Quote:
Originally Posted by Nate the great
I've been boosting NAEB and the Cybook based on that eventual pan and zoom. I know that I have talked at least 3 people out of a Sony Reader.
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Well, Nate, you've been around for a while, so it surprises me that you put so much weight into a manufacturer's announced willingness to extend the capabilities of a product. It's quite possible that Bookeen will follow up on their intent and fix up all the stuff they say they will fix up. But making this stated intent a basis for purchasing decisions... isn't it a bit
naive?
The way the consumer electronic manufacturing world works seems to point in the opposite direction. Once the product has been released, 90% of the resources are
immediately pulled out, the ones left directed to concentrate on small bug fixes and DRM improvements. The major resources are thrown into the next generation, whenever that may come out.
In theory Sony could add all the same features and more to their devices. The could add text search, better PDF support, ability to delete books, pan and zoom in PDF, etc. etc. But they haven't, because they figured the device was good
enough as it was. The only reason Bookeen may be any better is that they seem to be a much smaller company, ebook readers being their major business.
Now,
ergonomically Sony Reader 505 seems to be much better than Cybook. That was the agreement of the two Russian guys who had a chance compare the two. They also agreed that the manufacturing quality of the Sony Reader was obviously significantly better. Software wise, the 30+ second Cybook startup doesn't compare well with instant-on, offered by the Sony Reader (even if not from complete shutdown, but from "sleep" low power mode). The PDF reader in Cybook is not better
now (it may be better in the future, but this is just speculation). But for reading non-technical, non-PDF
literature (fiction, etc.) the Reader is already equipped just as well of better than Cybook, and will probably stay so.