Sony thinks quality will win out (for them)

[GeoffC]

Originally Posted by davidspitzer

You ask the average consumer, who knows about ebooks, what brand of ebook reader would they buy and 90% would say Kindle or Ipad. Sony just can not market to the hearts of consumers for some reason it is and continues to be their downfall

[davidspitzer]

Originally Posted by Lilly

What are you talking about. You guys are brainwashed. Sony has released a new model every year since 2006 (2009 - 3 models). Way more than any other e-book manufacturer. They have also giving the biggest software updates, DRM ePub & PDF usage in 2008 at the time with their proprietary LRX format. Not text to speech and Collection usage like Amazon (which Sony should have branded the name to make sure that Amazon could not use it). Also I've been able to make Collections since buying my PRS-505 in Dec of 2007. The biggest software updates Amazon gave is PDF (and only non-drm cripple PDF). Now they want to add annotation, highlighting, dictionary lookup as new PDF functions for the Kindle which Sony Readers have had the whole time. Yes, these things are new, only to the Kindle.

PRS-500 - Oct 2006
PRS-505 - Oct 2007
PRS-700 - Oct 2008
PRS-300 & PRS-600 - July 2009
PRS-900 - December 2009

By the way I think the PRS-900 is a way better value than the $189 kindle or $199 Nook (you are getting a great deal more an extra $50 or $60). Plus there is nothing wrong with the screen. By the way once you go touchscreen, you'll never go back. I can not imagine having a cell phone now that's not touchscreen and the same thing can now be said for my ebook readers.

I thought the 900 screen was bad even compared to the old kindle I think the new kindle Pearl screen will blow it away completely. The touch is "meh", for me.

I predicted the demise of Irex, Sony will be following. Mind you I don't think that is a good thing, but Sony has lost the game.

[SkyDream]

Originally Posted by boswd

yes but with the Prs300 you are getting a smaller screen, no wireless, smaller internal memory. So why would I purchase that over a Kindle or a Nook for the same price?

Because of ePub support ?

[Solicitous]

Originally Posted by SkyDream

Because of ePub support ?

And poor epub support at that. Time and time again I have read about the older version of ADE implemented in the reader (apparently the PRS900 has it right).

Sony, winning on quality does not just constitute nice physical hardware. At some point they need to (a) release firmware updates, and (b) think globally.

[SkyDream]

Originally Posted by Lilly

Plus there is nothing wrong with the screen. By the way once you go touchscreen, you'll never go back.

Mind the glare
That's what i hate about the 900 and touchscreens.
Maybe the new e-ink devices with touchscreen will minimize that with their better contrast.

[SkyDream]

Originally Posted by Solicitous

And poor epub support at that. Time and time again I have read about the older version of ADE implemented in the reader (apparently the PRS900 has it right).

Sony, winning on quality does not just constitute nice physical hardware. At some point they need to (a) release firmware updates, and (b) think globally.

Totally agree except ePub.
It's still ePub compared to Amazon no-ePub policy.

I love my 505 and 900 but since a few months i'm looking at other girls...

[Logseman]

Sony is not the device which supports most formats. Other smaller brands release more capable firmwares. A look to the Matrix will tell you that.

Besides, ePub support is no good if buying and reading ePub books is much more inconvenient than buying .azw ones. I may be an advocate for OSS and open formats, but I'm not blind to the facts.

[dsvick]

Originally Posted by davidspitzer

They always have really nice hardware but always seem to miss the mark with consumers.

Sony just can not market to the hearts of consumers for some reason it is and continues to be their downfall

I can't remember the last decent Sony advertisement I saw. The ones for the eReaders were good commercials in that they were funny, caught my interest, and made me pay attention. They sucked in that I never even connected them with eReaders until well after I bought my 900. Maybe a bit less star power in them or something would have helped. On the other hand, the Kindle commercials were pretty unmemorable as well

Originally Posted by SkyDream

Mind the glare
That's what i hate about the 900 and touchscreens.
Maybe the new e-ink devices with touchscreen will minimize that with their better contrast.

I have to agree with Lilly and the others who favor the touch screen. I love it and that was one of the big selling points for me. Yes, there is glare but moving the screen fraction of a degree usually gets rid of it, and the convenience of the touch screen beats the minor glare issue hands down. That's not just a Sony eRaeder thing either, I love my touch screen phone as well.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by dsvick

I have to agree with Lilly and the others who favor the touch screen. I love it and that was one of the big selling points for me. Yes, there is glare but moving the screen fraction of a degree usually gets rid of it, and the convenience of the touch screen beats the minor glare issue hands down. That's not just a Sony eRaeder thing either, I love my touch screen phone as well.

That's what I like about the BeBook Neo. It has a Wacom touch screen, so has all the benefits of a touch screen with none of the sacrifice of image quality that a resistive touch screen (such as Sony use) entails.

[J. Strnad]

Originally Posted by Logseman

Sony is not the device which supports most formats. Other smaller brands release more capable firmwares. A look to the Matrix will tell you that.

Besides, ePub support is no good if buying and reading ePub books is much more inconvenient than buying .azw ones. I may be an advocate for OSS and open formats, but I'm not blind to the facts.

Agree totally.

ePub has to be the open format, not one saddled with proprietary DRM, if it's going to compete with Amazon and .azw.

VHS won over Beta way back when because you had a choice: Beta, which worked only on Sony machines (they much later...too much later...added Toshiba), or VHS which worked on everything else.

Right now, ePub is like having six flavors of VHS, each married to a particular brand of player, which offers no competitive advantage.

Looks to me as if the other players are happy to squabble among themselves for Amazon's leftovers, like dogs at a banquet, rather than mounting any kind of unified front. And my own little dog, the Kobo, may starve to death.

[KNI]

I'm a happy PRS505 user. I like the different formats supported, not least including .epub. I like the idea that when the battery dies I can replace it with little difficulty. I like the metal construction and the leather jacket. I like that I can read books from many different sources, and am not tethered to a Company Store for content. Wifi would be nice but my PC and USB cable and Calibre are all I need. The Sony readers take a minimalist approach and that suits me just fine. I anticipate I will be reading on my 505 when most of the iPads are in landfills thanks to dead batteries that can't be replaced and Amazon is pushing the Kindle 8 that still won't read .epub but can download a $10 book in 15 seconds.

[davidspitzer]

Originally Posted by KNI

I'm a happy PRS505 user. I like the different formats supported, not least including .epub. I like the idea that when the battery dies I can replace it with little difficulty. I like the metal construction and the leather jacket. I like that I can read books from many different sources, and am not tethered to a Company Store for content. Wifi would be nice but my PC and USB cable and Calibre are all I need. The Sony readers take a minimalist approach and that suits me just fine. I anticipate I will be reading on my 505 when most of the iPads are in landfills thanks to dead batteries that can't be replaced and Amazon is pushing the Kindle 8 that still won't read .epub but can download a $10 book in 15 seconds.

I loved my 505 but the cold reality is that while I loved my 505 and you love yours currently, the majority of the rest of the world will be quite content to download their $10 book on there kindle 8.

I still own a commodore 64 but I am not holding out any hope that they will someday take over Apple's market share

[Mickey330]

I truly enjoyed my PRS-300.

But.

Sony's absolute refusal to recognize/fix the ADE problem where you can't load a library DRM'd ePub onto the device when you already have a library DRM'd PDF (and vice versa) is simply ridiculous!

Yes, yes, I know they have to deal with Adobe to fix the problem. They still need to Get. It. Fixed.

When practically every other ePub reader on the planet can easily access the public library, Sony is letting their customer's down and losing the whole public-library-access advantage.

Remember, it's one that Amazon does not have - and one that sells other readers over the Kindle. Why Sony is ceding ground on this is beyond me.

IMHO, this is one serious flaw/error on Sony's part.

Marilyn

[davidspitzer]

Originally Posted by Mickey330

I truly enjoyed my PRS-300.

But.

Sony's absolute refusal to recognize/fix the ADE problem where you can't load a library DRM'd ePub onto the device when you already have a library DRM'd PDF (and vice versa) is simply ridiculous!

Yes, yes, I know they have to deal with Adobe to fix the problem. They still need to Get. It. Fixed.

When practically every other ePub reader on the planet can easily access the public library, Sony is letting their customer's down and losing the whole public-library-access advantage.

Remember, it's one that Amazon does not have - and one that sells other readers over the Kindle. Why Sony is ceding ground on this is beyond me.

IMHO, this is one serious flaw/error on Sony's part.

Marilyn

I still think the Sony's fundamental flaw is their software - The Kindle is just too darn easy to buy a book (damn them ) . Most consumers wont understand ADE, epub etc nor will they care. "click" buy a book - cool

[Ziguezon]

I don't consider Sony to be in the same boat as Irex. In my mind, Irex is a niche company who does not have the resources and brand recognition that Sony has, plus their products were usually very expensive and mainly sold in Europe. It was really not surprising that they couldn't keep up with the competition ( no offense, Irex. I acknowledge your contributions towards helping ebook readers make it to where they are today, and I thank you).

Every refresh of Sony's Reader line so far has offered some compelling new features and qualities that made people want to buy them, even if they were on the expensive side.

They probably won't be selling tons of their Readers over the next few months, but I expect their next product refresh to have hardware specs comparable to the K3, plus maybe a few surprises to keep it interesting and help justify the slightly higher price tag. Of course they won't sell as many units as Amazon, but they will probably sell enough to keep them in the market for awhile.

I think Kobo has more to worry about than Sony does. Sony is no doubt on the verge of announcing a new product line to compete with the K3 anyway, but the bare-bones $149 Kobo reader is a brand new product! How on earth will it compete with the feature rich K3 at $139?