Daylight DC1 is a new tablet with a ‘Live Paper’ screen that could be better than e-ink — here’s how

Most of the time, when you think of e-ink displays, what comes to mind is an Amazon Kindle or the Barnes & Noble Nook, small tablets that aim to make reading on a digital screen more comfortable using electronic ink instead of the brighter and more common LCD and LED screens.

There is now a new competitor in the market. A company called Daylight Computer
(as shared by 9to5Google) recently announced the Daylight DC1, a 10.5-inch Android tablet with a screen that the company calls Live Paper.

The Live Paper screen is a monochrome screen that does not produce blue light, which is widely criticized as being bad for sleep and general health. Many smartphones now offer the ability to turn off blue light, and companies like Gunnar sell glasses designed to block blue light.

The Daylight DC1 is marketed as a healthier alternative to brighter tablets that produce blue light, but it’s not without its own luminescence. The tablet has a backlight for evening and nighttime use that emits a “pure amber” light, according to Daylight, without allegedly any PWM (pulse width modulation) flicker visible on other displays.

Amazon and others have attempted to create a proper e-ink tablet, but most e-ink displays tend to be slower and more prone to hang-ups or display errors than the best tablets. This is partly why some of us here at Tom’s Guide prefer reading comics on an iPad rather than a Kindle.

According to Daylight, the DC1 runs on a custom Android operating system called Sol:OS. It’s meant to be minimally distracting, with notifications turned off by default. The company touted that one of the goals of the Daylight tablet is to reduce our “dependence” on screens and phones. However, the tablet is designed to run normal Android apps and comes pre-installed with apps like Audible, Kindle, Google Docs and more.

The tablet also comes with 8GB of RAM and 128GB of storage with an 8,000mAh battery running on a MediaTek Helio G99 chipset. This battery, coupled with a minimal operating system, could mean this tablet could last several days on a single charge.

The tablet also comes with a passive Wacom stylus. You can pay $729 for a Daylight DC1 right now, but it appears the company is releasing the tablet in batches. The first three are already sold out and as of this writing, wave 4 won’t ship until November 2024.

Daylight was founded by Stanford grad Anjan Katta, and from what we know, he’s been working on the device for over six years. His goal with the Daylight computer is to create a “healthier” computer, and in various interviews Katta has said he wants his device to combat eye strain and distraction while redefining our relationship with gadgets.

Over the years, he has said in interviews that whatever device Daylight makes, it will be designed for “writers, thinkers, and knowledge workers.” Most of the podcasts we’ve found him speaking on are crypto-adjacent or specifically talk about discussions with “eclectic” thinkers.

According to various Katta podcast interviews, the DC1 is not the company’s end goal. Katta wants to see Live Paper display on all kinds of devices such as monitors, laptops and watches.

Is the Daylight DC1 a technological flash in the pan or will we see a wave of Live Paper devices in the future? It will be interesting to see how this device actually performs once it gets into people’s hands.

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