08:39 AM by kgian in E-Book General | News

Yesterday I went by one of Greece's largest computer and electronics stores. Imagine my surprise when I saw in the window advertisement for their own branded e-ink reader. I went inside and they had a demo unit.

Six inch e-ink, seemed quite fast, good screen, thin and light. Total cost, 249 euro. This brand is maybe the largest in Greece in electronics with brick and mortar stores in all major cities.

From the site I can translate:

• 6 inch e-ink
• 512mb internal, up to 4gb sd card
• Adobe DE pdf & epub
• various fonts and sizes, also it seemed full justification (the way I like it)
• music capability
• 8000 page turns
• 8.5mm thick, 174gr

http://www.plaisio.gr/Campaign/ebook.htm

12:32 AM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

I wasn't going to post this becuase the news was rather thin. But then I noticed that a bunch of sites (including Teleread) had posted about the demo ereaders at CES. I want to set the record straight.

The so-called "Bebook prototype with Liquavista display" was not a prototype. The screen did not work. It basically was a 6" piece of plastic glued into an empty shell. It was a mock up, not a demo.

There were no prototype ereaders in Liquavista booth. The only demos were lab samples, and they were bolted to the counter.

That being said, there are actually two new screens under development. One is gray scale and the other is color. The color screen will be released after the gray scale screen. I also have solid information on the availability. The new screen tech is no where near ready to be released. The current projected release date for e-readers with this screen is first quarter 2011.

The projected cost is at the same level as LCDs with only 1/10 the power usage.

10:56 PM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

This device was actually announced on 6 January, but I didn't have time to go see it until today. From the press release:

LAS VEGAS, Jan. 6 /PRNewswire-FirstCall/ -- International CES, Booth 11006-10506 -- Audiovox Corporation (Nasdaq: VOXX) today announced that it has entered the e-Reader market with a new line to be sold under the RCA brand. The product launch will be supported by e-content delivered through Barnes & Noble, the world's premier destination for e-books, magazines and newspapers.

...

RCA's Lexi will ship preloaded with Barnes & Nobles Desktop Reader Windows/MAC software for reading, purchasing and managing content and it will also contain Adobe® Reader® Mobile technology, making it interoperable and fully compatible with PDF and ePub formats. The product is expected to hit retailers in May 2010 and has an anticipated MSRP of $229.99.

I did make it to the Audiovox booth this morning but the units on display were mock ups, and obviously didn't work. But I did get some photos; they're attached.

There were 2 models on display, the EB 1060 and the EBW 1060 (it has wifi). They were identical, and only had one button, which was a rocker switch on one side of the touchscreen. The screens are 6" e-ink. Since these were mock ups I can't comment on the affect the touchscreen had on the screen quality. The Lexi is supposed to have an accelerometer; this means it can be turned upside down and used in the other hand.

The Lexi comes with 2GB of storage. The mock ups had a SD card slot, a microphone, a headphone port, and USB (client). The Lexi is going to use Adobe, of course, and the non Wifi model is supposed to be released in May with a retail of $229. The Wifi model will be released later and the retail price is unknown. It will be sold at B&N.

10:10 PM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

Freescale is a CPU manufacturer. Their chips are in a lot of devices including ebook readers. They had in their booth one of each of the major ebook readers that use a Freescale processor. I'd like to thank whoever thought up that idea; it was fun to see all those devices in one place.

The list of devices include:

• Onyx Boox
• Irex DR1000
• Irex DR800SG
• Sony PRS-300
• Sony PRS-600
• Freescale's own reference design
• Kindle DX
• Kindle 2
• Playaway Audio Book
• txtr

The txtr was really the only reason I stopped by the booth. It didn't show up until Friday morning, and that was because the developers who brought it from Germany didn't arrive until Thursday night. I played with the txtr on Friday afternoon, and then happened to meet the txtr people at a private party that night. I couldn't play with it Saturday because it was stolen Saturday morning. (I didn't do it, and I have security camera footage to prove it.)

It's a really neat device, and after having used it I understand why it's restricted to Germany at the moment. It relies heavily on txtr's servers. It is significantly more connected than any other ereader. I'm not going to give a detailed opinion on it because I couldn't test all of its abilities. But I did get a number of photos; they are attached.

I went back Saturday to play with the txtr some more. It wasn't there, so I had a look at the DR800SG. The first bad impression was when I realized there was no slot for the Wacom stylus, and it went downhill from there.

The txtr folks came by shortly after I started. One wanted to make a video so it could be discussed back home, and I'm glad he did. I know from the time stamp on his video that the DR800 has a boot time of well over a minute.

The firmware is very limited in its abilities. I'm shocked at how much it couldn't do:

• only one font size
• can't draw on the screen
• can't highlight
• no font choices
• dictionary didn't work

The DR800SG is not ready to be released, and there is no way it could have been released in late October. I can only conclude that the original release date was an outright lie on the part of Irex.

04:17 PM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

I had the good fortune to bump into one of the engineers who worked on the Alex. We both happened to be at the booth of a Chinese ebook reader manufacturer. The conversation was short, but it was fascinating.

Spring Design just signed a deal for Hanvon to distribute the Alex in China. I mentioned the problem I had had with the keyboard on the N520; he grinned and agreed it was a problem. He's noticed that Americans need a bigger keyboard than the Chinese developer who worked on the devices. He went into it at some length, so I think he's serious.

I also asked him about his opinion on whether B&N stole the design from the Alex. He thinks they probably already had the dual screen design when the two companies consulted back in April of last year, but he thought it likely that B&N was only going to use the LCD screen for a keyboard, not a menu system.

Now, this is why I go to CES.

06:00 AM by Alexander Turcic in Miscellaneous | Week in Review

Have something interesting to say about e-books or mobile computing? Join our forums and share your view on topics like the ones discussed at MobileRead this past week...

E-Book General - News and Commentary

• A New Year's reflection on the ePub e-book format
• Paradigm Shift's new ebook readers
• A last minute update for CES
• Skiff reader is largest yet with 11.5" display to debut at CES
• Vook's Sherlock Holmes App (mediabistro)
• Outlook for electronic books in China appears bright (WSJ)
• Cincinnati buys Mayor, other politicians Kindles to save $25K/year
• Hands On with Spring Design Alex
• New York Times- "Microsoft and HP to Debut Courier Tomorrow"
• E-Books – The Bigger Problem, Part One of Three
• Kindle DX goes International
• Meet Copia - a new ebook reading platform
• NewspaperDirect comes to the Kindle, Sony
• e-Books: Averting a Digital Horror Story (BusinessWeek)
• LiquaVista to demo color epaper reader at CES
• McGraw-Hill digital textbooks coming to the Entourage Edge
• Interview: Kars-Michiel H Lenssen of Philips Research (Tech-on)
• I just saw Samsung's new ebook reader
• Blio site is up
• Sungale EB601
• Iview-600EB
• E-book writes its 2nd chapter, ITnews AU
• PocketBook and Netronix to merge as PocketBook Global
• First readers with SiPix screens announced
• Borders to sell the Spring Design Alex
• Introducing the Bebook Neo
• Hanvon ebook readers
• Introducing the Cybook Orizon
• Ditto Book
• Copia

01:27 AM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

You might remember that I reported on Copia before. It appeared out of the blue with a complete platform of software+devices. Today I had time to visit the DCM Worldwide booth, and they might actually have something here.

Let me preface my remarks by saying that what I saw was a demo. They didn't have a complete version of the software on display. Also, the devices were present, but they wouldn't let me touch them.

That being said, it was an impressive demo. The desktop software I saw seemed very sophisticated and complex. When I describe it before as social media meets ebook reading, I was right. I don't know enough about social networking to comment on it.

There was an impressive number of ebook readers and accessories on display. I believe I caught most of them in the attached photos. (The 4th and 5th photos show a keyboard that is supposed to plug into the screen only units.)

I was told that the software should be out in March, and the ereaders are due out in June. I asked and was told that the retail price for the e-readers ranged from $199 to $299. Yes, the $299 price is for the 9.7" device with a touchscreen. (I don't believe it, either.)

11:53 PM by Nate the great in E-Book General | News

This company was a pleasant surprise. I first heard about them some time ago, when they were importing the stock Netronix reference model with the original firmware and offering customization services such as content loading and engraving. At the time they were barely worth a mention, but times have changed.

When I stopped by their booth today, I learned that Ditto Book now offer both the D-6, a 6" ereader with keyboard, and the D-9, a 9.7" with touchscreen. The larger one was not on hand, but they did have the D-6.

They actually have 3 devices to offer under this model name. All have keyboards, and they all come with FBReader. I identified at least one of the 6" units as being made by Insdream. You may recall I mentioned a e-reader with an unusual LCD screen a while back. That was it. The screen was a little odd, but it was usable.

Ditto Book will soon be selling the D-6 and D-9 retail at www.dittobook.com. The expected retail is $249 and $429 (they were less than certain on the price of the D-9, so it could be wrong).

P.S. In the pictures below, the gray ereader is the one with the LCD screen.