Now that I’ve read a couple of things on the new ereader, some thoughts on it.
I love:
- The touch screen. I love being able to annotate and highlight pages. End notes actually work well – the Sony displays these as highlights, and touching these will take you to the specific end notes.
- Being able to rotate the display – portrait to landscape mode. You can also format pages into columns.
- The fact that PDFs display quite well. (The ability to rotate the display helps here – displaying some documents in landscape mode makes them infinitely more readable.)
- The “Go to” page feature. You can actually “flick” through a book using this feature.
- The built-in dictionary. Mine’s set to the Oxford English Dictionary.
- The speed of the processor. The Sony takes hardly any time at all to load things! The characteristic eInk screen refresh when going to the next page is also very fast and (to me) practically unnoticeable.
- Being able to set multiple bookmarks in a book.
- Being able to tag and sort books into collections.
- 16-bit gray scale. Nice and clear.
- The metal case. It feels very solid.
- This feature: you can set the wallpaper on the device so that when it’s in sleep mode, it displays different pictures. I now have pictures of M and the chihuahuas on my Sony! (simple pleasures…)
Note that none of these features existed on the Kobo. The funny thing is that I did not miss them when I was using the Kobo.
I do miss the following features:
- With the Kobo, when you get to the end of a book, it’s marked “Read”. The Sony doesn’t do this, and to me it somehow lacks closure.
- Different fonts. With the Kobo you can choose between serif and sans serif fonts. It is possible change fonts on the Sony but this involves tweaking the epub file and fiddling with the CSS to change the font settings, and this only works on a single book at a time.
- The feel of the Kobo in my hand. Granted, the Kobo is plastic, but there’s something about it that makes it very pleasant to hold.
The Kobo is a good introductory ereader, but I am definitely ready for something with more features, and I shall enjoy the Sony. (I’m passing the Kobo on to my sister-in-law, A.)
It’s a pity this particular model (Sony PRS 950 Daily edition) isn’t available in Australia. The 5-inch (Sony PRS 350 Pocket edition, which M has) and 6-inch (Sony PRS 650 Touch edition) models are available, although I believe most shops are currently sold out of the 6-inch models.
Oh! I almost completely forgot to mention the fact that this new e-reader has wifi and 3G capabilities. I haven’t even bothered to try these features as I am not overly interested in them – I am quite happy to just connect the ereader to my computer when I want to load a book onto it. In any case, I don’t know if the 3G would even work in Australia. I believe Sony did not release the 950 here because the 3G connectivity only allows connection to the US-based Sony ebook shop, and from all reports there isn’t a very wide range of titles available to us in Australia.
My only gripe? I am back at work now, after a lovely restful fortnight – and have far less time to read!
8 Comments
Great that you are passing the Kobo to A. Will she get much reading time with three littlies, I wonder…? 😉
I have been paying more attention to posts re e-readers these days as I’m now reading on my iPad – am surprised by this development, I must confess.
The ability to change fonts is nifty as some fonts are more/less readable than others. But there are certain [paper] books for example one that I read recently ‘The Language of Things’ by Deyan Sudjic which I would never dream of tweaking. The Penguin version that I read was simply perfect from the non-matte cover to the type of paper to the different fonts used throughout; even the white spaces on the page were just so. If someone were to change the fonts, it would’ve detracted from the overall finished result, IMHO. (The version I read was this one: http://www.penguin.com.au/products/9780141031170/language-things …while I was reading it, I found myself wondering from time to time what the e-version was like and if that experience would have been as pleasurable. I could go on… Don’t worry, I won’t. ;-P )
I did wonder if you would be reading very much on your iPad!
Which app(s) are you using? What have you been reading?
Re: Jaded’s comments
There are plenty of advantages to an e-reader over print.
I find the one handed reading (books require 2 hands), lightness of the reader vs most books and auto bookmarking have become so nice that I grumble at the book when I go back to print.
Every time I read a book now I also wonder at the waste of paper.
I’m reading http://www.amazon.co.uk/Just-My-Type-About-Fonts/dp/1846683017 . The interesting thing was that I found it when I was browsing the App Store for font/typography apps. It just opens up on my iPad not in any particular app. I do have the Kindle app as well, on which I read an excerpt of Medium Raw by Anthony Bourdain (enjoyed but haven’t decided if I want to read more/buy); also have the Borders app which was inherited from my iPhone. I’m very much a newbie as you know, but enjoying it so far. I understand the need for less paper but I still see some paper items as a bit porny (no, not porn mags – those are best viewed online – just kidding!), if you know what I mean. The smell and feel of the paper of my Monocle magazines etc… I won’t get started or it will become porny.
Great evaluation, Constance. The Age has an e-reader article in the weekend section today, and the reviewers are not nearly specific enough about what they do and don’t like. Most of them noobs, I think.
(ALWAYS askalibrarian…!!!)
I’ve played briefly with the other Sonys in the Sony shop. This one sounds very good – I do like that footnote feature.
Con, I am wondering now – if you are connected to wifi, can you use the Readings shop? would be very interested to know, as your brand of reader is the one I’m most likely to buy. Send me a message if you end up trying it out sometime? thanks.
I’ll let you know when I find something I’d like to buy from the Readings shop, genevieve!