Qualcomm Mirasol color e-ink set for CES demo

Qualcomm's colour e-ink display, Mirasol, will indeed be demo'd in public early next year at the Consumer Electronics Show (CES), one of the company's device partners has let slip.

E-book reader specialist PocketBook last night put out a statement saying it will show off a device also called Mirasol at the Las Vegas industry shindig.

"The newest PocketBook model, Mirasol, features Qualcomm’s full-color Mirasol display which is based on a reflective technology," it said.

PocketBook subsequently contacted website The Digital Reader to say the press release had gone out by mistake, but the cat, as they say, is out of the bag.

Of course, there's a big difference between showing a screen and shipping it, and a PocketBook mole told TDR product won't be out until Q3 2011.

Mirasol's coloured sub-pixels each have a mirror behind them. Change the distance between the top of the sub-pixel assembly - a colour filter - and the mirror and you change the brightness of the sub-pixel. Red, green and blue sub-pixels combine to form a single colour dot on the Mirasol screen.

The mirror is moved elecromagnetically, so it can potentially move up and down quickly enough to make the screen's refresh rate high enough for video. You can read more about it on The Register. ®