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Sony turns the page with new eReader

JACK KAPICA

From Thursday's Globe and Mail

Latest comment posted at 4:27 PM EST 20/05/08

It's hard to imagine much in Sony's reader that can be improved technologically, but the question remains, can a digital reader match the experience of reading a traditional book? ...Read the full article

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  1. Guido Sartucci from Flin Flon, Canada writes: NEW? This thing came out in September 2007. In technology years, it is now ready for the museum.
  2. Jon Marvin from Toronto, Canada writes: I've had one of these for about 6 months, and I love it. It will never fully replace print books, but for travelling (and I like to have a selection of material when away from home), it can't be beat. I think it's going to fall somewhere between the DVD vs Blu-Ray mindset. Some people will never feel a need to change from DVD (print), some people see the advantage to Blu-Ray (ebooks).
  3. D K from Canada writes: It's from Sony. Yuck. How many viruses do they make you download? How does this compare to the Kindle?
  4. D K from Canada writes: " ....rechargeable lithium-ion battery will last over 7,500 pages" What does that mean? If I leave it on page 1 it will last forever? How about #hours like most things'

    "It's not at all like a real book, more of a compromise resulting from the power requirements of backlit screens, colour displays and battery life."

    Most print books are not color. Books are not backlit. Perhaps you were thinking of a laptop.
  5. Stephen Graham from Canada writes: D K, the e-reader doesn't use power the way other devices do. The display is not backlit. Displaying an initial page uses power but once the display is on the screen, with the eInk technology no power is used to keep it there. So your comment is true in theory. If you left it on page 1 it would not use any power. I'm not sure about forever but a long time. When you change the page it uses power to create the next page on the display. That's why the battery life is specified as number of pages rather than length of use.
  6. Mark T. from Toronto, Canada writes: I have this product as well... for what it was designed to do, it is worth the price from my perspective.

    For additional books in the sci-fi / fantasy genre, check out www.webscription.net, and click on Free Library; you can download free e-books in Sony's .lrf format.

    Of course, you can also buy additional books, and bundles of books... Baen's been doing this since the late 90's.

    Regards,

    Mark
  7. Slippery Slope from Canada writes: Sony has never been mac friendly. It's also cheaper in the States. I'm not buying.
  8. Greg Arbouw from Victoria, Canada writes: I own both the PRS-505 and the 500, I should say owned the 505. I had someone who was looking at it poke the screen to hard and completely ruined it after only 2 months of owning it. The screen on the unit of the 500 series is really tough and I have dropped it a lot and bent it a bit to fit in a back pocket, not too mention I bring it to work and it gets banged around there. The 505 however is very sensitive to damage, before purchasing it, I would advise reading various forums to make sure it was what I wanted. Personally I would either get the Kindle or hold off.

    I sent mine(the 505) in for repairs and I was told that it would cost nearly $760 to fix the screen. I immediately called back and asked how it could possibly be so much when its only $250 brand new, the Sony Rep told me that the screen costs $560, $100 for labour and then tax and shipping for the rest. Unbelievable. On the other hand it was much clearer than the 500 series with fairly decent battery life, you can read something like 4-5 books before recharging. Although scrolling through the screens and menus to pick a book can vastly reduce the battery life. Sometimes I could only read 1 book before recharge if I was checking other books and bookmarks.

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