March 18th, 2009

Fujitsu introduces color Kindle-killer 'FLEPia'

Posted by Andrew Nusca @ 6:26 am

Categories: Amazon Kindle

Tags: Battery, Fujitsu Ltd., FLEPia, E-books, Personal Technology, Andrew Nusca

E-readers, start your engines.

Fujitsu today announced that it will begin selling “the world’s first color e-paper mobile terminal,” or e-reader, in Japan today through its online store FrontechDirect.

The device, named FLEPia (doesn’t it just roll off your tongue?), is the first such device to feature color e-paper, and has an 8-inch display screen capable of showing up to 260,000 colors in high-definition, Bluetooth and high-speed wireless LAN.

FLEPia is also power-efficient, enabling up to 40 hours of continuous battery operation when fully charged, and does not require power for continuous display of a screen image, consuming power only during re-draw.

FLEPia also supports a 4GB SD card, and with it, can store the equivalent of 5,000 conventional paper-based books when each book is 300 pages long at 600KB per book.

Specs:

• 8-inch screen displays up to 260,000 colors in high-definition; 768 dots x 1,014 dots (XGA), with up to 260,000 displayable colors (4,096-color and 64-color display is also possible, if desired).
• Weighs just 385 grams, or about 13.6 ounces, and is 12.5mm thick, or just under a half-inch.
• Up to 40-hour continuous battery operation
• Bluetooth, high-speed wireless LAN
• A USB mini-B connector supporting USB2.0 (480Mbps) and a SD memory card slot.
• Stereo speakers (embedded) offer audio playback of e-books, including picture books.
• Touch screen, digital stylus, scroll key, function buttons
• Two e-book viewers included as standard features (XMDF and .book formats)
• Windows CE 5.0 (Japanese version)

Software upgrades will be offered free-of-charge. The FLEPia costs 99,750 Japanese Yen, or roughly $1,015 U.S. dollars. Ouch.

No word on whether the FLEPia will make an appearance in other markets besides Japan. Full specs, after the jump: