E Ink, Revisited
At its core, the Paperwhite remains an E Ink-based e-book reader. So, page refresh times are still significantly slower than what you’ll ever see on a tablet’s LCD.
E Ink employs charged microscopic capsules in order to generate images. So, the screen's refresh rate directly correlates to the time it takes to charge electrodes and move the capsules. This process isn't measured in single-digit milliseconds, as it might be on a tablet. Rather, the latency is quantified in the hundreds of milliseconds.
Paperwhite: What’s Different?
For starters, the Paperwhite employs a capacitive touch sensor, as opposed to the previous Kindle Touch's infrared sensor. This improves response times noticeably. Back in January of last year, we benchmarked screen refresh rates on the Kindle Touch and found them to be about 50-100 ms slower than the non-touch version and older Kindle Keyboard. The capacitive sensor yields a substantial speed-up; we can't detect a noticeable difference in the delay.
Perhaps more important, Amazon adds LED lights to the Paperwhite, allowing you to read the display in the dark. Backlight might be the wrong term to use, though. While tablet screens and computer monitors are illuminated by LEDs that emit light out towards the user, the Kindle Paperwhite shines light back down towards the screen. Ergo, the Paperwhite’s backlight is actually a frontlight.
The clip below is an excerpt from Amazon’s official Quick Tour video, which gives a breakdown of this technology:
In the next video, Amazon employees talk about the challenges they faced designing the Kindle Paperwhite.
It was actually very hard: We had to spend many hours in dark rooms to pick LEDs. We looked at samples and looked at for this batch here these are the best LEDS to match the characteristics of a white, very neutral color. We spent a lot of time looking at how many LEDs to put in, how hard to drive them, how bright we could get it without impacting the battery life. You don’t want someone to have to [consciously] manage their light, and say, I’d really like to have the light on but that’s gonna hurt my battery life.
In a nutshell, Amazon combined the extremely power-efficient characteristics of a non-glare display with a touch-sensitive screen, and managed to tack on illumination for good measure. This is nothing short of a tremendously impressive feat.

To be precise, the Paperwhite’s display employs a light guide that sits atop the capacitive touch sensor. The guide is made of a transparent material, and light from white LEDs enters at the bottom edge of the display, bouncing along nanoimprinted channels within the guide. Amazon says it operates in much the same way as a fiber optic cable, though the company doesn't share much more detail than that.

The nanoimprinted channels are responsible for an even distribution of light across the entire display. Because the LEDs provide the strongest illumination towards the bottom edge of the screen, the criss-cross pattern of these channels becomes denser towards the upper edge, intensifying the output to maintain even distribution of brightness throughout.

Nevertheless, it was an entertaining read! In fact, it's made me register an account here. I can't wait to read more articles like this. Fun stuff!
It's called "Sony Reader T2". It runs Android. And it's rooted.
And you are not bound to Amazon's store with it, even non rooted you can burrow books from electronic libraries and read common formats like EPUB.
worth should be worse
ive read several books on my kindle fire HD, often for hours at a time, and never had an issue with eye strain or battery life. In fact i prefer reading on the kindle HD then a regular book.
The one advantage of e-ink readers like the traditional kindle, is you can read it in daylight. I have an iPad and spend a lot of time chilling on the back deck during the summer, and I have to go through a lot of seating arrangements to minimize the glare so that I can see the iPad. Ordering a new Kindle just for this purpose.
Cloud sync is great too for those times when I don't have my Kindle with me. I can pick up my phone with my Kindle app and start reading right where I left off on my Kindle and vice versa.
Also, the battery lasts significantly longer (we're talking months of daily reading) if you just shut off the wireless connection when you're not downloading any books or sync-ing to the cloud. If you leave the wireless connection on full-time, you need to recharge after about 4 weeks.
Great article! *thumbs up the article*
If you plan to read a lot where there is natural light (in the sun or shadow outside or near windows, etc) I would really recommend the Paperwhite. Just my personal preference. My eyes are really having a hard time reading on a tablet under such conditions. If you mostly read where you can control the lightning condition the Paperwhite would still be easier on the eyes, but there is no longer a real problem reading on the tablet =)
If you are using your tablet to read, not comment, not surfing the web, not playing, reading, all you need is a previous/next page. The touch screen is not flawless, it will not work then you will skip 3 pages. Then you'll put your kindle on the coach and something will touch the screen and...
Bring back the button please!
Yes I am really pretty sick of the lack of buttons in favor of touch screens. Part of the reason I never really used a first gen iPod touch that someone gave me. If I am walking and have my MP3 player in my pocket... I want it to have buttons, for switching songs and volume up and down. Don't even get me started on phones without physical keyboards.
If you are using your tablet to read, not comment, not surfing the web, not playing, reading, all you need is a previous/next page. The touch screen is not flawless, it will not work then you will skip 3 pages. Then you'll put your kindle on the coach and something will touch the screen and...
Bring back the button please!
This is one thing I noticed too going from the keyboard Kindle to the paperwhite. I liked the buttons a lot better on the keyboard Kindle as the touchscreen is a bit laggy. All things considered, though, you can't beat the ability to read in any lighting conditions (no light all the way to direct sun light) with the Paperwhite. The lack of the keyboard is a little annoying, but if you think about how infrequently you use it, it's not so bad.
What I like. E-ink. This was the whole idea behind the Kindle revolution. Paper quality, no eye strain, read in the sun. Granted I use my iPad for surfing the net, reading news and all around keeping up. However I do notice the eye strain after a while and I just can't get a handle around curling up with my iPad to read a book.
Adjustable fonts. Made for older eyes. I used to pass up books because the print was too small or the binding had a chance of doing damage if I dropped it on my head while dozing off.
I do like the touch screen. I guess it is what we get used to. I was forced to use a button Kindle after my Kindle Touch went down. Never really got the hang of it. Almost everything we encounter now is touch so it becomes intuitive.
The back lighting. Finally!!! I really dont miss looking for a decent hotel room light to read by. I also don't miss my little external light batteries running out at inconvenient times. I don't even have a reading light on my side of the bed anymore.
Amazon has copyright agreements in many more countries than other makes. In other words in many countries you cannot download a book. Don't take a minimum wage clerk's word on it. We spend a lot of time out of country and it became very clear to us that Amazon by far gave us the most flexibility. A disclaimer. I do not, have not and never will work for for Amazon.. Oh and the customer service is terrific as well.
I know what you're saying but the thing of it is, there's probably been very little market penetration for Kobo and Nook. It's like including the E-reader I run across at the counter at the drugstore checkout (I don't even know the brand).
Are you kidding? The Nook is a huge seller! Barnes and Noble has 600+ retail locations that are all pushing those devices plus a thriving web site and e-book business. Amazon may sell more, but that doesn't mean there isn't competition worth mentioning.
This is basically like having an iPad comparison and only comparing it to the iPad Mini (and excluding the Surface RT, various Android tablets, etc).
I'm all for the competition, but look it up. Barnes and Noble is basically with us still due to last year's cash investment of $300,000,000 by Microsoft (17% ownership in the Nook unit). As far as retail paper book stores, Barnes and Noble is going by way of those paper book stores we've seen precede it into the great beyond. Now that Microsoft has their own tablets, what value does the Nook provide them?
I wish it were different, but I wouldn't put any money on a company that's still thoroughly invested in old ways of doing things (paper book stores). We saw Borders go away pretty quickly.
Barnes and Noble is far from the thriving company you make it out to be.