The Kindle Scribe, the first E Ink tablet Amazon has ever come up with scored another first in being the first E Ink device to have ever been subjected to the torturous ordeal at JerryRigEverything. It was scratched, bent, and ripped open, all of which can be quite heart wrenching for those who have a special place in their heart for E Ink tablets or e-notes. The Scribe did put up a brave fight though, before being rendered unusable.
The Pen turned out to be the weakest link and snapped into two easily. The interior is familiar stuff though, with the replaceable tip holder coiled with copper wire which lets it interact with the copper wire mesh placed behind the E Ink panel. This enables the pen to determine the exact location of the pen tip on the display. The interior also revealed the magnetic piece which serves the sole purpose of attaching the pen to the side of the e-note.
The external matte surface made of plastic has a grade 3 rating for scratch resistance as per the standard laid down by the propagators of the YT channel. What that means is the display is prone to picking up scratch marks when scratched with a sharp object. The external display surface however survived the flame test with elan, with no visual changes to be seen, save for a few slight ripples that resulted from the heat acting on the plastic layer. The screen otherwise continued to be functional and responsive.
Scratching the sides and the back also left deep scratch marks but the device still was able to hold on to its own. Even the little rubber footpads, one each along the four sides that serve as the first point of contact between the e-note and the surface it is placed on are made of high-quality rubber that took some effort to be ripped off entirely.
Things however started to turn ugly during the bend tests as the e-note got bent but only after being subjected to considerable pressure. Also, it being a metallic structure, the device got bent though everything remained in place. Also, the bend was sort of permanent as the device didn’t revert back entirely to its original shape, which again owes it to its metallic chassis. What is impressive though is that the e-note was perfectly responsive and fully functional even in its bent state.
Things turned uglier when the e-note is bent from the front. This left a portion of the display to be completely unreadable with only hazy gray horizontal and vertical lines lining the portion against a white background. The other portion however continued to show the last page it held but turned out to be entirely unresponsive. In other words, this was the extent of torture that the Scribe was able to take and is rendered unusable beyond that.
Ripping off the back cover reveals a large battery, 3000 mAh of it dominating the interiors. The rest is all components and circuits held within the metal case. At the front lies a thick display assembly which also includes 35 LEDs that illuminate the display so that you are able to read at night or where there is less ambient light. It isn’t similar to the way QLEDs work in that it essentially is an emissive display while the E Ink panel is reflective in nature. As already stated, with backlit E Ink panels, the LEDs only illuminate the e-paper and, unlike QLED, no light is incident on the user’s eyes.
Meanwhile, the Power button, as we all know, is made of a hundred percent recycled aluminum though we sure would like to see that extend to more portions of the device and not just anything as minuscule as a button. Also, it isn’t that anyone who has spent around the $370 that the Scribe costs will be subjecting it to the sort of things that has been shown in the video. Still, it’s informative to see how much the Scribe is able to take before it goes out. The tests also reveal the solid build quality of the Scribe makes it almost indestructible in real-life conditions.
Meanwhile, here is the video.
With a keen interest in tech, I make it a point to keep myself updated on the latest developments in technology and gadgets. That includes smartphones or tablet devices but stretches to even AI and self-driven automobiles, the latter being my latest fad. Besides writing, I like watching videos, reading, listening to music, or experimenting with different recipes. The motion picture is another aspect that interests me a lot, and I'll likely make a film sometime in the future.