E-Ink: Pearl Is It for Now

Many e-reader owners have been wondering what is next for e-ink based e-book readers. Amazon Kindle 3 with Pearl technology is a very complete device. Amazon still has some work to do to make the device perfect though. Launching Kindle 4 with an even better screen would be the way to go. Unfortunately, E-ink won’t have drastically improved screens until 2012:

We’re generally on a two-year cycle with our e-ink technology.. It takes some time to develop and test the next generation.

said Sri Peruvemba, vice president of global sales and marketing at E Ink.  From the sound of it, Kindle 4 won’t have a very different screen.

Amazon could always make its hardware faster and change Kindle’s design though. Kindle 4 could get a color e-ink screen (E-ink Triton) but that does not seem likely at this point. As CNET reported:

E Ink Triton is a response to market need for a color ePaper display that mimics the printed paper experience… Triton will compliment our monochrome product line to enable new markets.

Next generation e-ink devices will be able to handle video and enhanced e-books more effectively. But we don’t expect Kindle 4 to be a huge upgrade over Kindle 3. Could Amazon make Kindle touch-enabled? We will have to wait and see.