In his video review of the Sony Reader, PC Magazine’s Patrick Norton praises the screen as good for text, but has some hesitation about it for pictures. Release date is looking to be the September-October period.
Norton excitedly talks about Sony’s forthcoming e-book store, as if that takes care of the content issue. He makes no direct mention of the eBabel problem. Just when will the MSM learn? Stop getting caught up so much in hardware features and think about format issues that will considerably detract from the value of E Ink machines. A caption with the video says: “It also plays music and can display PDF files.” But not encrypted ones–the main kind that big publishers use.
iRex, from what I know, will be more enlightened about eBabel than will Sony, even if hardware vendors can do only so much.
(Thanks to the industrious Roland Rohde. MobileRead link here. Scene from video review below.)
For those who notice how much faster the Sony is than the Irex device, according to the latter manufacturer the Sony Reader stores books in a pre-rendered format (follow the link, search the page for “zoom”). Totally unconfirmed, use at your own risk. And of course, the Iliad’s screen is 1.6 times as large.
BTW, a certain Herr Roland Rohde not only got appointed head keyboard puncher at Mobileread yesterday, but today he also received his Irex Iliad this morning. Let’s hope reviews will follow soon. Nothing can beat real-world use.
Agreed. Congrats to Roland! – David
Wow, thanks for posting the update and video link. I’ve been wondering when the new release date would be set for.
One thing I’d like the mention that gets to me when people comment about this reader is their concerns about its cost. First, I have to think Sony’s selling this thing at a loss in hopes they can make it up by selling books. Also, R&D is expensive and someone has gotta pick up the tab. I think $350 is a very reasonable price for this incredibly useful device. After watching Norton’s demo, I’m even more eager to get one of these.