2nd day w/ the PRS-700

[thibaulthalpern]

It's my second day with the PRS-700. I'm evaluating if I like this whole ebook enterprise. The idea is good, especially I think for those of us who have lots of PDF documents which we haven't yet read but have collected for our scholarly research. What seems to be sorely lacking is good software to manage these various PDFs and books. Yes, there is Calibre but from what I can see so far if one has several hundred PDFs, Calibre doesn't seem to be a very good organising program for such a large library. I do use a citation management software called EndNote that keeps my PDF and references together and it does a wonderful job. Unfortunately, it wasn't built with ebook readers in mind so it doesn't manage ebook readers. So, those are my thoughts on this whole ebook business so far.

Regarding the PRS-700, it's a good machine but there are several things I would like to see change:

1. Lock - I would like to see a lock button when switched, none of the buttons would operate. Right now, whenever I close my PRS-700's cover, it is easy to depress the buttons accidentally and flip through several pages of what I'm currently reading
2. More sensitive touchscreen--I like the sensitivity of the iPod Touch and iPhone and would like to see the PRS-700 emulate that. I know the iPhone touchscreen and PRS-700 works in different ways. Whereas the iPhone touchsreen calculates electricity difference (something like that), the PRS-700 is pressure sensitive
3. Better zoom features for PDF files
4. Dictionary--a lot of people have been craving this. I'd like to see a built-in dictionary support feature.

These are some of my preliminary thoughts on the PRS-700, after using it for two days.

[jbruce]

I ran into the same issue with the no lock thing. But, if you flip the power switch quickly mine goes into sleep mode (I didn't set this) - which stops that. Then to recover - just flip the switch quickly again, and it's instant on.

For PDFs I still think the plastic-logic eReader coming out this year - is more in the park.

I have about 250 books in my library (not many PDFs) - and find Calibre to be on similar part to my iTunes library - if I'm actually hunting for a song.

My biggest issue is no auto-sync - I hope I'm just missing something somewhere.

Cheers,
J

[Andybaby]

1. put it to sleep/ turn it off when you close it. I dont know what you expect here, anthing to put it to sleep would be 1 button or 2 button presses, while putting it to sleep is 1 button already

[thibaulthalpern]

I think I was hoping to have it operate like a real book where I don't have to press any button and can just close the cover. After all, it doesn't use electricity when displaying an image.

[el.astrologo]

I'm not so sure how well would that work keeping in mind that it turns itself off after 60 minutes of inactivity

[xianfox]

Originally Posted by thibaulthalpern

I think I was hoping to have it operate like a real book where I don't have to press any button and can just close the cover. After all, it doesn't use electricity when displaying an image.

The display doesn't require power to maintain the image, but the device is still a computer, the processor is drawing power while the unit is powered up. Sony's sleep mode works great for me to conserve battery power while not in use, and it's instant on when I want to pick it up again.