Are you happy with your EReader form factor?

[mgmueller]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

I have a 6" reader; I want a smaller one. I read for two years on PDAs before they died, and decided I wanted to replace them with something with longer battery life. Since most of my reading is leisure text, screen size is irrelevant to me; all I care is that the words are of a comfortable size and the pages turn fast enough.

People who want to read letter-sized PDFs or color magazines are going to need larger devices, and I think we'll see a growing number of tablets. I hope we don't lose the small, pocket-sized ereaders; I have no interest in "upgrading" to something I can't comfortably hold in one hand for an hour on a crowded train.

It's expensive and kind of "overkill" for a reader. But you should check out Dell Streak. Beautifully designed, highly portable and still way much more screen estate than your usual smartphone. And since the (official) availability of 2.2 for the Streak, it's UI and performance is competitive to iPhone and the likes as well.
No ePaper unit, but like you I've started with PocketPCs/Palms and never had any issue with display quality.
Battery life of course remains an issue, but at least the battery is user-replaceable.

[SlowRain]

I read on my phone, which has a 4" screen. If it were any larger, it'd be less convenient carrying it with me wherever I go; although it could easily be smaller and still functional. The only other option is for me to have a tablet or dedicated reader at home with a larger screen, but that would just double the cost of my reading. What I have seems to be the best balance for me.

[Ken Maltby]

Originally Posted by Elfwreck

I have a 6" reader; I want a smaller one. I read for two years on PDAs before they died, and decided I wanted to replace them with something with longer battery life. Since most of my reading is leisure text, screen size is irrelevant to me; all I care is that the words are of a comfortable size and the pages turn fast enough.

People who want to read letter-sized PDFs or color magazines are going to need larger devices, and I think we'll see a growing number of tablets. I hope we don't lose the small, pocket-sized ereaders; I have no interest in "upgrading" to something I can't comfortably hold in one hand for an hour on a crowded train.

I started my e-reading with a PDA as well, in fact I still have many thousands
of .pdb ebooks. Your post is almost an advert for the 5" reflective TFT readers like the Ectaco Jetbooks and Aluratek Libre Pro. I like the Jetbook Lite
as it has a wide range of format support (including .pdb) and runs on 4ea AA
batteries. It fits in any large sized pocket even with its leather slip on cover.

Luck;
Ken

[Jakie]

DMccunney, I wonder if the archos 4.3 would meet your needs. It is an android platform, so it could meet your other than ebook needs, as well as download any ebook for android app. Just wondering?

[Maggie Leung]

I like my iPad and Touch combo.

The tablet is big enough for relatively easy Web navigating and typing, as well as book reading.

When it's too big, I use my Touch. It's especially handy when strap-hanging on a packed subway in Asia during rush hours, because I can wrap my whole hand around it and tap pages. I tried using my Kindle, but it was big enough for people to accidentally knock out of my hand when pushing on and off the subway. (Good thing I put it in a clear pencil case with a handstrap, or it would've been toast.)

I might add a Samsung Galaxy-size tablet in future, but I'd need for such a gadget to be as reliable and easy to use as an iPad first. I'm not sure I'd need such a size frequently enough, so I'll probably wait till prices come down before adding that 'tweener size. I've been happily using the iPad- and Touch-sizes, so I know I'll be sticking with those.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

My normal reading device is a Palm OS PDA, with a 320x480 3.25"x2.25" screen. I started reading ebooks on a PDA years back, and have continued the practice.

I still use my PDA for reading, even though I have a 5" and a 6" e-ink reader as well. The smallness makes a perfect portable reader.

(though, mine is 640x480 and I find that that increase in resolution is great. My previous PDA had the same screen size and half the resolution...)

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

The biggest limitation is the small screen. I wouldn't mind a larger one, but haven't seen a device that does everything the PDA will do. Meanwhile, with appropriate font selections, I get a decent amount of text on screen, and am quite comfortable reading on it. (Comfortable enough to have about 4,000 ebook volumes occupying most of a 2GB SD card in one of the card slots, with half of the PDA's purpose in life being ebook viewing.)

If you ever find one that can replace your PDA and has a larger screen, keep me informed!

My JE100 is adequate for reading, but nothing more than that. It's simply too slow for most things.

Jakie, I did look at that device. But decided against it, first of all, I'm not sure about android at all, but most importantly, it doesn't have any buttons on the casing, at all. I don't like to have to "swipe" the screen to get to a next page, I prefer hardware buttons for that. My current PDA has 3 locations... (left, right and bottom)

(oh, and the resolution is also less than my PDA has now for the same screensize...)

[shanghaichica]

First I had a 5'' screen and was satisfied with that. Then I got a 6", which I now prefer to the 5''. I think anything bigger than 6" would not be comfortable due to the size of the reader itself. Plus a 6" screen is about the same size as a regular page in a paperback book. Apart from their weight, the size of the pages in hardbacks have always been off putting for me. I think anything bigger than 6" would be more akin to a page in a Hardback. So I think for me 6" is the optimal screen size, but would prefer 5'' to anything bigger than 6".

[leebase]

I like having an iPhone and an iPad. I read mostly from the iPad, but I can switch to my iPhone when I'm out and about.

Lee

[KenJackson]

I've quickly come to love my 6" PRS-650.

I thought a 5" screen would be too small, but now that I've used a 6" screen for a while, I believe a 5" screen would be more than adequate and a tiny bit more convenient. I don't read schematics or architectural diagrams on it after all, I just use it to read text.

[Penforhire]

My PRS-650 is awfully close to ideal. I sort of want another inch in both dimensions but I can't tell if it would be unweildly. My PRS-900 wasn't as perfect, probably because of the large weight gain (not just its size). A 650 scaled up would not weigh as much, so hard to say. If we ever get to folding/rolling screens then I don't see why I wouldn't want an 8.5 x 11" opened size.

[ardeegee]

As I've mentioned before, I think of ebook readers being in two classes-- the portable "take everywhere, all the time" size, and the large "at home or only when you really need it" size. For me, anything bigger than a 5 inch reader is too big for the first category, and the ideal reader for the second category would have a display of at least 10 inches diagonally, with a bit more being better.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Jakie

DMccunney, I wonder if the archos 4.3 would meet your needs. It is an android platform, so it could meet your other than ebook needs, as well as download any ebook for android app. Just wondering?

The Archos looks nice, but I'd be more interested in a larger device. For something like the Archos, my choice might be one of the Nokia Internet Tablets running Maemo. (The N800 with two SD slots looks tasty.)

Connectivity for web surfing, email and the like is needed, but I'm not concerned with being able to download books directly to the device. I currently roll most of my own from HTML source and drop them into the proper directories on the SD card in my PDA where the various ebook viewers (Plucker, MobiPocket, eReader, PalmPDF and a few other things) will see them, and my master ebook library lives on my desktop. (The eBooks directory tree occupies about 19GB on the drive it lives on.) I'd want easy connectivity between my desktop and the device to transfer things back and forth.

Some of what I'd want to do really needs a bigger screen than the Archos or the Nokia, which is why stuff in the iPad form factor is attractive. I'm not concerned with being able to carry it in a pocket (and my PDA is big enough I usually don't carry it in one.) Nor am I overly concerned with one handed operation. Much of what I would do couldn't be managed one handed in any case.

Thanks for the pointer, though - noted for a closer look.

What I'd really like, alas, no one seems to make. I don't want a smartphone that can display ebooks because the screen isn't big enough for a lot of the other stuff I do. I'd want a dual device: a small cell phone, and a larger tablet, that could each be used stand alone but would work together if both were present. (Like, the cell phone could serve as a modem for the tablet in areas where 3G was present but wifi wasn't.) Someday...
______
Dennis

[Ankh]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

What I'd really like, alas, no one seems to make. I don't want a smartphone that can display ebooks because the screen isn't big enough for a lot of the other stuff I do. I'd want a dual device: a small cell phone, and a larger tablet, that could each be used stand alone but would work together if both were present. (Like, the cell phone could serve as a modem for the tablet in areas where 3G was present but wifi wasn't.) Someday...

Always Innovating has something that is close to your wishes: https://www.alwaysinnovating.com/products/smartbook.htm

Close, but no cigar. The small device is not a cell phone.

[Prince Hal]

Originally Posted by DMcCunney

My normal reading device is a Palm OS PDA, with a 320x480 3.25"x2.25" screen. I started reading ebooks on a PDA years back, and have continued the practice.

I'm not interested in a dedicated reader, because I need color support (which rules out eInk), and I need a device that does more than display ebooks. Aside from the standard PDA personal organizer functions, I have apps for handling Word and Excel files, a good word processor, web browser, email app, viewers for video and and photos, a music player, paint app, several programming languages and a programming editor...and oh, yes, it plays games.

The biggest limitation is the small screen. I wouldn't mind a larger one, but haven't seen a device that does everything the PDA will do. Meanwhile, with appropriate font selections, I get a decent amount of text on screen, and am quite comfortable reading on it. (Comfortable enough to have about 4,000 ebook volumes occupying most of a 2GB SD card in one of the card slots, with half of the PDA's purpose in life being ebook viewing.)

The next device is likely to be an Android based tablet, with a folding BT keyboard as an accessory.
______
Dennis

The Archos 43 might be the one for you. I am interested in it for the same reasons that you are. It has a 4.3 inch screen - not quite the resolution of an Ipod Touch 4g, but excellent none the less. Bigger screen in a small format, it seems to be the new heir to the PDA world - along of course with the iTouch. I prefer it to a phone for which you would need a phone contract.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Sweetpea

I still use my PDA for reading, even though I have a 5" and a 6" e-ink reader as well. The smallness makes a perfect portable reader.

Yep. Mine goes with me everywhere.

(though, mine is 640x480 and I find that that increase in resolution is great. My previous PDA had the same screen size and half the resolution...)

320x480 is usable, though I heard about but haven't actually seen a Palm model with a 640x400 resolution. A little custom font configuration helps a lot.

Most of my documents are converted locally from HTML source for Plucker, an open source offline HTML viewer. I can also handle MobiPocket, PDF, eReader, plain text and other files. About the only thing I can't read directly is ePub, since there's no Palm OS viewer for it, but I can convert that to Mobi via Calibre.

The only pain is needing to recall which book is in what format, viewed by what program.

Plucker:


PalmPDF:


MobiPocket:


PalmFiction:

If you ever find one that can replace your PDA and has a larger screen, keep me informed!

How large a screen would you want?

Jakie, I did look at that device. But decided against it, first of all, I'm not sure about android at all, but most importantly, it doesn't have any buttons on the casing, at all. I don't like to have to "swipe" the screen to get to a next page, I prefer hardware buttons for that. My current PDA has 3 locations... (left, right and bottom)

Expect a lot more Android devices to arrive. It's Linux based, and free and open source, so anyone can grab and use it with no license fees or permission required from Google. It's also modular, so device makers can include the parts that support the particular hardware and functions they want to include.

I was wondering back when it was first released when we'd see devices based on it that weren't smartphones, and now we have them in plenty.
______
Dennis