[mdotson]

I presently own a Sony Reader, an Augen The Book, and now one of the Slick e-readers from Big Lots. I have had it up and running for two days now and these are my impressions.

1. On the music player. I love to read, and buy e-readers for for that purpose, but since it is part of the slick I tried the feature out. With earphones the unit is more than adequate as a music player. Hooked the slick up to my PC and when loaded dragged a music folder of MP3's over. The slick recognized the files immediately and played with no problems. Sound on earphones was quite good. Once music is loaded you can hit the Slick back button and return to reading a book if you like. Since I like classical music, with the volume set on low this was actually nice as an added function.

2. On SD cards. I have SD card with almost 1400 epubs on it already. I placed the SD card in the Slick and turned it on (yes, you have to hold the on button for about 2 to 3 seconds for it to activate, but it works every time). The Slick immediately recognized the card and loaded all my books in about 1 minute to the library bookself. All were in alphabetical order. I have had no problems opening any of them. With such a large number the you can access them easier by folder by going to settings - explorer.

3. On the video player functions and pictures. I have not as yet tried this and probably will take a pass as I have never watch videos on small screens. Seems like a waste of effort to me for an e-reader.

4. On page rendering and readability. Page turns are faster than the Sony Reader, but slightly slower than Augen The Book. The readability of the one supplied font (small, medium, and large) is quite simply the best I have seen to date. This is by far the most readable LCD screen I have come across. Since I prefer the LCD screes to e-ink Augen The Book was my personal favorite for readability, but this is far better.

5. On battery life, I suspect it will be about 8 hours from what I have seen so far, but time will tell.

6. On will I Keep it. The answer is an unqualified yes, and I will buy a few extras for Xmas presents. This makes units such as The Literati, and Pandigital look like sad second cousins.

7. On Kobo and Borders bookstore access. I have not tried it as yet, but this is one unit I most likely will attempt to use it on just to see how well it fares.

8. On the Instruction manual. Ok on Kobo and basic unit functions, but weak on details. They could stand to do some cleanup up and add more detail on things like clock settings, bookmarks, etc.

For a Unit under $100.00 this one has more going for it than many of the pricier model. I do not need WiFi or 3G in an e-reader. Just good basic functionality and the Slick passes that test with flying colors.