Researchers at GE have found a way to print OLEDs (Organic Light-Emitting Diodes) “roll-to-roll,” much like printing newspapers. The breakthrough, coming as a result of four years of work, will allow manufacturers to create OLEDs at a fraction of the cost.

OLED technology is behind the flexible and e-ink displays popping up daily now, but price has always been a barrier. Now, with some tuning and polishing, the researchers hope they’ll have a working “printing press” set up to manufacture OLEDs at a much cheaper price.

OLEDs are much more energy efficient than traditional lights or displays. As soon as the printing method is perfected, we will see OLED displays quickly taking over current technologies. Just one of the benefits of OLEDs is better battery life for our gadgets, meaning less frequent recharging.

There is now just one major hurdle to jump - improving the lifetime of OLEDs. Since they are made of organic materials, they are very sensitive to outside elements, especially water. As soon as scientists figure out a way to overcome that, expect to see OLEDs everywhere.

The Livre, designed by Nedzad Mujcinovic, a student at at Monash University, is vying with Amazon’s Kindle to become the next-generation e-book reader.

The design won a Dyson Student Award in 2007. Perhaps the most important feature that makes this gadget stand out is it’s simple, easy-to-use gesture input scheme. Instead of pressing buttons, you simply slide your finger from corner to corner to turn pages, somewhat like a real book. Sliding two fingers skips by 10 pages, and three fingers goes 50 pages ahead.

The touch surface overlays an e-paper (or e-ink) surface, which is standard for these sorts of e-book readers. What does set it apart is the leather stitched cover, making the device resemble a real book.

Livre seem set to bridge our gap between traditional books and their digital counterparts. A device like this could help us transition to e-books with ease due to its intuitive nature. We hope to see a real-life version of Livre in stores soon, so Nedzad better work on making this a reality. Another pic after the jump. Read more »

Hitachi has just announced the W61H cell phone, a sleek device that features a 2.7-inch E-Ink display on the backside that can show one of 95 predetermined patterns on it (users can change the pattern shown).

In addition to the ‘Silhouette screen,’ the phone features a 2.8-inch display with a 240×400 resolution, a 1.97 megapixel camera, and a built-in 2GB micro SD card.

The phone has launched in Japan only, with no current plans to release a US version anytime soon.

The inclusion of the E-Ink display is pretty cool, but it’s very unfortunate that it’s only for aesthetics. Would be nice if it would show incoming calls, the time, or something else useful. More pics after the jump. Read more »