[sebastienbillard]

Hi,

The announce of the availability of the Kindle in France led me to look at ebook readers. In fact, I may have bought immediately the Kindle if web browsing and blog reading were available in my country, but it is not the case...

Here is my typical day : As I live in Lille and work in Paris, I got 2 hours of train (TGV) every day. Usually I watch videos on an archos device (604 wifi), and sometimes write/read on an EeePC 701 (the first one, with 7' display). I tend not to use the EeePC very often, as it is still too heavy and not very comfortable for reading. When I don't watch videos, I read documents.

My readings can be very graphical pdf catalogues, web pages saved as pdf, academic papers, technical references, long texts such as buddhist scriptures with strange characters du to pali/sanskrit words, or images/schemas. It may be sometimes powerpoint documents. No novels. And only free stuff, I will never buy an e-book (i do buy paper books).

Do you think an e-ink device would satisfy my needs ? Or will it be a disapointment ? Here are my pros/cons so far (don't hesitate to correct, add feedback etc.) :

Pros

- E-ink technology, good for my eyes
- Autonomy
- Light-weight
- The idea of having a ton of documents (but it is already the case with notebooks, usb keys, archos and so on)

Cons or doubts

- Pricey
- May not be suited for reading pdfs with pictures (though I don't care about colors)
- May be another not environnemental friendly electronic gadget
- Many of these device look sluggish to me (am a computer guy)
- The flickering when changing pages looks strange to me (as in computer world flickering means lack of power)
- Perhaps should I wait a kindle like free access to web and blogs ?
- How are ppt documents read ? like a pdf export ? or with animations and so on ?

So far the Bebook Mini looks the best candidate to me considering its price and features. Other candidates ?