Fujitsu’s Flepia comes in at such a high price point ($1,000 approximately) that its instantly out of the reckoning as a Kindle Killer.
There are however some interesting things about it, and there’s a chance that as Fujitsu scale-up they can cut down the price enough to be a threat. Given that eInk screens might not get color until 2011, the Flepia does hold promise.
Here are the Flepia’s main features and benefits -
- Consumer sales started on March 18th, 2009 in Japan. You can buy a Flepia at Fujitsu Frontech’s online store “FrontechDirect” (which isn’t to be found).
- A price of 99,750 Yen that at March 27th’s exchange rate is $1,013.771. So almost exactly triple the price of Kindle 2.
- Color e-Paper 8-inch display screen capable of showing up to 260,000 colors in high-definition.
- 768 dots x 1,014 dots (XGA) screen resolution. And it does look impressive –
- The Flepia’s proprietary epaper technology is developed jointly by Fujitsu Laboratories and Fujitsu Frontech.
- Up to 40 hours of continuous battery operation when fully charged, and like eInk only requires power to re-draw the screen.
- Through Fujitsu Frontech site owners can buy ebooks from Japan’s biggest eBook store and download directly into FLEPia.
- Weighs just 385 grams and only 12.5mm thick.
- Bluetooth and high-speed wireless LAN. Also, FLEPia has dial-up connection via Japanese mobile carriers.
- SD Card slot and stereo speakers.
- Touch Screen with digital stylus.
- Approximately 20,000 Japanese e-books in either XMDF or .book format can be downloaded. Those two seem to be the formats supported (via BunkoViewer and T-Time ebook software programs).
- Windows CE5.0.
- They also state that their sales target is to sell 50,000 of these by the end of 2010. Talk about a lack of ambition.
Fujitsu has hit an important landmark – color e-Paper. If they can figure out a way to cut down on price, and become more ambitious about sales targets, they might become a viable contender.
Fujitsu Flepia Technical Specifications
Dimensions, Weight 158mm (Width) × 240mm (Height) × 12.5mm (Depth. Thinnest section: 11.3mm) , Weight: 385g Screen Size 8-inch (123.6mm x 164.8mm) Unit Colors White or Black Resolution 768 dots x 1024 dots (XGA) Number of Displayable Colors 260,000 colors (3 Scans); 4,096 (2 Scans); 64 colors (1 Scan) Re-Draw Speed 1.8 seconds (1 Scan), 5 seconds (2 Scans), 8 seconds (3 Scans) Wireless LAN (embedded) IEEE802.11b/g（11/54Mbps *1） Bluetooth Bluetooth Ver2.0+EDR Memory SD Memory Card*2 (Maximum up to 4GB) USB Connector USB2.0 (480Mbps) mini-B connector × 1 Audio Stereo speakers (embedded), headphone connector x 1 Power Supply Lithium polymer battery (embedded), AC adaptor
Fully-charged continuous operation： 40 continuous hours
(Conditions: Display of 2,400 pages/at 1 minute per page/with 64 colors)Content Storage Capacity (when used with a 4GB SD card) Equivalent to 5,000 paper-based books when each book is 300 pages long with 600KB per book Security 128Bit AES (Advanced Encryption Standard) Software FLEPia application, Japanese version Microsoft Windows CE5.0, Japanese e-book viewers: BunkoViewer (XMDF), T-Time (.book) CPU (embedded) XScale RISC CPU Environmental Operating Conditions Operation: Temperature range: 5 to 35 degrees Celsius, Humidity: 20 to 80% RH
Storage: Temperature range: – 10 to 50 degrees Celsius, Humidity: 20 to 80% RH
Filed under: eBook Reader Devices Tagged: | fujitsu flepia, kindle killer
Thanks for the review.
-Can notes/annotations be added? If so, page by page or gathered somewhere. Can notes be exported/saved separately?
- In the video it seems a powerpoint presentation was opened. Are you certain your list of formats is allencompassing? How about PDF, mobi, txt etc.?
- Is the screen back-lit? (Since it’s e-paper, not e-ink.)
Thanks!
Sol, I’ve contacted Fujitsu with your questions.
The list of formats is from their official site so it’s almost certainly all encompassing.
Waiting to hear from Fujitsu about the notes.
There is no mention of a back-lit screen. In general backlighting with any eInk or ePaper technology is a bad idea. Sony PRS 700 messed up its readability by including a light. its much better to add on a book light that is completely separate from the eInk/.ePaper and does not affect readability.
will update as soon as i hear from them.
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