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Hrafn · 02-17-2011, 03:44 AM

Received my Pocketbook 360 within the last 48 hours, and these are my initial reactions:

Hardware:
Like the weight, size and display (particularly with Droid fonts).

Dislike the curved right-hand side: makes the 360 just slightly too wide to hold comfortably, and doesn't appear to serve any real purpose.

Really don't like the buttons. The 360 is small enough to use one-handed, meaning that it would be ideal to be able to turn the page with that hand. However, (i) there are no suitable buttons on the side edges that could be given that task & (ii) the buttons that are there are set sufficiently far back from the sides and require a sufficiently firm push that the holding fingers/thumb are unable to get sufficient leverage to operate them. Yes, I could play around to get wrist-flipping to work satisfactorily, but really, it's less trouble just to bring in a second hand to turn the page. All in all, not a deal-breaker, but certainly a missed opportunity -- and renders the 'page buttons' largely superfluous.

Firmware/software
Two minor peeves:

1) 360 fails to sync with Windows in 'PC Link' USB Mode and resets instead of asking about half the time in 'Ask when connected'.

2) When returning from settings menu in FBReader, it occasionally 'loses' the page setting (takes you to a semi-random page & fails to display the page number).

Two brownie points:
1) Really like the adjustable fonts.

2) Really like the implementation of FBReader (already my favourite e-Reader under Windows, and the PB implementation gives an even cleaner read).

Manual:
Amateurish and inadequate. What sort of manual doesn't even indicate where the on-off button is on the diagram? Or fully document the standard menu settings? And that's without even going into issues like where the battery cover is (and how you remove it) to access the 'Button "Reset"' it mentions, or its failure to document any of the special key-combinations, or how to set up themes (incidentally, could somebody put more prominently in the stickied-thread that it's only the .pbt file that you need for them -- the archive that I downloaded for one also contained a .gz.tar) and fonts. If it wasn't for this forum, I'd probably be all at sea.

Summary:
However, at the end of the day, this appears to be close to exactly the e-Reader that I wanted -- a small and lightweight one that does just one thing, displays text eBooks, and does it well. No touchscreen, WiFi or other wireless connections, audio-player, etc to complicate things, add weight and/or suck the batteries flat. (If it didn't have the photo-viewer, games and so on to add clutter, I'd be even happier -- but I can live with them.)

02-17-2011, 03:44 AM	#1
Hrafn Fanatic Posts: 520 Karma: 846170 Join Date: Feb 2011 Location: New Zealand Device: Onyx Boox Poke 5, Samsung Galaxy Tab S5e 10.5	Pocketbook 360 first thoughts Received my Pocketbook 360 within the last 48 hours, and these are my initial reactions: Hardware: Like the weight, size and display (particularly with Droid fonts). Dislike the curved right-hand side: makes the 360 just slightly too wide to hold comfortably, and doesn't appear to serve any real purpose. Really don't like the buttons. The 360 is small enough to use one-handed, meaning that it would be ideal to be able to turn the page with that hand. However, (i) there are no suitable buttons on the side edges that could be given that task & (ii) the buttons that are there are set sufficiently far back from the sides and require a sufficiently firm push that the holding fingers/thumb are unable to get sufficient leverage to operate them. Yes, I could play around to get wrist-flipping to work satisfactorily, but really, it's less trouble just to bring in a second hand to turn the page. All in all, not a deal-breaker, but certainly a missed opportunity -- and renders the 'page buttons' largely superfluous. Firmware/software Two minor peeves: 1) 360 fails to sync with Windows in 'PC Link' USB Mode and resets instead of asking about half the time in 'Ask when connected'. 2) When returning from settings menu in FBReader, it occasionally 'loses' the page setting (takes you to a semi-random page & fails to display the page number). Two brownie points: 1) Really like the adjustable fonts. 2) Really like the implementation of FBReader (already my favourite e-Reader under Windows, and the PB implementation gives an even cleaner read). Manual: Amateurish and inadequate. What sort of manual doesn't even indicate where the on-off button is on the diagram? Or fully document the standard menu settings? And that's without even going into issues like where the battery cover is (and how you remove it) to access the '*Button "Reset"' it mentions, or its failure to document any of the special key-combinations, or how to set up themes (incidentally, could somebody put more prominently in the stickied-thread that it's only the .pbt file that you need for them -- the archive that I downloaded for one also contained a .gz.tar) and fonts. If it wasn't for this forum, I'd probably be all at sea. Summary:* However, at the end of the day, this appears to be close to exactly the e-Reader that I wanted -- a small and lightweight one that does just one thing, displays text eBooks, and does it well. No touchscreen, WiFi or other wireless connections, audio-player, etc to complicate things, add weight and/or suck the batteries flat. (If it didn't have the photo-viewer, games and so on to add clutter, I'd be even happier -- but I can live with them.)