Motofone F3 as Ebook Reader?

luqmaninbmore · 08-26-2010, 02:06 PM

Greetings,

An idea has been wurring around in my head for a bit now: would it be possible to use the Motofone F3, which features a basic eink screen, as a portable, extremely durable, extremely basic ereader? I could get a sim card and purchase a prepaid unlimited texting plan (these are not expensive if you don't want any minutes attached) and then use email-to-SMS gateways to send chapters of whatever book I'm reading to the phone. I could keep track of where I left off by only opening the messages when I intend to read them. I could also subscribe to various twitter and rss feeds to get news updates throughout the day. Can anyone who has this phone comment on the viability of this plan? I know the phone's text display capabilities are primitive (limited number of characters on screen at one time, limited punctuation, etc.) but if one is not a stickler for the formating of the text you are reading, is this doable? The phone itself is dirt cheap (less than $25 with free shipping on Amazon) so the risk would be minimal. Any opinions?

Luqman

jago25_98 · 05-10-2012, 08:00 AM

only one post so not much harm in this necrobump.

the phone unfortunately only has a 2 line display and afaik no j2me. strangely there has never been any proper eink phones...

en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_FONE

pretty cool phone though

andyh2000 · 05-10-2012, 08:41 AM

And the character set is a random jumble of upper and lower case characters and one, maybe two punctuation marks. The display isn't bitmapped, it's pretty much equivalent to a 14 segment led display. Plus you only get about 8 characters on screen at once...

They're great as a cheap, sunlight-readable, long battery life lightweight phone. But pretty useless for SMS let alone anything else.

Andrew

jago25_98 · 05-11-2012, 08:49 AM

I'm really scraping the barrel looking for a eink phone!

It's a problem for me as I work outdoors and can't see the screen...
plus I had my Nook stolen so it feels hard to buy another one again... yet most phones either have a small screen or too big to read for hours at a time without it plugged in

08-26-2010, 02:06 PM	#1
luqmaninbmore Da'i Posts: 1,144 Karma: 1217499 Join Date: Oct 2008 Location: Baltimore Device: Toshiba Thrive, Kobo Touch, Kindle 1, Aluratek Libre, T-Mobile Comet	Motofone F3 as Ebook Reader? Greetings, An idea has been wurring around in my head for a bit now: would it be possible to use the Motofone F3, which features a basic eink screen, as a portable, extremely durable, extremely basic ereader? I could get a sim card and purchase a prepaid unlimited texting plan (these are not expensive if you don't want any minutes attached) and then use email-to-SMS gateways to send chapters of whatever book I'm reading to the phone. I could keep track of where I left off by only opening the messages when I intend to read them. I could also subscribe to various twitter and rss feeds to get news updates throughout the day. Can anyone who has this phone comment on the viability of this plan? I know the phone's text display capabilities are primitive (limited number of characters on screen at one time, limited punctuation, etc.) but if one is not a stickler for the formating of the text you are reading, is this doable? The phone itself is dirt cheap (less than $25 with free shipping on Amazon) so the risk would be minimal. Any opinions? Luqman

Similar Threads
Thread	Thread Starter	Forum	Replies	Last Post
Großes MobileRead Frühlingsgewinnspiel: eBook reader und eBook-Gutscheine zu gewinne	Alexander Turcic	Deutsches Forum	18	05-17-2010 12:09 AM
Motorola Motofone F3 with E Ink display	Bob Russell	Alternative Devices	24	05-09-2007 09:04 AM
eInk Motorola Motofone F3 for 9 Euro	joblack	News	0	05-02-2007 01:28 PM
PDA247 reviews the E Ink-based MotoFone F3	Bob Russell	Alternative Devices	9	05-01-2007 07:36 AM
Motofone to have an E Ink diskplay?	Stuart Young	Alternative Devices	6	02-27-2007 03:47 AM

05-10-2012, 08:00 AM	#2
jago25_98 Zealot Posts: 114 Karma: 3200000 Join Date: Dec 2005 Device: n35 p800 n30	only one post so not much harm in this necrobump. the phone unfortunately only has a 2 line display and afaik no j2me. strangely there has never been any proper eink phones... en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Motorola_FONE pretty cool phone though

05-10-2012, 08:41 AM	#3
andyh2000 Avid reader Posts: 880 Karma: 6399168 Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: UK Device: Samsung Galaxy Z Flip 4 / Kindle Paperwhite / TCL Nxtpaper 14	And the character set is a random jumble of upper and lower case characters and one, maybe two punctuation marks. The display isn't bitmapped, it's pretty much equivalent to a 14 segment led display. Plus you only get about 8 characters on screen at once... They're great as a cheap, sunlight-readable, long battery life lightweight phone. But pretty useless for SMS let alone anything else. Andrew

05-11-2012, 08:49 AM	#4
jago25_98 Zealot Posts: 114 Karma: 3200000 Join Date: Dec 2005 Device: n35 p800 n30	I'm really scraping the barrel looking for a eink phone! It's a problem for me as I work outdoors and can't see the screen... plus I had my Nook stolen so it feels hard to buy another one again... yet most phones either have a small screen or too big to read for hours at a time without it plugged in

Advert