e-ink & ebooks

[Jandra]

Just purcased a Sony ebook Reader of e-bay USA. Hopefully it will be shipped soon. It's a gift for my graduation.

Anyone here who has experience with dedicated ebook readers?

I like the idea that ebooks don't require ink/paper/physical transport of materials or end product and that they don't take up a lot of physical space. Ebooks are also cheaper than paper books. The down side of the reader device is that it's manufacture probably isn't very green, but it should last a long time.

The device I bought uses e-ink. It is a different technology from LCD. As you can turn some 7500 pages on one battery charge I don't consider the energy use of the device a problem. It should also be very easy on the eyes. But it's quite hard to get one over here, so I haven't actually ever seen one except on pictures.

If anyone is interested I'll post a short review when I've received it.

Jandra

[wulf]

I would be very interested to hear more about it once you have had a chance to give it some testing. I use my Palm Pilot for daily Bible reading (backlit, it means I can do them before getting up or switching on the light) but, while okay for short passages, I haven't found it a patch on real books for extended reading. I have read a couple of the ebooks that came bundled with it but haven't been inspired to seek out more.

The concept of eInk is one I am intrigued by, so I will keep an eye out for your report.

Wulf

[Shirley]

I'm definitely interested to learn more about this - please do review it for us...

Congratulations on the graduation!!!!!

[hedgewitch]

I'm also very interested to learn more about this, your review would be most welcome.

[Jandra]

Well, the e-ink reader has been shipped and I hope to have it in 6 tot 10 days. Unfortunately not in time for a big train trip I have to take next Friday. That would have been a great opportunity to test its battery life: 6 hours of travel.

I'll keep you all posted.

Jandra

[Jandra]

Okay, the Sony e-ink reader arrived about a week ago and I have read half a book on it. Have taken it with me during train travel and resd in it at home.

I'm really pleased with it. Picture and description can be found in Wikipedia
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sony_Reader

The text is really sharp and the screen is easy on the eyes. So far I've only read books which were RTF formatted and that worked well. Haven't purchased e-books from the Sony store. Found using the software to transfer a book from pc to device pretty easy to use.

Actually I have only one gripe: contrast. The background is grey and in low light conditions it is less easy to read than a regular book. I knew this would be the case, but I'm slightly disappointed that the contrast is (even) less than I had imagined.

Before buying this I'd make sure that the sort of books you read are available as ebooks. Many current titles are available, but prices can still be quite high imo.

I'm happy with it, as it is sooo much easier on the eyes than computer/PDA screens. Ultra portable: as many books (and documents on PDF etc) in your bag as you wish.

Jandra

[Thomzo]

Sounds like a great idea for a holiday. Save lugging several books in your case. Do you know how long the batteries last?

Cheers
Zoe