The Sony Portable Reader PRS-500 has dominated our headlines lately and made everyone want to kick out some cash for one of the most promising e-book reader devices. Unfortunately it won't hit the market before this coming spring. Upon visiting its product page (http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/en/-/USD/SY_DisplayProductInformation-Start?&ProductSKU=PRS500) today, I noticed that Sony has revealed the final pricing for the reader: USD $349.99. That's exactly between the price range of $300-400 which was cited earlier by various sources.

If you like Sony to notify you by e-mail when the Portable Reader becomes available, click here (http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/en/-/USD/SY_ViewStatic-Start?page=%2femail%2fsy_stockalert_sendmail%2eism l&ProductSKU=PRS500&ProductName=PRS-500&ProductDesc=Sony%ae%20Portable%20Reader%20System).

Related:
Gizmodo hands on with the Sony Reader (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5676)
Will Sony help the e-book market to grow? (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?threadid=5670)
Sony's new e-book reader officially announced (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5663)
Sony Reader vs. iRex Iliad e-book reader (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5664)

Brian already posted about the price, but it's good to have it mentioned explicitly.

$350 for a low res (relatively-speaking), proprietary device?

For less, I can get a Palm Tx that can read standard format eBooks (conversion is also needed - but using freely available utilities) plus do many more things.

I'm not seeing good value here.

Add native support for HTML, text and RTF (or give me an open-source program to convert to the proprietary format) and I'll consider it. But as it stands... close, but no cigar.

Ahh I didn't catch the update on Brian's post (http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=5663). $350 isn't a bargain, but on the other hand, with a 6-inch E Ink screen it'll make a better e-book reader than my Axim PDA with its 3.7-inch LCD screen. It's about time I give my eyes a treat.

I share my disappointment with rlauzon about Sony's decision to go, yet again, for its own format (BBeB), which - and that's the plus side - Sony is said to open specs for in near future.

Ahh I didn't catch the update on Brian's post. $350 isn't a bargain, but on the other hand, with a 6-inch E Ink screen it'll make a better e-book reader than my Axim PDA with its 3.7-inch LCD screen. It's about time I give my eyes a treat.

I'll agree with you on that. The screen would be much better to read eBooks with, but that one thing alone isn't worth $350 (at least to me).

Now when the competition comes out, we'll see how much of a value Sony's device is.

I share my disappointment with rlauzon about Sony's decision to go, yet again, for its own format (BBeB), which - and that's the plus side - Sony is said to open specs for in near future.

I'll believe it when I see it. Sony has always been a "proprietary" company (as opposed to an open company) and - especially seeing how they are pushing their proprietary eBook format - I don't see that changing any time soon.

The price is not unreasonable: it is a new product for early adopters who wants to be regarded at the forefront of technology (though realiticly, the Librie owners beat them to it). They should pay for this pleasure of having a relatively low-res, monochrome display and all the early bugs. :)

But it certainly looks like a very nice product and is at one level very tempting; however, I have long ago decided that it is more important to me that my ebookreader is pocketable than that it has a perfect screen.

Tabletpcreviewspot.com has some Sony Reader 'pr0n' here (http://www.tabletpcreviewspot.com/default.asp?newsID=365). Don't worry, they're G-Rated ;).

Even though it can only display 4 grayscale images, based on the photos it does an excellent job.

Looking good! Certainly considering it's just 2bpp. Seems kind of sepia-toned, but that could be due to the lighting.

>"Even though it can only display 4 grayscale images, based on the photos it does an excellent job."

No doubt, but although we generally don't read many illustated books, we won't be happy until we get a 32 bit colour display. My guess is that this will come within a year or so.

...we won't be happy until we get a 32 bit colour display.You're so right! But who are we kidding? Even that won't be enough... we'll always want more, brighter, faster, longer-lasting, sturdier, etc etc!

For me as a scholar the crucial question is search capabilities. With Plucker, I can search through a 4.5mb compressed file like Aquinas's Summa in 50 seconds on my Clie NX. It's not great but its sufficient for many purposes. I wonder how good the search capabilities here are (and what they do to battery life).

$350 for a low res (relatively-speaking), proprietary device?

For less, I can get a Palm Tx that can read standard format eBooks (conversion is also needed - but using freely available utilities) plus do many more things.

I'm not seeing good value here.

Add native support for HTML, text and RTF (or give me an open-source program to convert to the proprietary format) and I'll consider it. But as it stands... close, but no cigar.

I think the public at large will view the price negatively as well; I can buy a quality hardcover for $25 or so, or I can buy a $350 device I can use to purchase a $25 e-book to read on. The value proposition is just not there.

This spring we'll see just how good the marketing is.

"or I can buy a $350 device I can use to purchase a $25 e-book to read on"

That is not the worst: you buy the device for $350 and pay $25 per book and what do you get? You get a book you can only read as long as you own a Sony Reader!! If you sell the Sony and buy, say, an iRex, that's it. :(

Jorgen

Jorgen is probably right. Unless Sony opens up its BBeB e-book format, readers are stuck to a single reader, and this cannot be an incentive for buying e-books in the future.

Oh, and Slashdot picked up the reader just today:

http://hardware.slashdot.org/article.pl?sid=06/01/10/067251&from=rss

That is not the worst: you buy the device for $350 and pay $25 per book and what do you get? You get a book you can only read as long as you own a Sony Reader!! If you sell the Sony and buy, say, an iRex, that's it.

Actually, it's worse than that. If you buy a DRMed eBook, you pay $25 for a book that you can't resell when you are no longer interested in - as opposed to the non-DRM paper book you can buy for $25 and then re-sell on Amazon.com for about half of what you paid for it.

Mmm, I don't understand all this talk about closed formats. Wasn't it said that the Sony Reader would read PDF files? If that's true, every txt, doc, rtf and whichever is readable, since all of them can be converted to PDF. In fact, I remember reading that the DRM protected PDFs would be unreadable, so this implies that it would read open PDFs.

Mmm, I don't understand all this talk about closed formats. Wasn't it said that the Sony Reader would read PDF files?

That depends on what you term "readable".

There seems to be some confusion as to whether or not the Sony Reader will read PDF natively or whether you have to go through a conversion process to turn the PDF into something that the reader can use.

The conversion process is definately more work than just putting the PDF on the device. The process will probably be proprietary - which means those of us who have open OSs will be left out and if Sony decides to drop support, you are out in the cold.

Plus, many PDFs of (legal) eBooks are protected in some way. So the conversion process would also prohibit you from reading many PDFs that you would want to read on the device.

according to the adobe blog the sony reader has a mobile version of acrobat reader on it so there should be no issues with reading (self converted) PDFs.

according to the adobe blog the sony reader has a mobile version of acrobat reader on it so there should be no issues with reading (self converted) PDFs.

Problem, however, is that the Sony Reader's PDF software cannot reflow text. In other words: PDFs have to be paginated and formatted to fit within the Sony Reader's dimensions. Really unfortunate.

More info: More on Sony Reader's PDF, DRM, and reflow (http://blogs.adobe.com/billmccoy/2006/01/more_on_sony_re.html)

Problem, however, is that the Sony Reader's PDF software cannot reflow text. In other words: PDFs have to be paginated and formatted to fit within the Sony Reader's dimensions. Really unfortunate.

More info: More on Sony Reader's PDF, DRM, and reflow (http://blogs.adobe.com/billmccoy/2006/01/more_on_sony_re.html)
I didn't know that ;(
*BUMMER*

I didn't know that ;(
*BUMMER*

In the interest of fairness, many PDFs are hard-formatted anyway. (The PDF must have structure tags for a viewer to reflow its text correctly.) PDF support isn't completely useless without reflowing capabilities.

In the interest of fairness, many PDFs are hard-formatted anyway. (The PDF must have structure tags for a viewer to reflow its text correctly.) PDF support isn't completely useless without reflowing capabilities.

This looks like a good case for an eBook reader to support more than PDF.

Reformatting to fit the screen is a MUST for any eBook reader. I expect to get the same, if not better, experience from an eBook reader as I do from a paper book. If I have to scroll side-to-side (which will not be pleasant on eInk which refreshes very slow) to read a book, it certainly won't be as good as a paper book.

Reformatting to fit the screen is a MUST for any eBook reader.

I think it depends. For something that is primarily image based, the whole reformatting concept gets rather weird in the first place.

My own litmus test, however, is the ability to place a straight html text file on the device native and have it render correctly. Any device should be able to do that at a minimum.

Hello,
a few time is gone since Sony launched the PSR-500 on his site. OK the price will be about $350. But I didn't find any online store to buy the Sony Reader.

Does anyone know how to buy it?

Thanks,
Bepp

They wont sell it before September. I even heard a release date in December somewhere. So there is no way to buy it right now.

The sony reader isn't on sale yet.
Nobody knows exactly when it will be.

Sony said spring, then they said late summer...:-)

Hi all,
it seems that the Sony Reader is now available:
http://www.sonystyle.com/is-bin/INTERSHOP.enfinity/eCS/Store/en/-/USD/SY_DisplayProductInformation-Start?sssdmh=dm11.90805&ProductSKU=PRS500U2&Dept=audio&CategoryName=pa_pdr&hqs=order

Regards,
Bepp

Sony still insists on proprietary, dangling the vision of opening up later. They have thrown out this lure in many technologies along the way, but are slow to move away from proprietary standards.

Sony aspires to replicate Apple's iTunes success with e-books with their Connect Store. That design limits the market and further limits opportunities for (1) new publishers, (2) new authors and (3) new resellers to champion books.

The Treo and Windows Mobile devices can carry as many or more books without the limits of Sony, for less money and in a smaller package. Sony's reader costs less than $40 to manufacture at mature volumes so why is it being so greedy on margin and greedy with proprietary standards. Take out Sony's software and hardware for managing its proprietary store and the cost could go sub $25. Market needs a good, paperback sized sub-$50 device that people can put in Christmas stockings along with an SD card loaded with new books.

Welcome to MobileRead, bobl. There's a lot of information on electronic readers of all sorts around here. :wink:

Sony's reader costs less than $40 to manufacture at mature volumes so why is it being so greedy on margin and greedy with proprietary standards. Take out Sony's software and hardware for managing its proprietary store and the cost could go sub $25.Best guess on the screen alone is $150~$200, so it's not the software that's keeping it above the $25 range. :no:

The Reader handles native (as in not converted) RTF, TXT, PDF, MP3, ACC, PNG, JPG, GIF and several other file types that escape me at the moment. :smile:

Yes it also handles Sony's proprietary BBeB format, but eReader, Mobipocket, MSReader and pretty much all the rest have proprietary formats, and they require that files be converted to use them on their software/hardware. Should they be chastised for doing more than most everybody else has done in this area? :blink:

Would you consider the iRex iLiad to be open? It doesn't handle as many formats as the Sony does. :shrug:

Have a look around, and you might be surprised by what you'll find in the nooks and crannies of MobileRead. :grin:

Natch,

:) Thanks for the response. The exchange in this forum is great.

I agree that Sony holds no exclusive on pushing proprietary standards in the e-book space. Re: Costs -- they're largely a factor of volume and maturity. If you bake Sony's corporate allocations into the cost, it can certainly go up from my estimated parts costs, but at volume those allocations drop dramatically as a percentage of cost. Not only does that happen for Sony but real overhead per unit drops all the way through the supply chain. When you break down the materials costs of the screen, for example, it is much, much less than burdened cost of a low volume product would indicate.

The One Laptop Per Child Project is attacking the screen for the $100 laptop with that thinking in mind. And they have come up with a very interesting screen technology.

That being said, I'm a sucker for e-reading devices -- bought one of the original rocket e-books when they came out. IF the Sony device could read DRM'd PDF's, I would be very tempted to buy it as an interim measure. Size of PDA screen is tight as someone else suggested. BUT my preference is an OpenReader standard with a paperback sized device for less than $50 - a do-able solution over the next few years.

What's missing from your calculations, bobl, is that these readers use e-ink (http://www.eink.com) screens, which are not a fully mature technology, manufacturingwise and which are currently being manufactured by one, single company. :shrug:

Someone over in the iRex iLiad forum recently broke his screen and iRex quoted him $343 to replace it. That is apparently right in line for actual cost. My estimate on the 6" screen that the Sony uses is roughly 1/2 the surface area of the iLiad's 8" one and only 4 shades of gray to the iLiad's 16 -- that's why I said $150 to $200. You could claim $100~$150 and I wouldn't argue the point, but it's still too high for your $25 range.

The folks over at the Baen Bar (http://bar.baen.com) (NOT Baen publishing, just folks who hang out on their forum) are working on designing their own reader. Unfortunately, the company that makes the e-ink displays NDA'd them, so they can't say exactly which costs what, but they did say that if they bought all the components themselves from other sources, and the e-ink displays from PVI (the company that makes them), and did all the assembly work themselves, the cost would be around $300 per unit (that's for ~1000 units, and there's no volume price break on this side of 10,000 displays). That's without a profit margin, cause they're basically trying to make the readers themselves for themselves. They're currently looking at other display types to see if they can find anything that compares to e-ink, for a lower cost.

So while I haven't seen a B.O.M., I stand by my guess as being fairly informed. :smile:

You mentioned the $100 laptop -- the Baen folks looked at it and discussed it some, and the general consensus there was that it just wasn't suitable for a reader. :shrug:

Natch,

Thanks for your additional data. Looks like its current and well-sourced, Premised on that, I concede that my numbers are bogus. Premise is built on using a PDA screen (4x6) at 100,000 units. Clearly, this is the wrong formula. Sounds like it's going to take more than volume and efficiency to get the e-ink solution anywhere close to the range I'm talking about. Wonder what else could take the pricing down enough to drive major adoption.

Bob

I'd think the most likely thing would be major adoption driving production volume up enough to take advantage of economies of scale. :smile:

Having more than one company manufacturing the stuff might be a good step too.