The HANNspree Hybri Monitor, priced at USD 900, will be available for pre-order in Taiwan. The pre-sale will be held exclusively by the Taiwanese e-reader store Bear Boss and the national telecommunications company Chunghwa Telecom. The first deliveries are expected in late March.
Until now, paper-like displays have mostly been confined to static tasks like reading documents. A few displays have reached the crucial 60Hz refresh rate needed for smooth video playback, but Hybrid Monitor is the first to get 75Hz, enabling more dynamic multimedia use cases.
Hybrid Monitor features a 23-inch Transflective LCD (TLCD) screen (1920×1080), a unique paper-like display technology that differs significantly from the electrophoretic displays found in most e-readers. TLCD shares similarities with reflective LCD (RLCD), which is made from a liquid crystal layer sandwiched between polarizing and reflective layers. However, TLCD stands apart due to micro-perforations in its reflective coating, which allow an LED backlight to pass through it, much like a traditional LCD.
The Hybrid Monitor’s proprietary TLCD technology boasts an impressive 75Hz refresh rate and an actual 8-bit color depth of 16.7 million colors. This ensures a vibrant, Full HD experience for video watching and gaming. The monitor offers paper-like eye comfort in purely reflective mode, making it perfect for prolonged use. The reflective mode works best in environments with over 1000 lux of ambient light, while its flicker-free backlight should be activated when ambient light drops below that range.
Michael Kozlowski is the editor-in-chief at Good e-Reader and has written about audiobooks and e-readers for the past fifteen years. Newspapers and websites such as the CBC, CNET, Engadget, Huffington Post and the New York Times have picked up his articles. He Lives in Vancouver, British Columbia, Canada.
