Astak announces 5 inch Pocket PRO for $199

[Alisa]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

Not necessarily, iLiad has dictionary support for PDF I believe using mobipocket dictionaries. You have to support two applications running simultaneously but Linux already does that.

Dale

This makes sense to me. I have no first hand experience with any of these applications so I'm just going off of what I've seen working with other sorts of projects. I work on rather different kinds of products so my assumptions may be way out of line. It does seem to me that the most important part of the process is understanding the dictionary and knowing how to search it. Grabbing a string from a book of a different format shouldn't be too difficult in most cases. It does necessitate running two applications, as you say, but the support for that is already there.

[MaggieScratch]

Oooh...I already have an eReader dictionary. (Got it free when I paid for eReader Pro for my Treo a couple of months before Pro became free...)

[Robertb]

Originally Posted by DG25

Does it have dictionary support?
Can we have some 5" vs 6" pictures?
Maybe a video showing the speed of the Epson controler?

Thank you.

Dear DG25:

I agree that more pictures are needed. However, we do not even have the samples yet. Last night I received firm specs. Hopefully samples will arrive Friday.

Yes, I want pictures too. So far I have to gleam everything from online pics which are poor. Will ask for whole slew of pictures tonight but best ones will be when we get the samples.

Yes, a video would be good but we are always in discussion on that and we never get it done. I will try to get up a video when samples arrive.

[Robertb]

Originally Posted by kacir

Do the picture?
You mean "make at least 15 minutes long High Resolution Youtube video", don't you? :-))

By the way, you could make a poll here about what books to include on the reader. Perhaps you could strike a deal with some of authors lurking here to include their book, so people could see that e-book readers are not just about old, very old, classics like Seneca, Plato, Homer , Giovanni Boccaccio, Chaucer, Shakespeare -in original language, of course ...

Perhaps some of us could help you to format books for the Pocket Pro in exchange for being able to purchase some "special edition" Pocket pro.

And last but not least, think about reviewers here. Is there any chance that some Mobilereaders could get an early access to the devices for the purpose of reviewing.

Dear Kacir:

All good points but WE do not even have samples yet. They are on their way and may arrive Friday. That will only be TWO. Yes, I fully anticipate giving an eval sample to Dale of MobileRead Forum as soon as I have enough.

Let us get the samples first and then we can discuss freelance publishers and other items like that.

Be aware that we are fortunate to get great FREE ebook classics to put on our devices. We normally include: "Call of the Wild", "Hunchback of Notre Dame", "1001 Arabian Nights", "Complete Works of Edgar Allen Poe", "Little Women", "Andersen's Fairy Tales", 'The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", and more.

These are quality reads for the entire family. We have to have something for children as well as adults.

There are COPYRIGHT issues that we could be sued over so we have to get them only from a reliable source where there will not be a problem.

We do post on our websites links to about twenty free eBook websites. We also are working on a search engine for the 500,000 Google Free eBook Library. It is better, I feel, to make it easy for everyone who buys the Pocket PRO to choose their own free eBooks. Astak was the FIRST I know of to offer free ebooks pre-loaded on the device as an aid to people who buy the device so they at least have something decent.

[Robertb]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

Robert, you do know that because fry's won't ship the EZ Reader, you are losing lots of sales in the US. Will they ship this 5" device or will you lose sales because of frys once again?


Also, Sony does give a perfectly good case with their readers.

Dear JSWolf:

Sorry, I did NOT know Sony provides a perfectly good case. I am happy that they do. ALL companies should do this. I only know that ours is leather and works great and has a fine magnetic clasp. My point is that people can buy the unit and then NOT need to go out immediately and replace it for $50.

FRY's does ship from FRY's.com.

FRY's will not be carrying the Pocket PRO. No retail store will sell Pocket PRO. IF we allowed retail stores to get involved they would raise the price. The Pocket PRO has that great attractive price because Astak will sell it direct from its website and we DO ship. If we went thru FRY's the price would be higher; and we would have to promise NOT to sell below their price.

WHY would you want a higher price? This is a bargain BECAUSE we are keeping the middle-men out of it.

[Robertb]

Originally Posted by NatCh

I see.

Sorry, I don't mean to pick nits, but in light of the shortness of the time-frames involved, six months and three months, the claims about reliability strike me as a bit ... let's go with "premature" -- that is, unless you've sold really huge numbers of them, both directly and through Fry's, in that time ....

Dear NatCh:

We have sold roughly 5,000 units thru FRY's and that is a decent sample. However, Jinke and its other distributors in Europe and Asia have sold about 500,000 versions of what is the EZ Reader. That is a VERY representative sample to base reliability upon. We got into the unit well after the rest of the world had thoroughly tested it. The V3 is the number one seller in Europe.

[Robertb]

Originally Posted by ahi

What is the actual width and height of the screen's document viewing area in pixels and in cm or inches?

- Ahi

Dear Ahi:

The samples are on their way to us. We only know now that the screen is measured in 5 inches diagonally. I will measure it in length and width as soon as the samples arrive and then post.

[Robertb]

Originally Posted by etherspin

dont forget vegans and vegetarians - you can please us and get us on board with your brand by making non leather cases - and save money for yourselves!


a nice range of colours in some other material would be awesome.

Dear Etherspin:

Yes, we could go non-leather case and save a few pennies. Leather is just very inexpensive in Asia. Also, "There is NOTHING that some person cannot build cheap and lower in quality and charge for less money". That has been my motto for 25 years. Our goal is to sell a quality product all the way. That is why we stay with E-Ink and leather cases, and Grade "A" screens, and factory software. WHEN you buy an Astak product you know you are getting the good stuff!

OOPS!! I missed your point entirely... sorry. Yes, maybe we should look at non-leather as real leather does come from animals and I hate animal cruelty too. BUT... if the animal is grown for food and killed for food... why waste the skin (leather)? I am not being a smart alec here... I am torn now that I understand what you were getting at. I am an animal lover. Sorry I missed this at first glance.

[igorsk]

Originally Posted by Robertb

However, Jinke and its other distributors in Europe and Asia have sold about 500,000 versions of what is the EZ Reader.

Is this a real number or your estimate?

[cheese bogart]

Originally Posted by Robertb

Dear Ahi:

The samples are on their way to us. We only know now that the screen is measured in 5 inches diagonally. I will measure it in length and width as soon as the samples arrive and then post.

Robertb your blog says that its 800x600 pixels, so unless I've got my maths wrong (quite possible!), the screen should be 4" x 3".

Anyone else please correct me if I'm wrong.

[slayda]

Originally Posted by cheese bogart

Robertb your blog says that its 800x600 pixels, so unless I've got my maths wrong (quite possible!), the screen should be 4" x 3".

Anyone else please correct me if I'm wrong.

That's a very good guess (and one that I also made). However it does assume a square pixel and I do know that is not always the case (at least for CRTs). Probably is the case for eink.

[Sweetpea]

Originally Posted by cheese bogart

Robertb your blog says that its 800x600 pixels, so unless I've got my maths wrong (quite possible!), the screen should be 4" x 3".

Anyone else please correct me if I'm wrong.

If I remember my phytagoras correctly:

a right triangle, where one side is 3 and the other 4, will have a diagonal of 5.

(3/4/5 triangles). And as screens are generally measured diagonally, you might be right.

[cheese bogart]

unless its a 16:9 (widescreen), but this is a 4:3.

[HarryT]

Originally Posted by Robertb

Be aware that we are fortunate to get great FREE ebook classics to put on our devices. We normally include: "Call of the Wild", "Hunchback of Notre Dame", "1001 Arabian Nights", "Complete Works of Edgar Allen Poe", "Little Women", "Andersen's Fairy Tales", 'The Legend of Sleepy Hollow", and more.

These are quality reads for the entire family. We have to have something for children as well as adults.

There are COPYRIGHT issues that we could be sued over so we have to get them only from a reliable source where there will not be a problem.

If you'd like to distribute with your devices any of the "classics" that I've uploaded here to MR (eg my illustrated versions of Dickens), you are most welcome to do so.

[Robertb]

I have been all over the internet trying to find good shots of the new Pocket PRO (V5) and all shots are essentially of the screen. I was trying to find the rumored scroll wheel. Overnight, Jinke sent me two good side shots that you may want to see... and confirmed the scroll wheel on the right-hand side. I do not yet know its full function. I will get more info on that.https://www.mobileread.com/forums/att...1&d=1244047712