MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Classic Barnes and Noble's reader: first pics

fuzzy_dunlop · 10-14-2009, 08:15 PM

The device looks sleek. When I saw the Kindle I, the expression 'face that only a mother could love' came to mind.

The unknowns are:
1) Price? Reports are saying less than Kindle but it looks expensive. But if the iRex costs $400 and uses the B&N store why would they release two products at the same price, cheaper seems likely. B&N < iRex < Plastic Logic would be the most likely price structure.
2) What formats will it support? Will it one up the Kindle 2 and support PDF?
3) Delivery method? Wireless looks likely, and my guess is that the iRex device is giving us some clues.
4) DRM? Probably, I think we have to just resign ourselves to DRM at this point.
5) International? B&N has no int'l stores and I recently noticed that almost all of their ebooks say 'only ships within the US' so I doubt it. Then again iRex will be intl?
6) Unicode? B&N eReader program only supports Western languages, so doubtful.
7) Android? I was psyched about this initially but Android is still very young, I couldn't find a non-beta PDF viewer for it. I don't know much about Android though so I could be wrong.

Like I mentioned I think the iRex and the B&N ebook store will provide some clues.
iRex)
"DR800SG's Qualcomm Gobi chip means it will work on overseas HSDPA networks: Not only will the same product ship in Europe, but the press release promises international roaming sometime next year."
"Yes, the included 3G data is unlimited (no contract required), but there's no browser—so it'd take a lot of books to freak Verizon out."
http://gizmodo.com/5365676/irex-dr80...us-touchscreen

BTW: I've read that out of the 700k ebooks B&N offers, 500k are actually just Google books, so mostly public domain stuff.

10-14-2009, 08:15 PM	#42
fuzzy_dunlop Enthusiast Posts: 29 Karma: 10 Join Date: Oct 2009 Device: none	The device looks sleek. When I saw the Kindle I, the expression 'face that only a mother could love' came to mind. The unknowns are: 1) Price? Reports are saying less than Kindle but it looks expensive. But if the iRex costs $400 and uses the B&N store why would they release two products at the same price, cheaper seems likely. B&N < iRex < Plastic Logic would be the most likely price structure. 2) What formats will it support? Will it one up the Kindle 2 and support PDF? 3) Delivery method? Wireless looks likely, and my guess is that the iRex device is giving us some clues. 4) DRM? Probably, I think we have to just resign ourselves to DRM at this point. 5) International? B&N has no int'l stores and I recently noticed that almost all of their ebooks say 'only ships within the US' so I doubt it. Then again iRex will be intl? 6) Unicode? B&N eReader program only supports Western languages, so doubtful. 7) Android? I was psyched about this initially but Android is still very young, I couldn't find a non-beta PDF viewer for it. I don't know much about Android though so I could be wrong. Like I mentioned I think the iRex and the B&N ebook store will provide some clues. iRex) "DR800SG's Qualcomm Gobi chip means it will work on overseas HSDPA networks: Not only will the same product ship in Europe, but the press release promises international roaming sometime next year." "Yes, the included 3G data is unlimited (no contract required), but there's no browser—so it'd take a lot of books to freak Verizon out." http://gizmodo.com/5365676/irex-dr80...us-touchscreen BTW: I've read that out of the 700k ebooks B&N offers, 500k are actually just Google books, so mostly public domain stuff. Last edited by fuzzy_dunlop; 10-15-2009 at 12:51 AM.