Entourage Edge hands on

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by hakim

CPU: Marvell ARMADA 166E 800MHz
source

Since that is supposed to be one of Marvell's new CPUs, it's probably also the screen controllers.

[kennyc]

Thanks Nate!

[JanieGirl]

Holy cow! The prices are sky high in their ebook store!! Everywhere else books are $9.99 for bestsellers like the Nook/Kindle but for the Edge it's $19.99! Are they insane? There is no way on this earth I will be buying that thing when I can get ebooks very cheap prices elsewhere.

Makes no sense whatsoever except for rich people I guess.

[TallMomof2]

You don't have to buy books through their store. Since it supports ADE that would allow one to purchase where the price is the best.

[mrscoach]

OK, this might be a stupid question, but I really don't know. My textbooks are password PDFs. Since this can connect I would be able to read my textbooks on it, correct? I really hate the way our books are done, but can't beat the price because they are dirt cheap and are automatically assigned to my online classes for my major. My last textbook alone was half price from the pbook versions I looked up.

[JanieGirl]

Originally Posted by TallMomof2

You don't have to buy books through their store. Since it supports ADE that would allow one to purchase where the price is the best.

THe nook, the kindle etc all have great online stores you can access through the device. You are telling me to buy elsewhere off of the edge device and put it on the edge? Who wants that? Yeah anyone could do that but I want an ebook reader where I can wirelessly download not jump through hoops.

It's also very expensive, too much for me

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by mrscoach

OK, this might be a stupid question, but I really don't know. My textbooks are password PDFs. Since this can connect I would be able to read my textbooks on it, correct? I really hate the way our books are done, but can't beat the price because they are dirt cheap and are automatically assigned to my online classes for my major. My last textbook alone was half price from the pbook versions I looked up.

It should be possible (the software supports it), and I did ask about it. But Doug wasn't sure that it had been implemented.

I'll raise the issue again. You're probably not the only one who relies on them.

[soilwork]

Originally Posted by JanieGirl

THe nook, the kindle etc all have great online stores you can access through the device. You are telling me to buy elsewhere off of the edge device and put it on the edge? Who wants that? Yeah anyone could do that but I want an ebook reader where I can wirelessly download not jump through hoops.

It's also very expensive, too much for me

I would agree that this may be too huge, cumbersome and expensive just to read novels. For reading novels, I don't see much advantage of getting this over smaller devices.

However, I think this device will mainly appeal to academics or graduate students who need to handle huge number of PDF articles. For them (including me), it will not matter whether it has integrated bookstore or not. As long as it handles PDFs reasonably well, it will be excellent device for that purpose.

[mgm1979]

Originally Posted by JanieGirl

THe nook, the kindle etc all have great online stores you can access through the device. You are telling me to buy elsewhere off of the edge device and put it on the edge? Who wants that? Yeah anyone could do that but I want an ebook reader where I can wirelessly download not jump through hoops.

It's also very expensive, too much for me

I'm just hypothesizing here, based on the specs and preliminary reports...but I would think that its more than feasible to connect to ANY online store you choose, through the eDGe's wifi (and eventualy 3G connection) and DL eBooks directly to the device...something FEW, if any, other eReaders can do themselves.

Also, I would also expect Entourage to lower their prices on ePubs once the device launches for JUST this reason - they want the revenues to go through THEIR store, as much as possible, and they HAVE to know that customers WILL shop around for the best price...its just a matter of negotiating better deals through their vendors - which they should be able to accomplish once they can provide accurate projections based on pre-order and production numbers.

[shazwagon]

Huh, you need one extra screen to navigate the whole thing?

But I can see how it could be useful for academic purposes.

[Latinandgreek]

Thanks for the review! I will definitely be taking this product into consideration for my next purchase.

[gabriel.gdawg]

Could you please describe more the dictionary functionality


Thanks!

Originally Posted by Nate the great

At a minimum, you can highlight, bookmark, search the dictionary, and sketch directly on the page. These 4 abilities are provided by the Adobe software, and the Edge can do more. You can select a word or phrase and search Google or Wikipedia. The search results will be displayed on the LCD screen while the ebook is still open on the epaper screen. When you find a relevant result, you can then attach it to the ebook (specifically the word or phrase you just searched for).

[Sweetpea]

Can you use both screens for reading? Right now, I'm using two readers, one LCD, one e-ink. One for nighttime reading, one for daytime reading (or well-lit areas). It would be awesome if I could put those two functions in one device...

[Kokomo Lee]

Hi Nate, thank you for the review! What is your impression of the Edge's note-taking abilities? Was it easy to take notes, or did you find the stylus "skipped" when taking notes. Thanks again, and I appreciate your information!

[lsoverdrive]

what sort of capabilties does it provide for just taking down notes straight off. I.e. is there an app that just gives you blank "sheet's" to write on?