8+ Readers in comparison

[mgmueller]

Minor changes in my ranking:
iRex 800 has grown on me (https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=70664).

#13: BeBook (a bit ugly, looks a bit cheap)
#12: Sony 300 (don't like turning pages with the 5-way-button)
#11: Sony 700 (great unit, but given Sony 600 it has lost its place)
#10: Cybook Gen3 (nice unit, especially after the firmware update. But no real arguments against Kindle 2 and others)
#9: iRex 1000S (great unit, but too bulky for me)
#8: Sony 600 (very pleasant surprise, but given Sony 900 it has lost its place)
#7: Kindle DX (flawless, but the big screen doesn't have any real advantage to me and makes it bulky. Maybe with more advanced PDF support?)
#6: Sony 505 (still one of my favorites, but no real advantage over Sony 900)
#5: iRex iLiad (still one of my alltime favorites, but replaced by iRex 800)
#4: Cybook Opus (only a niche product for me, 5" often difficult to read. But within its niche it's phantastic)
#3: Kindle 2 (there's a reason why Amazon is considered market leader)
#2: iRex 800 (has grown on me and we've learned a lot in our dialogue with iRex)
#1: Sony 900 (a real beauty. Display quality a bit below iRex 800, but more than acceptable)

As always, absolutely subjective evaluation.

My ranking can't be a purchasing recommendation, we all have our own demands.
So my ranking reflects "probability to take the unit with me on a trip when traveling light and not taking all of them".

[JerseyBiker]

Originally Posted by mgmueller

Minor changes in my ranking:
iRex 800 has grown on me (https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=70664).

As always, absolutely subjective evaluation.

My ranking can't be a purchasing recommendation, we all have our own demands.
So my ranking reflects "probability to take the unit with me on a trip when traveling light and not taking all of them".

I am looking to buy my first ereader. I have read many of the post in this thread and you really put out a lot of good information comparing the readers. I am leaning toward the Nook but I may end up with a K2 or something else. I'm surprised you haven't added a Nook to your collection. Do you plan to get a Nook or are you just not interested in it?

~eddie

[mgmueller]

Originally Posted by JerseyBiker

I am looking to buy my first ereader. I have read many of the post in this thread and you really put out a lot of good information comparing the readers. I am leaning toward the Nook but I may end up with a K2 or something else. I'm surprised you haven't added a Nook to your collection. Do you plan to get a Nook or are you just not interested in it?

~eddie

I've ordered Nook when it came out. But the order failed (wrong address with my US supplier). B&N didn't retry, but canceled my order and opened a new one.
This 2nd order already has arrived in Germany. I'll have it tomorrow or the day after.
Next eInk probably will be Que. And most likely I'll get iPad as well.

Right now I wish, there was an eInk combining:
Sony 900's form factor and overall design.
iRex 800's touchscreen and display quality.
Kindle's webshop (not quite sure yet about B&N's webstore. I've bought some PDB for iRex 800 but still don't understand when to get PDB and when ePUB).
Cybook Opus' speed in turning pages.
BeBook's range of supported formats.

I'll post my first impressions about Nook and comparisons to the others at the latest Tuesday evening (CET).

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by mgmueller

I've ordered Nook when it came out. But the order failed (wrong address with my US supplier). B&N didn't retry, but canceled my order and opened a new one.
This 2nd order already has arrived in Germany. I'll have it tomorrow or the day after.
Next eInk probably will be Que. And most likely I'll get iPad as well.

Wow... are you independently wealthy? If so, did you want to adopt me?

BOb

[mgmueller]

Originally Posted by pilotbob

Wow... are you independently wealthy? If so, did you want to adopt me?

BOb

I wish.....
Actually, I spend more or less all my free income for gadgets.
Always have so.
As a child working as a paperboy to purchase books and comics. Did have about 5.000 books at the age of 14. (My mother did trash lots of them because all the closets had been bursting).
Later on it was CDs, then DVDs (about 1.000 I guess).
Partially it's still iTunes (about 1.000 movies and about 6.000 TV episodes). May seem a lot, but actually it's just constantly building up over the years.
And of course the usual PSP or NDS.
Problem only is, all of those gadgets are getting boring faster and faster.
My feeling is, most of the companies aim for getting cheaper and cheaper. So the quality permanently goes down, so goes the fun. iPad is a perfect example. Obviously it's been important to offer a basic entrance unit below $ 500.
BTW: If I compare my gadgets to what some spend for their car, my hobbies really are relatively cheap.

[sassanik]

Originally Posted by mgmueller

I wish.....
Actually, I spend more or less all my free income for gadgets.
Always have so.
As a child working as a paperboy to purchase books and comics. Did have about 5.000 books at the age of 14. (My mother did trash lots of them because all the closets had been bursting).
Later on it was CDs, then DVDs (about 1.000 I guess).
Partially it's still iTunes (about 1.000 movies and about 6.000 TV episodes). May seem a lot, but actually it's just constantly building up over the years.
And of course the usual PSP or NDS.
Problem only is, all of those gadgets are getting boring faster and faster.
My feeling is, most of the companies aim for getting cheaper and cheaper. So the quality permanently goes down, so goes the fun. iPad is a perfect example. Obviously it's been important to offer a basic entrance unit below $ 500.
BTW: If I compare my gadgets to what some spend for their car, my hobbies really are relatively cheap.

I have 3 ereaders, do I really need 3 ereaders? Naw one would be fine.

I am like you I want to try out the new ones! I liken it to my friends that get a new cellphone every 6 months or so.

Me? I wait until my cellphones battery is not functioning properly, then I will get a new one.

Same with my brothers 4 wheeler, he gets new items for it all the time.

The purchases of my extra ereaders now and then seems rather minor when compared to some of these purchases!

Amy

[JerseyBiker]

Originally Posted by mgmueller

I'll post my first impressions about Nook and comparisons to the others at the latest Tuesday evening (CET).

Thanks. I am looking forward to your opinion. The readers on my short list are the Nook, Kindle2 and the Sony 900. The Sony 900 looks like it would be the one I would prefer but the price is a little more than I want to spend.

~eddie

[JerseyBiker]

Originally Posted by mgmueller

BTW: If I compare my gadgets to what some spend for their car, my hobbies really are relatively cheap.

I love motorcycles and I buy a new one every couple of years. Every bike I buy I end up spending thousands by adding accessories and improving the performance. Right now I have a '09 Harley that I paid almost 20K for and have already added about 3K in extras. I will be adding more stuff at some time. Until about 3 years ago I had a boat. BOAT stands for Break Out Another Thousand. Seems like every time you have to do something with a boat it's at least a thousand dollars. The boat kept me broke so it had to go. So your hobby of collecting electronics and media is cheap compared to what other pay for their hobbies.

~eddie

[jcatl]

I bought the Sony PRS-900 yesterday at Fry's. They had a few on the shelf but they were very hard to find. I had to drive about 20mi to get there and thought they were mistaken about actually having them in stock but finally found them on the top shelf with no shelf labeling. I almost bought it at Best Buy and they also had trouble locating the one (1) they had in stock, but due to their restocking fee I walked away from it. Fry's has a 30-day, no questions asked policy so it was worth the drive. They'll also price match if it shows up cheaper in the next 30 days.

Anyway, this is my first foray into the ereader world. I had hoped the iPad would be more than an overgrown iPhone and so that pushed me over the edge towards a dedicated device. I'm impressed with the Sony so far, especially the build quality. Given the way it's packaged I'm almost certain there will be a cheaper offering without the Case Logic add-on, but then it may come without the charger as well so I have no idea if I should have waited. Of course with the Amazon/MacMillan to-do recently the entire e-book world may be getting turned upside down, so I wanted a device that was more open than the Kindle 2.

The only hesitation I have about the device is the much discussed glare problem. Frankly, only if the light source is shining directly on the panel is it an issue, and this is pretty easily resolved by tilting it slightly one way or another. Under good, non direct light, the display is great and very clear. I normally wear contacts or distance glasses and can read the display easily at Medium font even with sub-optimal lighting. I replaced my nightstand bulb with a 100W (CF equiv) and with that much light believe I may revert to small text.

The touch functionality is great with the stylus, and most navigation can be accomplished with a fingertip. It requires a more deliberate press or swipe than my iPhone, but that's due to the type of panel used. Of course using the stylus prevents fingerprints and smudges.

My only other direct experience with an ereader was with my sister's Kindle DX, and that only for about 2 minutes. Too large for me.

I'm about 90% sure I'll be keeping the PRS-900, but if not I'll update this thread with my reasons.

John

[KunoK]

I agree that collecting ebook readers is not that expensive, compared to many other things. A holiday to somewhere for a week and you have spend some more than a couple of readers. Buy a car, and you can buy several readers a months for the same cost.Ok, I live in Denmark where cars are really expensive.
Some would argue that you only need one reader. True, but do you really need to go Egypt or to go skiing in Austria? Your choice is as good as the next guy's.

For me, your posts on this forum are a great source of information, and I enjoy reading them.

[pilotbob]

FYI: Just so everyone knows.. I wasn't complaining about mgmueller ability to buy so many readers... I was jealous. I get that we all spend our "disposable" income on different stuff.

Mine all seems to go to the two colleges my kids are attending.

BOb

[KunoK]

There you see, you use your money on kids (a lot of people do), and they are more expensive (I am told) than just about anything else.

I don't see your post as a complaint, I just wanted to cheer mgmueller, because I like his posts.

[mgmueller]

Originally Posted by JerseyBiker

I am looking to buy my first ereader. I have read many of the post in this thread and you really put out a lot of good information comparing the readers. I am leaning toward the Nook but I may end up with a K2 or something else. I'm surprised you haven't added a Nook to your collection. Do you plan to get a Nook or are you just not interested in it?

~eddie

Unboxed my Nook about an hour ago. First impressions are great.
Definitely the most solid box I've seen with all of my readers. Inside the cardbox, there's a very rigid plastic box. It's a bit oversized to contain the cables. But still I really consider, using that box for traveling. More protection than any cover ever could give...
The unit itself is impressive as well. Seems more "valuable" than Kindle 2 in direct comparison.

And I really don't understand complaints about the touchscreen.
I haven't been sure what to expect. It's a glass surface like iPhone and seems about as responsive. Of course the eInk screen takes significantly more time to react than the touchcsreen theoretically would be capable of. But so far, this doesn't seem a biggy.

For the moment, I'm struggling with the Android SDK to change my unit's time, so I can register to my B&N account. This I really hate. On Sony 900, I simply manually can change time and date. But of course that's my "fault", being outside of the US.

Display is extremely crisp, can compete with Sony 505.

If you're out for a first reader, I certainly can recommend it. For me, as unit #14, quite frankly there's no real argument for it. It's a great unit, but of course none of those units has "outstanding" features against the others.
Because of its stylish elegance, I'd rank it above average.
I need some more time with it, on Wednesday I'll use it on the train. For now, I'd rank it about even with Kindle 2. Probably not within my top 3, but definitely somewhere between #4 and #6 (out of 14 eInk readers in total).

[abq254]

Dear mgmueller,

thanks for all the detailed information!

If you are still taking requests - I have a few questions about the more subtle features, that I've found difficult to find answers to elsewhere. As a background: I am mostly looking for a portable convenient pdf-ereader for (academic) work.

1. Does any of the ereaders allow you to open more than one document at once, so that you can go back and forth (or have them side by side in landscape format) to compare something?
2. What searches to the ereaders allow? Full text search? Searching annotations? Searching file names?
3. Can annotations be exported? Either to be used with desktop software or (better) with the original document in the original file format?
4. Can you compile highlights? That is, highlight passages and the ereader automatically compiles all highlights (from one/ multiple files) into a single file?

Thanks a lot. It is very much appreciated!

[mgmueller]

Originally Posted by abq254

Dear mgmueller,

thanks for all the detailed information!

If you are still taking requests - I have a few questions about the more subtle features, that I've found difficult to find answers to elsewhere. As a background: I am mostly looking for a portable convenient pdf-ereader for (academic) work.

1. Does any of the ereaders allow you to open more than one document at once, so that you can go back and forth (or have them side by side in landscape format) to compare something?
2. What searches to the ereaders allow? Full text search? Searching annotations? Searching file names?
3. Can annotations be exported? Either to be used with desktop software or (better) with the original document in the original file format?
4. Can you compile highlights? That is, highlight passages and the ereader automatically compiles all highlights (from one/ multiple files) into a single file?

Thanks a lot. It is very much appreciated!

Happy to answer. Brings back some of the fun I've had (or still have) with the respective units.

Question 1: iRex 1000S does have tabs. You can jump back and forth between documents.
Question 2: Search isn't available on all readers. If they allow it, in library view you can search for author or book title (partial search possible). In the book itself, you can search within the content.
Question 3: Solved differently on various units. First of all, most don't offer annotations at all. If they offer it, on some you easily can export them (i.e. iRex iLiad via companion software), on others it's a bit tricky.
Question 4: Not that I know of. But quite frankly, I never use annotations or highlights, so others may know differently.

Given your very specific demands, most of the readers in the market probably won't fit your needs:
- PDFs are critical on many. In my opinion, reflow isn't the best solution for PDFs. Original idea of PDFs usually is, remaining the layout intact. So zoom is preferrable to reflow.
Sony 505 did have zoom before the firmware update (about 18 months ago). Maybe you can reinstall the former firmware?
iRex iLiad and iRex 1000S have fantastic zoom capabilities via touchscreen. iRex 800 DOES NOT have this feature for the moment.
Sony 600/700/900 have the very same zoom capability. But only for a single page, whereas iRex iLiad/1000S can use this zoom for the entire document.
- Annotations and highlights are critical as well. In my opinion, annotation and export has been solved nicely on iRex iLiad (which was and is my favorite for PDFs anyway).