Best Reader for A4 documents and textbooks

[Latinandgreek]

Originally Posted by animedude01

I hop this long winded ramble helps a bit and didn't tick off too many readers

Pas de tickage, don't worry! It was a good ramble. I agree that 6 inch readers aren't the best for pdf's but I was still surprised at how well mine has been able to handle them, with the added bonus that it is super-portable, as I commute a lot.

[animedude01]

Originally Posted by davidspitzer

I have been testing netbooks for work (great fun by the way) - I have 4 of the latest one including the newer Asus 30a which is advertised as having 12 hours of battery life - running a battery voltage program and running on a balanced plan the HP, Lenovo and Dell all died at about the 3.5 hour mark. The Asus (with a core 2 ) was the fastest of the bunch and run for 4.3 hours; better but still does nto float my boat. I want to be able to take a device to the beach, park or library etc and read as long as I want not as long as it will let me

The battery life the manufacturers list aren't realistic. That's what they get when they turn off the drive, put the cpu into the lowest power mode short of sleeping, and turn the screen brightness to just short of off and just let it sit until it dies. Doesn't even come close to what real life use is like

If you're reading, the drive (if it has one rather than flash) will spin down and the cpu slows down, but the screen still sucks power, and under bright light, you need to turn up the brightness, which uses even more. That's one reason the e-ink displays use so little power, they only need it on refresh.

If you want longer battery life, get a slower processor and slow it down even more, and read in the shade so you can lower the brightness. Of course, with all that, it will probably only give you an extra 30 minutes or so

[animedude01]

Originally Posted by Latinandgreek

Pas de tickage, don't worry! It was a good ramble. I agree that 6 inch readers aren't the best for pdf's but I was still surprised at how well mine has been able to handle them, with the added bonus that it is super-portable, as I commute a lot.

If the PDF is designed properly, is text, and reflows, it shouldn't be an issue at all. That's just text.

The problem is that most of my PDFs are images as they are scans of old and out of print books. Not Google, but still scans. Also, most of the other PDFs I have don't reflow properly even if they are text

[Dulin's Books]

I have responded to a similar post about the PocketBook 301 here https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=65732 . I attached some screen shots from the device that may help

[dmaul1114]

Originally Posted by animedude01

A netbook isn't a full power PC, it's something small and portable and it's designed for the 80% of people that only do e-mail, browsing, play some music, look at some pictures, update their twitter/facebook/whatever pages. I have one and I've started to use it more than my laptop because 80% of the time I'm just doing e-mail, browsing, logging into the servers remotely and it does exactly what I want it to do. I also do some reading on it and it does that fine. In fact, many people are using their smart phones in place of their PCs because most of what they want to do, the smart phone does!

Yeah, I was considering a netbook to supplement my work laptop that I try not to do too much random web browsing etc. on to avoid viruses.

But nixed that idea when I tried running ESPN360 and some other streaming videos on a few different ones and they all stuttered etc.--especially on HD videos.

I'll get by with my work laptop for now, and maybe try to pick up a deal on a 13" Sony Vaio or something similar sometime in the future.

[acastillo]

Alot of pdfs do re-flow quite well on my PRS-505, but anything with photos or dual columns causes my Sony reader fits.

I am anxiously awaiting more information on the Que proReader.

Since the OP said that he/she could wait until at least mid-January, I would suggest that the OP wait and hope the proReader will be a good alternative to the options already raised in this thread.

[brecklundin]

As others have suggested , wait until after CES is done. There is the Que, which from everything so far is a super looking 8.5"x11" screen with a lot of ability that fits your stated needs. Also, there were hints from Pocketbook that those waiting for a larger format device will be "happy" when CES arrives. And odds are there will be a wide variety of large format reading devices with several different display tech's...given the price of the Entourage eDGe at about $490US:

http://www.entourageedge.com/devices...rage-edge.html
Nate the great's review here: https://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=66821

It seems to have nice set of features but is still rough around the edges, still it will likely put pressure on the Que price so no way it will be near the kilobuck price point many have been pushing...likely those are shills anyway.

[animedude01]

It's always possible to wait until something better comes along. Part of the decision making process is determining when to buy and when to wait. All these devices being shown still have to make it to the retail channel and that may not even happen for another 6-9months after the CES!

Frankly, given the traditional production delays, I don't expect anything to actually hit shelves until the middle of the year at minimum. Also, those will be newer devices with all of their own bugs and quirks. I really love how some people (not anyone specific, or on this thread) bash a device and say how much better X will be based only on paper specs. Remember, they can list whatever they want on the specs, and those are generally written by the marketing department and don't always match what gets delivered!

If someone wants a device with a large display, especially one that can take notes, the choices are limited for the near future, no matter what great stuff they have at CES.

[EowynCarter]

If reading pdf if your main point, avoid 5". It seams a lots of larger screen reader will be out (iRex, pocketbook, and most likley other too).
Curently, i guess it's iRex.
Might be some comprmise with Pockebook (301), and Cybook (gen3), Sony prs-600 ad they seam have some decent pdf reader too. But they're 6", and it's real tiny for pdf. And the cybook in landscape mode can be a mess. (I know know about pocketbook or sony, i've never used them first hand).

If someone wants a device with a large display, especially one that can take notes, the choices are limited for the near future, no matter what great stuff they have at CES.

Personlly, at these prices, i'll only go for someting that will fully satisfy me. And none of the current readers fit that criteria, so i'm waiting.

[dmaul1114]

Originally Posted by EowynCarter

Personlly, at these prices, i'll only go for someting that will fully satisfy me. And none of the current readers fit that criteria, so i'm waiting.

Yep. I get the "you can't keep waiting as there's always something better around the corner" angle. I mean I own a Kindle 1 and have early adopted lots of tech over the years.

But this is a case where for those of us wanting to read and mark up academic PDFs etc., there really isn't anything really good out there.

You have things that are fairly limited with things like e-ink lag in writing with the stylus etc. and costing around $1,000 right now. Or paying even more for a full fledged tablet/slate PC which is too large, too poor on a battery life etc.

I'm perfectly fine waiting another year or two for an array of devices like the Que are our and improved, multimedia tablets are out etc. so I can make a good purchase.

I'm perfectly fine printing PDFs and marking them up as I have for years. Doesn't cost me a cent since it's on the Universities dime. And I keep the vast majority of them and recycle anything I don't need, so I don't feel bad at all on the environmental angle.

When there's a device that suits my needs for under $500, I'll take the plunge.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by davidspitzer

I would not agree - If the Kindle DX is available in your area it works very well with PDF's - yes it does not do TOC's but it renders almost every pdf I have thrown at it with ease - i have 20 law books scans that range from 30 meg to well over 200 meg and it read them all with aplomb. With the recent update i dont even have to crop them becuase in landscape mode it automatically crops the white space on pdf's now. and for $489 US it is a pretty good value. In my opinion the DX1000, while a very good pdf reader is simply not worth twice the price;

It depends what you want to do with it, of course.

One of the most useful capabilities of the DR1000 is that you can have multiple documents open at once, and flip between them with a tap of the stylus. This is amazingly useful if you're reading one document, and looking up references in others. That's something that the Kindle DX simply cannot do, so if it's a facility that's important to you, the iRex can be worth paying significantly more for.

[dmaul1114]

Yep. And the lack of stylus annotation/highlighting and table of contents (especially with how slow it is to flip through pages on current e-ink displays) render the DX useless for my needs.

I need something I can flip through pages quickly, jump to tables and figures, and highlight and write tons of notes just like I do on printouts currently.

[Estuche]

I, too, have been looking for the definite PDF reader for academic papers. Yesterday after a lot of research I decided to give the Sony PRS-900 (aka Daily edition) a try, so I ordered it from Bestbuy for US$372. It is expected to arrive in January and it includes both hard and soft cases, a charger and stylus.

Reasons why I pulled the trigger:

1. It allows for text reflow, note taking, bookmarking, underlining, dictionary, and search functions on PDF files.
2. It has a touch screen, which makes things more intuitive (trade off is less contrast and some glare)
3. It has a margin crop feature and a 7" screen that, when placed in landscape mode allows for reading PDFs in their original size and formats (good for graphic heavy documents). The downside is the extra scrolling to read the entire page, but at least no zoom+pan is needed
4. It is still compact and light enough to be portable
5. Cheaper than the other large screen readers
6. If anything better appears next week at CES I can always cancel my order. In the mean time I am taking advantage of the sale price!

Hope it helps,

[Latinandgreek]

Originally Posted by Estuche

I, too, have been looking for the definite PDF reader for academic papers. Yesterday after a lot of research I decided to give the Sony PRS-900 (aka Daily edition) a try, so I ordered it from Bestbuy for US$372. It is expected to arrive in January and it includes both hard and soft cases, a charger and stylus.

Reasons why I pulled the trigger:

1. It allows for text reflow, note taking, bookmarking, underlining, dictionary, and search functions on PDF files.
2. It has a touch screen, which makes things more intuitive (trade off is less contrast and some glare)
3. It has a margin crop feature and a 7" screen that, when placed in landscape mode allows for reading PDFs in their original size and formats (good for graphic heavy documents). The downside is the extra scrolling to read the entire page, but at least no zoom+pan is needed
4. It is still compact and light enough to be portable
5. Cheaper than the other large screen readers
6. If anything better appears next week at CES I can always cancel my order. In the mean time I am taking advantage of the sale price!

Hope it helps,

I am very tempted to get the Sony prs-900 as well, it looks like a fantastic reader and I have been more than pleased with my prs-505, so I'm sure that I would love the prs-900 just as much. I'm sure that you will be very happy with your purchase, and I have seen good reviews of the screen. I will definitely be taking it into consideration as my next purchase. I won't be able to purchase anything for the next two months at least, however, so we'll see what else is on the market at that time.

[catharsis]

Thanks for all the answers. I would definently roule out netbooks, as I work and read on a laptop and I don't think netbook screens are much better than that. I didn't say I want a reader now, but in the next 2-3 months and it seems that it sucks now to want a large screen e-ink device, as the Irex DR1000 would be the best choice, with the obvious drawback of limited bettery life and insanely high price (it costs as much as my laptop). As I understood, the other choice available would be the Kindle DX, but its policy is more closed and it's ridiculously big with that keyboard and doesn't have a touchscreen, which makes adnotations harder.

I saw a video of a Sony PRS-900 posted on this forum and it seemed to handle well A4 documents when in landscape mode. Basically, it loolks almost as wide as a PRS-600, but way more longer. Having a touchscreen and being cheaper than 500€, it would be a nice choice when available in Europe. I will look for more oppinions and videos of it.

The 6" devices seem too small for what I need and I saw that reflowing a document can really mess up the formatting.

I'm still going to wait for 2-3 months because some new devices seem like a better choice than the PRS-900.

The Irex DR800 seems to be a cool reader and cheaper than the DR1000, but it was supposed to be released almost 2 months ago and I have no idea why it's not on the market. The manufacturer is from Netherlands, though, so EU availability would be easier.

The Entourage Edge also seems to be an awesome device, although it's more of a netbook with an e-ink screen than a ebook reader and it has limited battery life, but it's enough for one day's work. If it would be on the market right now, I would of bought it because it seems very suitable for academic work, despite the fact that it looks kinda ugly.

The Plastic Logic Que would also be a good choice, but usually business device is synonyme with pricey and very few things are known about it. I'm waiting for what they have to show off at CES.

And also, I saw there will be a large screen PocketBook 901, which would be cool as it's produced by a neighbouring country (Ukraine) and it would be very easy to buy it, as my parents leave closer than 100km from the border, but I didn't read many things about it.