ZDnet: "Sony Reader felled by the classics"

[recycledelectron]

ZDnet has an interesting story called "Sony Reader felled by the classics."

http://www.news.com/Sony-Reader-fell...0-20&subj=news

They are correct in their facts, but I disagree with the conclusions.

Andy

[Nate the great]

Originally Posted by recycledelectron

ZDnet has an interesting story called "Sony Reader felled by the classics."

http://www.news.com/Sony-Reader-fell...0-20&subj=news

They are correct in their facts, but I disagree with the conclusions.

Andy

Which conclusions do you not agree with?

[kovidgoyal]

Umm there are no conclusions in that article. It's "just another piece of Web 2.0 whining".

[astra]

• The load-up time
The load-up time, I've discovered, depends on the length of the book. At 3,423 pages with the smallest font (4,757 pages in the medium font, and 7,269 in large font), War and Peace takes more time than any other book I've tried. Our Mutual Friend, the Charles Dickens classic at 2,678 pages, comes in at 16 seconds. Pudd'nhead Wilson, at 428 pages, takes only about five seconds. Anything less than 400 pages takes about three seconds.

The Reader apparently insists on loading up the entire book before you can read it. Since most people don't read entire books in one sitting, this seems a bit weird.

What is he talking about?

I never encountered this type of problem.
No matter how long is a book, after initial open up it opens immediately.

[igorsk]

It's possible the Sony Classics books are not generated properly (e.g. too few page elements).

[HarryT]

If you copy a book to the Reader via USB, the first time you open it it paginates it, which takes a while for a long book (1 minute sounds about right for "War and Peace"). This only happens the first time you open it (or the first time you select a new font size); subsequent opening should be pretty much instantaneous.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by HarryT

If you copy a book to the Reader via USB, the first time you open it it paginates it, which takes a while for a long book (1 minute sounds about right for "War and Peace"). This only happens the first time you open it (or the first time you select a new font size); subsequent opening should be pretty much instantaneous.

But if you use Ebook Library to load the ebook onto the reader, it will already be sorted and open right away. It sounds like this person did not use Ebook Library to load these books.

[astra]

Sounds like people at ZDnet are quite unprofessional.

[JSWolf]

What the author needs to have done is tested the 505 using both Ebook Library and just copying the books onto the 505 as a mass storage device and then citing the differences.

[athlonkmf]

Originally Posted by astra_lestat

What is he talking about?

I never encountered this type of problem.
No matter how long is a book, after initial open up it opens immediately.

If they're using the old firmware, the it can be slow.

[JSWolf]

Can't be using old firmware on the 505. It's only had one firmware release and that's what comes with it currently.

[jmorton]

Anybody notice that the article says it's about the Sony PRS-505, but the picture is of the PRS-500?

Jim

[nathantw]

Originally Posted by jmorton

Anybody notice that the article says it's about the Sony PRS-505, but the picture is of the PRS-500?

Jim

I noticed that too. I was wondering which one they were talking about.

Did you read the comments that people made? One person was definitely a Kindle lover and he went out of his way to make sure he shot down the Sony whenever he could.

[Ervserver]

ever read the feedbacks on Amazon? there are the same 3 or 4 Kindle lovers that reply to every post with less than 5 stars...seems to me they aren't spending much time reading their Kindles

Originally Posted by nathantw

I noticed that too. I was wondering which one they were talking about.

Did you read the comments that people made? One person was definitely a Kindle lover and he went out of his way to make sure he shot down the Sony whenever he could.

[sirmaru]

The following are the contributors to the S L O W processing of the Sony PRS 505:

1. It takes too long to move the cursor or to open a new page if it is not the very next page.

2. There is no search function.

I downloaded an NIV Bible from the Sony eBook Store to the PRS 505 and brought it to Bible Study. I found the cursor moving VERY SLOW from line to line. I especially found it died in the Psalms Book since there were 150 chapters which the cursor had to move through at the beginning.

I can only conclude that the firmware needs an upgrade, the processor needs an upgrade and the database software needs an upgrade.

If I just use it to read a book from one page to the next, it serves the purpose. Personally, I read on my PC most books and will only use the Reader if I have to babysit for my daughter or wait in a doctor's office. If I have to go to Bible Study again, I'll just have to bring my NIV Thinline Large Print Bible. The Sony PRS 505 just doesn't cut it for that purpose.