Comparison of Kindle DX and iRex DR1000

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Digriz

I own both...

The DR1000 just sits on my shelf of shame of I didn't do enough research devices. it has been way too quirky. PDF support war really slowI really wanted to like the device especially with the newspaper support, etc. After 6 months+I gave up on it. Though, to be fair haven't updated to the latest 1.5 firmware.

You really need to upgrade. The current firmware version is 1.6 and it now all works as it should do.

[owl123]

There's 1.6 firmware for DR1000S. It does improve the device.

minihub: You'd need either a Kindle or iPhone/iPod Touch to buy Kindle books first and then deDRM them and put on another reader.

[jharker]

My 2 cents... I just bought the DX and find it very, very nice. I previously owned an iRex iLiad, so I can't speak for the DR1000S from personal experience.

The DX's support for pdfs is currently more than good enough for my needs. Reading technical paper pdfs works extremely well; in landscape mode, they are basically at 100% size. This is fine for most papers, in my opinion. I don't usually annotate my papers, so lack of annotate/highlight is not currently an issue for me.

Whispernet already seems to be amazingly easy and useful. In addition to document delivery (which I haven't tried yet), browsing the web and downloading free books from MobileRead and Feedbooks is extremely, gratifyingly easy.

Size-wise, my DX in the Amazon case is literally half as thick as my iLiad in the iRex case. The DX is a bit heavier, but since I have custom, heavier batteries in my iLiad the difference is not so striking.

I only ever used the pen on my iLiad for navigation; I decided quickly that it was not a useful device for note-taking. I also prefer a physical keyboard to an on-screen one. So the lack of stylus/touchscreen does not bother me.

DX issues for me: lack of SD card slot. Lack of folders.

Given that the DR1000S is about twice the price of the DX, its advantages are not really enough to recommend it for me. Plus, the DX has several advantages that I quite enjoy.

[wallcraft]

Originally Posted by minhiub

Here is my question, do we need to purchasing an sony ereader in order to buy book in its online store? What kind of format they use for the ebooks, pdf or something else?

They use their own format, LRX, which has DRM (encryption) and is locked to up to six devices. These can be any combination of Sony Readers and Windows PCs. So it is possible to buy Sony ebooks without a Reader providing you read them on a Windows PC.

The Sony PRS-505 and PRS-700 also read Adobe PDF and ePub ebooks, which are sold by many ebook stores but not by the Sony store.

[owl123]

Originally Posted by HarryT

That is my understanding, yes, although personally I just connect it to my PC for an hour a day and that keeps it fully charged, so I have no personal experience of how long the battery actually lasts. Perhaps someone else may be able to comment on this.

Edit: To give you a rough idea, I read for about 2.5 hours on my fully-charged reader last night, and the battery is now showing a charge of 82%.

That's interesting.

With 1.5 firmware I couldn't get more than 4-5 hours of continuous use. I'm yet to check how 1.6 extends the battery life.

Some people reported 10 or 11 hours but only when the device was in sleep mode and no pages were being turned during this time.

[HarryT]

1.6 claims a 10% increase in battery life but, more importantly perhaps, the device now automatically goes into a "sleep mode" after a short period of inactivity. Perhaps that accounts for the increased battery life?

[tklaus]

Originally Posted by phantoz

3. I need to read technical papers in it, something like (for instance) this: http://www.cs.usask.ca/~cab938/icalt...leva_cooke.pdf -- is this readable on a dx?

Yes, see attached photos.

[minhiub]

Originally Posted by owl123

There's 1.6 firmware for DR1000S. It does improve the device.

minihub: You'd need either a Kindle or iPhone/iPod Touch to buy Kindle books first and then deDRM them and put on another reader.

Thanks for the info but I just wonder about the quality after you do the conversion. Does it hurt the quality at all?

Compare with the DR1000, the price is a plus for DX but its lack of wifi really bothers me since I have to take it back home to use. I heard that for the Kindle 2, you have to the settings through Whispernet, which international customers could not do. Also, I am pretty worry about the firmware update, although I know that Amazon does not do it very often. Do we need to have the Whispernet for upgrading Kindle's firmware, if it ever happens?

[owl123]

Originally Posted by HarryT

That is my understanding, yes, although personally I just connect it to my PC for an hour a day and that keeps it fully charged, so I have no personal experience of how long the battery actually lasts. Perhaps someone else may be able to comment on this.

Edit: To give you a rough idea, I read for about 2.5 hours on my fully-charged reader last night, and the battery is now showing a charge of 82%.

Here are my results. 1h 10m of reading with some annotations and the charge is 87%. The battery was fully charged.

minhiub: No quality problems, it's just a lot of hassle. Sorry for misspelling your nick in the previous post. :-)

[sirbruce]

In comparison the Kindle DX should provide 15 - 45 hours of continuous reading depending on speed, font size, etc.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by owl123

Here are my results. 1h 10m of reading with some annotations and the charge is 87%. The battery was fully charged.

My understanding is that using the pen for annotating really "eats" the battery. With straight reading you'll get much longer battery life.

4h usage with mine last night, and the battery is at 68%. I reckon the 12h figure for "pure" reading is a realistic one.

Any device which will get me through a full day of usage is fine with me, since I'm never away from power, and, of course, unlike some other devices (eg my CyBook) one can use the DR1000 while it's charging.

[yingwu]

So Harry, I still want to ask that for you, do you reckon you have made right decision to have the DR? And is the DR worth to buy for professional, academic use?

You know, it is really difficult to decide considering the price. However, I don't write much on the paper, but it is important to make marks to some words or formulas, which is impossible with the DX....

I prefer hearing your options. Thanks.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by yingwu

So Harry, I still want to ask that for you, do you reckon you have made right decision to have the DR? And is the DR worth to buy for professional, academic use?

You know, it is really difficult to decide considering the price. However, I don't write much on the paper, but it is important to make marks to some words or formulas, which is impossible with the DX....

I prefer hearing your options. Thanks.

For me, yes, the DR1000S was absolutely the right choice to make - I am delighted with it. I don't use it for that, but I would imagine it would be excellent for academic work, with its excellent PDF rendering and ability to rapidly flip between multiple documents.

Yes, it's comparatively expensive (but still a lot cheaper than a tablet PC) and for some the battery life might be an issue, but for me it's exactly what I was looking for in a large-screen bookreader.

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by fugazied

I think the main benefits of the iRex really are the SDHC support and directory style filing. Both are awesome. I guess they are really advantages for people who have huge collections.
I'm at about 75 books, so the Kindle can handle that pretty easily.

Isn't the Kindle DX like $300 less than the DR100S? If so, that is quite a PRO in the Kindle column.

BOb

[pilotbob]

Originally Posted by minhiub

I just have a irrelevant question but since I already had a similar question here, I thought it would be acceptable to have it here. Here is my question, do we need to purchasing an sony ereader in order to buy book in its online store? What kind of format they use for the ebooks, pdf or something else?

You can purchase eBooks from the Sony ebook store without owning a Sony reader. However, other than reading it on your PC with the Sony eBook Library software no other device supports that format.

BOb