alarming lot to say about advertising. If they want to embed ads into books....fuggetit.
If the price is right, I'm in for one.
I feel like I'm in 1980 all over again, and to get a color copy, you have to pay $2.00 per page, while the B/W is 25¢, and the screens are monochrome.
I'm so over 256 scales of gray.
the first image is misleading. theres no way u can bend that. its thinner than the other images.
@(Unverified)
That's the screen, not the entire device.
They're demonstrating that the screen is flexible and thus less prone (or immune) to things like this: http://gizmodo.com/5290328/busted-why-i-cant-wait-for-flexible-displays
damnit...just after i ordered my sony daily edition *sigh*
Man I wonder what the iThingy will look like compaired to this. Man the bar sure is being set high
The flexible screen is cool but this is only relevant if the hardware cost is covered by a subscription fee. If the target market is newspaper readers ask yourself this; Would I pay twice for a newspaper, once for the content and again for the paper?
Put in a Pixel Qi screen and I'm sold.
Aesthetically, this is one of the most appealing e-readers announced. It appears to have a marketplace supported by publishers, hopefully more than Hearst, and a retail partner. The price will need to reasonable or subsidized by Sprint for units to sell. The other question I have for all of these e-readers is what is there ability to handle to forthcoming LTE network? I would hate to spend $400-$500 on a recyclable periodical only to replace it in two years. I would also like to know how the display functions after so much bending.
1600x1200 res and fast response time will make this a seller even 10" and 11" notebooks don't even come close to supporting this res. Hopefully it's UI is well thought out otherwise next...
In Persian:
http://www.handheldusers.com/forum/t4269.html#post57550