Sony Data Discman

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Anyone still got one?
Anyone ever used one, or the DOS program that emulates it and allows reading the ebooks on mini CD?

[Quoth]

This is slightly inaccurate:
https://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Data_Discman

All models can play mini (8cm = 3.15") Audio CDs, but the later ones can play "audio files".

I have now the first Western version, the DD-EX released in 1991. The DD-1 was in Japan in 1990.
It takes 9V DC at about 0.5A. The battery pack is missing, which is either 6x AA cells or rechargeable (likely NiCd).
There is video out (4:3 mono in 625 lines 25fps interlace or 525 lines 30 fps interlace). The LCD panel (256 x 256 pixels = 30 characters x 10 rows) is blank. Blacklight works.
The included title works.
The caddy opens easily and is like a double thickness 3.5" floppy. There is an official Sony DOS emulator (try Archive Org) and the discs removed from caddy work in any regular drive that takes 8cm discs as well as regular size.

There is a demo version of an authoring tool (size limited) and then you burn a CDR. It takes text files and images (which are reduced to 256 x 200 and 1 bit).

They later expanded the features of the system and the screen. Initially plain text of 30 characters by 9 lines and a 10th menu line for F1 to F5 keys with 1 bit images.

So far I've found
DD-1EX (256 x 200 or 256)
DD-10EX
DD-10BZ
DD-8
DD-20
DD-25
DD-35 (Last model sold up till 2000)

Japanese
DD-1
DD-MR10
DD-S35
DD-75SP
DD-95
DD-300
DD-350
DD-S1000 (Color 320x240)

See https://retrostuff.org/2019/05/22/so...iscman-repair/
User and Service for the DD-1EX

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I now have a DD-20. I think from 1993.
It supports EBXA as well as the earlier 1991 EBG.

The screen is probably more than 256 x 256.

There is no backlight and the screen goes blank if external video cable is plugged in. So that could be fault on the DD-1EX, or the contrast control as that makes the screen blank.

No audio playback controls available if lid is closed. It has a built in speaker. Works on 4 x AA cells or 6V PSU.

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Even a Calibre plug-in is theoretically possible
https://www.mistys-internet.website/eb/index-en.html

EB Library is a C library for accessing CD-ROM books. It can be built on UNIX derived systems. EB Library supports to access CD-ROM books of EB, EBG, EBXA, EBXA-C, S-EBXA and EPWING formats. CD-ROM books of those formats are popular in Japan. Since CD-ROM books themseves are stands on the ISO 9660 format, you can mount the discs by the same way as other ISO 9660 discs.

Source https://github.com/mistydemeo/eb

Also
https://github.com/yasuhirokimura/eb

Edit:
There is a package of utilities for Linux Mint. At console:

sudo apt install eb-utils

The discs easily pop out of caddy any drive that can hold a mini-CD works. Disc are standard CDROM format.

I've no idea how to use the utilities.

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EB - Electronic Book (Text + Graphics, Japan Only. 1990)
EBG - Electronic Book Graphics (Text + Graphics, Outside Japan Only. 1991?)
EBXA - Electronic Book Extended Architecture (Text + Graphics + Audio, Worldwide. 1992?)
EBXA-C - EBXA-Chinese (EBXA with Chinese character support, Japan Only)
S-EBXA - Super EBXA (EBXA with Color Support, Japan Only?)


The EBG is the first Western format (1991) and on the first Western model, the DD-1EX, which can use bare mini-CD as well as caddys.
The EBXA is at least the DD-8 and DD-20 models. The EBXA models also run EBG titles. Certainly available from 1992.

The DD-8 and DD-20 use only caddy based mini-CD.

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So both the Sega Saturn and the JVC X'Eye had options to read EBXA discs removed from the caddy.

The JVC X'Eye was a partnership console between JVC and Sega. It combined a Sega CD and Genesis into a single console. It was released in March (?)1994 and was produced into late 1994 with a little over 500,000 units produced (?),

The Sega Saturn was late 1994 in Japan and May 1995 in the USA.

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A server for Linux to access the ebooks via HTTP
https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/bionic/...1.0.dfsg.1-4.3

Install this first
https://launchpad.net/ubuntu/quantal...sg.1-4.2build1