The Amazon Kindle Scribe is a totally new Kindle, unlike anything that has come before. This device is part e-Reader and a digital note taking device or e-note. You can do a ton of different things with it, with the accompanied stylus. View and edit PDF files, annotate eBooks or freehand draw. This is the first 10.2-inch E INK product in the world that has a 300 PPI screen. The major selling points is the large surface area which will be great for reading books, comics, manga, magazines, newspapers and digital textbooks for the classroom. Will you pre-order or buy the Scribe?
“Kindle Scribe is the best Kindle we’ve ever built, creating a reading and writing experience that feels like real paper,” said Kevin Keith, vice president of Amazon Devices. “It’s inspired by the Kindle customers who have added billions of notes and highlights to books over the years, and it’s also ideal for reviewing and marking up documents, managing your to-do list, or doodling over a big idea. I’m so excited to get it in the hands of customers soon.”
Keith said the new Kindle pairs features customers know and love, including access to more than 13 million eBooks available worldwide in the Kindle store, adjustable fonts, and weeks of battery life, with the world’s first 10.2″ 300 ppi glare-free Paperwhite display. “The screen itself is a big deal,” said Jordan Meenen, another senior product manager on the Kindle team. “Going with a display of this size means you don’t have to turn pages as often. You can use a big font for readability and get great text layout.”
Kindle has been a huge hit ever since Amazon founder Jeff Bezos unveiled the first model in 2007. Since then, the company has been constantly working to improve the experience by adding more functionality to the e-Reader. To understand what could come next, the team started talking to customers about what they love about reading on Kindle and looking at what features they used the most. They found a growing interest in reading non-fiction books and that customers around the world add billions of notes and highlights while reading on Kindle.
Enabling the new reading and writing features on Kindle Scribe involved a number of software and hardware design components. At the center of it all is a new large, thin display that showcases writing, graphs, and images in gorgeous detail, a battery-free pen, and new foldable covers, each element designed to delight readers and writers.
Customers around the world will be able to discover their favorite thing about Kindle Scribe in time for the holidays. Like previous Kindle e-readers, Kindle Scribe retains weeks-long battery life, an adjustable warm light and auto-adjusting front light, instant access to the Kindle Store, and a host of accessibility features. For the first time ever, Kindle Scribe users will be able to write with a pen featuring customizable line widths that comes with highlighter and eraser tools. Kindle Scribe also includes templates for notetaking and to-do lists, and with the Send to Kindle feature, customers can easily transfer content from their computer or phone for reading or notetaking, including PDF, Microsoft Word and other document formats.
The Amazon Kindle Scribe will feature an E INK Carta 1200 e-paper display panel with a WACOM layer and has a resolution of 300 PPI. The screen is flush with the bezel and protected by a layer of glass. It features the same asymmetrical design as the Kindle Oasis, which a big chunk on one side. This is designed for you to be able to easily hold it with one hand. The device itself is made out of recycled aluminum. There is a front-lit display and color temperature system with a combination of white and amber LED lights. There are 35 LED lights, which is the most ever found on a Kindle and should provide amazing illumination.
Underneath the hood is an 1GHz MediaTek MT8113 processor and 1GB of RAM. There will be multiple storage versions available, 16GB, 32GB or 64GB variants. It will have USB-C for charging the device, in addition to transferring documents and PDF documents to the Scribe, in order to annotate them. There is WIFI internet for accessing the Kindle or Audible Store for listening to audiobooks or reading. There is Bluetooth, this will allow users to pair wireless headphones to listen to said audiobooks. For reading, a single charge lasts up to 12 weeks based on a half hour of reading per day, with wireless off and the light setting at 13. For writing, a single charge lasts up to 3 weeks based on a half hour period of writing per day, with wireless off and the light setting at 13. Battery life will vary and may be reduced based on usage and other factors such as Audible audiobook streaming and annotating content. The dimensions are 7.7” x 9.0 x .22 (196 x 230 x 5.8mm excluding feet) and weighs15.3oz (433g device only).
The Amazon Kindle Scribe is available now for preorder for $340 with a standard stylus or $370 with a premium stylus and will ship out on November 30th.
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.
