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slayda · 07-31-2008, 10:57 AM

First, I am one who is dissatisfied with Sony's business plan as indicated by, not only the Reader but other hardware as well.

I find it incredible and yet expected that the Sony supporters seem so belligerent on this issue. The original poster presented, IMO, a calm logical statement of his opinion, only to be attacked and ridiculed. So here is my opinion;

Sony promised PDF capability on the PRS-500.
- What we got was the ability to view PDFs in a size too small to be readable. OK maybe we were wrong to believe that "PDF capability" meant "readable PDF capability". One can argue whether Sony completely fulfilled their advertised capability but their statement implied something better than what was delivered. Perhaps there are HW restrictions or even PDF format restrictions that make that impossible. I didn't care about PDF personally but I can readily see how many people could be disappointed. Yes perhaps they should have gotten one in their hands to see for themselves. I have only personally ever seen one Sony reader, the one I purchased. We don't all live in large cities where a store was that carried them.
Sony promised RTF capability on the PRS-500.
- Again what we got was a somewhat crippled RTF capability when the implication was a full RTF capability. No Sony did not state "full RTF capability" so by the letter of the law they are off the hook there too. However, I really did want the ability to at least have images embedded in my RTFs and the RTF format easily supports that. That is only a SW upgrade and should be doable. Maybe there is a restriction due to memory (a HW issue) but Sony does support embedded images in their LRF format so I find it hard to believe they couldn't have added that feature in the RTF format.

Several of the attackers say it is foolish to expect a HW upgrade. I agree. However we are not asking for HW upgrades, but did reasonably (IMHO) expect them to at least try to provide a more complete ability to do the things they said the 500 would do.

You can not say that they can't make SW upgrades when several "hackers' on this very forum have managed to provide some upgrades independent of Sony. I would like to point out that they were not and are not on the Sony design team. Does this mean that "our hackers" are geniuses or that the Sony design team are untalented? I'll leave that for you to decide, but there is obviously room in the memory for SW upgrades if Sony chose to support the 500. Since they have, I believe, stated that there will be no SW upgrades, it is obvious to me (again IMHO) that they have abandoned the 500. The only logical reason I can think of is because they are no longer selling it and therefore no longer care about it.

'nuff said. I've had my rant and hopefully it has been logically presented. If not I apologize.

07-31-2008, 10:57 AM	#11
slayda Retired & reading more! Posts: 2,764 Karma: 1884247 Join Date: Sep 2006 Location: North Alabama, USA Device: Kindle 1, iPad Air 2, iPhone 6S+, Kobo Aura One	First, I am one who is dissatisfied with Sony's business plan as indicated by, not only the Reader but other hardware as well. I find it incredible and yet expected that the Sony supporters seem so belligerent on this issue. The original poster presented, IMO, a calm logical statement of his opinion, only to be attacked and ridiculed. So here is my opinion; Sony promised PDF capability on the PRS-500. - What we got was the ability to view PDFs in a size too small to be readable. OK maybe we were wrong to believe that "PDF capability" meant "readable PDF capability". One can argue whether Sony completely fulfilled their advertised capability but their statement implied something better than what was delivered. Perhaps there are HW restrictions or even PDF format restrictions that make that impossible. I didn't care about PDF personally but I can readily see how many people could be disappointed. Yes perhaps they should have gotten one in their hands to see for themselves. I have only personally ever seen one Sony reader, the one I purchased. We don't all live in large cities where a store was that carried them. Sony promised RTF capability on the PRS-500. - Again what we got was a somewhat crippled RTF capability when the implication was a full RTF capability. No Sony did not state "full RTF capability" so by the letter of the law they are off the hook there too. However, I really did want the ability to at least have images embedded in my RTFs and the RTF format easily supports that. That is only a SW upgrade and should be doable. Maybe there is a restriction due to memory (a HW issue) but Sony does support embedded images in their LRF format so I find it hard to believe they couldn't have added that feature in the RTF format. Several of the attackers say it is foolish to expect a HW upgrade. I agree. However we are not asking for HW upgrades, but did reasonably (IMHO) expect them to at least try to provide a more complete ability to do the things they said the 500 would do. You can not say that they can't make SW upgrades when several "hackers' on this very forum have managed to provide some upgrades independent of Sony. I would like to point out that they were not and are not on the Sony design team. Does this mean that "our hackers" are geniuses or that the Sony design team are untalented? I'll leave that for you to decide, but there is obviously room in the memory for SW upgrades if Sony chose to support the 500. Since they have, I believe, stated that there will be no SW upgrades, it is obvious to me (again IMHO) that they have abandoned the 500. The only logical reason I can think of is because they are no longer selling it and therefore no longer care about it. 'nuff said. I've had my rant and hopefully it has been logically presented. If not I apologize.