9.7" Sony ?

[Lord KiRon]

I think Sony have to reply with it's own 9.7" device (after all both Sony and Amazon use same screen maker) or loose the fight completely.

And it's better be plastic based device , because I do not know of Kindle DX but if its glass we will see a lot of broken screens very very soon ...

I really hope Sony do release something like that because I hate Amazons e-books sales policy , EPUB rulz !
(and of course we need it for A4 PDFs)

Updated:
Based on this:
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=46375

My hopes looks to be true !!! YEA !!!

[grisjuan]

Personally, I'm hoping Sony goes the other direction and produces a 5" screen reader with a minimal bezel.

[Alphapheemail]

i went into cardiac arrest when i read this thread title. way to play with one's emotions...

[Lord KiRon]

Originally Posted by grisjuan

Personally, I'm hoping Sony goes the other direction and produces a 5" screen reader with a minimal bezel.

Get PocketBook 360 , not Sony but 5" "with minimal bezel" and giro that rotate it 360 degrees when you rotate the device.

http://www.the-ebook.org/forum/viewt...=10740&start=0

On Russian , but you can see the images there in topic.

[Lord KiRon]

Originally Posted by Alphapheemail

i went into cardiac arrest when i read this thread title. way to play with one's emotions...

Partly that was an intention : , I hope Sony execs read this forum

[Pangolyn]

I agree that flexible is critical for a larger format. However, if Sony made a large machine for $600 I would not buy it. I WOULD buy a 6" model with a smaller form factor, though. The PRS-700 is too big to put in a jacket pocket with it's cover on.

[Ervserver]

I don't think Sony needs to respond to the Kindle DX at all and doing so would be a big mistake, Sony needs to release an entirely new reader with color screen, WiFi, and keep the memory expansion. There will be plenty of large screen readers on the market soon thanks to the publishing industry who don't want anything to do with Amazon

[Lord KiRon]

Originally Posted by Pangolyn

I agree that flexible is critical for a larger format. However, if Sony made a large machine for $600 I would not buy it. I WOULD buy a 6" model with a smaller form factor, though. The PRS-700 is too big to put in a jacket pocket with it's cover on.

I believe there are 2 market segments actually , one for "trevel" and one for home reading , the 5" as you mentioned (and as this PocketBook will be) is for trevel - I think it would be excelent device, but for home , when you sit in the armchear and read I would preffer something bigger, also sometimes you (or at least I) need to read technical PDFs that usualy graphical and formated A4 so 6" and for sure 5" just not good for them even with fast scrolling and zoom.
So I personally need two - 5" and 8-10" , as for price ... Kindle DX is less than $500 , but one way or another I would take big Sony for $600 without thinking twice but only if I am sure I the screen will not brake next day with $500 replacement cost

[Lord KiRon]

Originally Posted by Ervserver

Sony needs to release an entirely new reader with color screen, WiFi, and keep the memory expansion.

Forget the color - there is only one company doing screens in mass production and its not doing color.

[dhbailey]

And color eats up memory because then there's more information needed for each group of pixels which define each color dot. And then there's less memory for books.

I'm all for leaving it black/white as it is now.

I'd rather have them put the research dollars into making the 700 screen have all its current functionality but with the crisp clarity of the 505 screen.

[grooks]

Originally Posted by Lord KiRon

I think Sony have to reply with it's own 9.7" device (after all both Sony and Amazon use same screen maker) or loose the fight completely.

I don't think it's a matter of producing a 9.7" device or loose the fight. The Kindle DX is obviously geared toward a specific segment of consumer/business. There may be a lot of cases where the average consumer doesn't want to hold a device the size of the DX/iRex DR/Plastic Logic. People who are interested in reading popular fiction or classical novels or any mass markey paperback will be content with a 6" or 5" device.

If Sony decides they want a businees device or get their device into schools then that will be their choice to expand to those markets, but does not mean they should give up producing Readers. I think the more manufactures out there will mean more technological advances, lower prices and hopefully cheaper ebooks by publishers.

[antistar]

Well, in my case, the only thing that's gonna stop me from ordering a kindle DX is a Sony device of about the same screen size...
A screen as big as 9.7" would be handy in reading PDFs, and save me a lot of trouble of file conversion. It would also be wonderful for Chinese books which have vertical lines. I've scanned a few such Chinese books and put them into a prs-500. Recognising the scanned pages into txt is just impossible because the recognition rate for Chinese characters is really poor. So I printed them as PDFs instead. Readable, but the tiny characters are really a big put-off...
I hope Sony would launch its own big screen device with built-in dictionary, and price it at $100 or so less than Kindle DX. Are you hearing me Sony~

[slumba]

Originally Posted by dhbailey

And color eats up memory because then there's more information needed for each group of pixels which define each color dot. And then there's less memory for books.

That is true, however it is not very much memory.

The number of pixels on the screen, multiplied by 3 or 4 bytes per pixel, is all that is needed for color.

For a 1280x1024 in black and white, you would use 1 byte per pixel = 1,310,720 bytes, or slightly more than 1 megabyte of RAM.

For the same screen in color, you would need (let's say) 4 times the bytes, thus 5,242,880 bytes, or just about 5MB of RAM.

Given that most readers have at least 128MB of RAM I think they would be willing to give up 4MB of RAM for decent color...

[jpharvey]

I think that the issue is not Sony Vs Amazon but a general public acceptance of EBooks. The large screen helps users feel like they are reading a real newspaper, some people will like that. Color would make it even more attractive and allow magazine subscriptions. Price cuts is mandatory here. As long as we have to spend 400$ or 600$ for a reasonable device to read books and newspaper, it will remain a specialized market and people like you and me will continue to look like we are coming from another planet when we take the bus with our EReader.

Yes we need a Sony >= 9.7 inch, color, cheap, etc... Maybe then we will see services like cell phones, offering monthly fee for subscriptions over wireless networks and a FREE READER on a 3 year plan. Come on, make it accessible to millions of people. I am sure most of the people spend more time reading than talking on the phone.

[Lord KiRon]

Color as much as we need it - thing of distant (or may be not so distant) future, large size however can be produced now since "panels" already available as Kinndle DX shows as.