Be Book
- Thread starter Gottaa
- Start date
I think the general consensus is that PDF on eReaders is crap but there are other formats (that's half the problem, too many!!). Epub seems to be emerging as a possible favourite; I think the main thing is what the publishing houses decide to support.
Cull, the Bebook doesn't seem to be available anywhere apart from mybebook.com - oh, and inkino.co.uk but that's about it. Whether it will ever appear in a retail outlet remains to be seen.
Cull, the Bebook doesn't seem to be available anywhere apart from mybebook.com - oh, and inkino.co.uk but that's about it. Whether it will ever appear in a retail outlet remains to be seen.
More poking around and it looks like CyBook Gen3 has the best font resizing support, but it's 70 quid more than the Sony Reader, I'll wait till a waterstones nearby has one in I can actually look at, if it's good enough I'll get that otherwise it's looking like the CyBook will be the one for me
http://www.e-readers.co.uk/products/cybook/cybook.htm
http://www.e-readers.co.uk/products/cybook/cybook.htm
Pit.Sweat
Full Member
Still waiting, but after this thread started I've been in comic heaven reading the on my laptop so many thanks 
Never thought of doing this before. Wife is anoyed that I'm spending even more time on the laptop but pleased that I'm saving on storage space
And since she's already on the lookout for my xmas pressy, an ereader could be heading this way..
Never thought of doing this before. Wife is anoyed that I'm spending even more time on the laptop but pleased that I'm saving on storage space And since she's already on the lookout for my xmas pressy, an ereader could be heading this way..
Well I got my mitts on it at the weekend and was pretty un-impressed, this could be have been the "test" media put on the device, but if that is the case why pick such crap examples.
1. Page rotation.
Simply never worked, on either of the 4 documents it had been pre-loaded with
2. Reaction time.
I pressed the zoom button, nothing happened, I pressed zoom again, about 10 seconds later it did the first zoom, and about 3 seconds later went to the next zoom
3. Page turning,
Buttons on the bottom left and on the right hand side, neither of which felt comfortable or clear, even just a slight raising of the buttons on the right would have been enough, you had to push pretty hard anyway to get them to work (could have been the demo model being beaten up)
4. Zoom (3 levels).
3 Levels of zoom, wow I thought, until I actually used it, I had expected something like
* Normal size of a book print
* Childs type print
* Larger size again
But, what you actually get is (from my perspective remembering my vision isn't top notch anyway)
* Tiny, the kind of size print used in mobile phone contracts
* A little smaller than normal book size (when compared to six different actual books around the e-reader)
* A few points larger than a normal book size
I was hoping I could use this to read without glasses, as I can read childrens books who use larger fonts I expected something like that, but obviously I'd need to turn the pages more often reading a normal book
5. Contrast
I'd read all about it looking like paper, yet an open book next to it was so much clearer to read compared to the mid-grey background and not jet black font, I'm oretty suprised given all I'd read, it didn't suffer with any reflection issues which was as expected, but the difference in contrast was really poor
Overall
3.5/10
I do still really like the idea of it, but the demo model was either so poorly configured or the device just poor I've no idea what else to look at
1. Page rotation.
Simply never worked, on either of the 4 documents it had been pre-loaded with
2. Reaction time.
I pressed the zoom button, nothing happened, I pressed zoom again, about 10 seconds later it did the first zoom, and about 3 seconds later went to the next zoom
3. Page turning,
Buttons on the bottom left and on the right hand side, neither of which felt comfortable or clear, even just a slight raising of the buttons on the right would have been enough, you had to push pretty hard anyway to get them to work (could have been the demo model being beaten up)
4. Zoom (3 levels).
3 Levels of zoom, wow I thought, until I actually used it, I had expected something like
* Normal size of a book print
* Childs type print
* Larger size again
But, what you actually get is (from my perspective remembering my vision isn't top notch anyway)
* Tiny, the kind of size print used in mobile phone contracts
* A little smaller than normal book size (when compared to six different actual books around the e-reader)
* A few points larger than a normal book size
I was hoping I could use this to read without glasses, as I can read childrens books who use larger fonts I expected something like that, but obviously I'd need to turn the pages more often reading a normal book
5. Contrast
I'd read all about it looking like paper, yet an open book next to it was so much clearer to read compared to the mid-grey background and not jet black font, I'm oretty suprised given all I'd read, it didn't suffer with any reflection issues which was as expected, but the difference in contrast was really poor
Overall
3.5/10
I do still really like the idea of it, but the demo model was either so poorly configured or the device just poor I've no idea what else to look at
Cullhaven
Hernes Son
Think I might wait a year or so for one of these. I rushed out in the early 80s to get one of the first Sony Walkmans and it was like a housebrick - within six months they had more compact models, better features etc. It'll give them time to settle down in the formats/whats available stakes and iron out some of the un-user friendly features.
http://www.tgdaily.com/html_tmp/content-view-39220-97.html
Now that looks nice ... something for next year or the year after I'd guess
Now that looks nice ... something for next year or the year after I'd guess
I've just been reading about the Bookeen Cybook, I don't think we've discussed that one. It supports Mobipocket which is good for me, and you can install extra fonts on it which may be good for you Gottaa, although I can't see much info on the zoom capabilities. Only �180 at WH Smiths although they don't have any in stock atm.
I looked at the Sony in Waterstones, probably would have gone for it personally except for the lack of format support. I can convert my lit books easy enough but haven't found a way of converting secure Mobi files.
The mobileread.com forum seems to be the font of all knowledge ereader-wise.
I looked at the Sony in Waterstones, probably would have gone for it personally except for the lack of format support. I can convert my lit books easy enough but haven't found a way of converting secure Mobi files.
The mobileread.com forum seems to be the font of all knowledge ereader-wise.
Swither
Full Member
Amazon get in on the act
Been reading a bit about the Amazon version of the ebook reader, the Kindle DX. Still expensive, but with Amazon producing this one it might take off a bit better with a decent range of books and reasonable cost.
Amazon's Kindle
The technology looks good, but it looks like it has a qwerty keyboard which is something I wouldn't be bothered with myself.
At $350 it is still too expensive though I reckon.
Been reading a bit about the Amazon version of the ebook reader, the Kindle DX. Still expensive, but with Amazon producing this one it might take off a bit better with a decent range of books and reasonable cost.
Amazon's Kindle
The technology looks good, but it looks like it has a qwerty keyboard which is something I wouldn't be bothered with myself.
At $350 it is still too expensive though I reckon.
Yeah I saw this, but doing a search yesturday for kindle 2 and it seemed to find everything but.
I'm still half and half on this atm, I'm holding out for a startrek one
:edit: Actually I just looked at the supported formats and they really suck. PDF is experimental and you may even have to pay for the conversion as it's not a default supported format, neither are most image formats..... not good.
I'm still half and half on this atm, I'm holding out for a startrek one
:edit: Actually I just looked at the supported formats and they really suck. PDF is experimental and you may even have to pay for the conversion as it's not a default supported format, neither are most image formats..... not good.
If the DX actually released in the UK I'd get it today, that said I'm not so happy about the idea of having to sign up to a contract, infact that would be what would stop me, things are advancing though, I'm just hoping the apple tablet rumour one day comes true and that could be my e-book reader as well, and then formats and all that junk are dealt with simply, the down side is the battery life, but I'd live with that I think for the simplicity and full colour
I must admit that it really does look good, zooming, text to audio, all sort of scrolling by a litle joystick, mp3 playback, bookmark and commenting features, usb..... the list is endless.
It's a shame it only reads:
I'm a little concerned that you need to email amazon for their automated service to convert pdf's and other formats for you, and pdf's are experimental at the moment. it sounds like they are really locking you into the amazon service as it won't read any of the other standard ebook formats (.lit being a biggie for me). I can see how the audio stuff for you though would be great as you can just have it read the book for you which sounds pretty awesome.
Oh and it has a 4 week battery life if you turn off wifi too... amazing.
It's a shame it only reads:
I'm a little concerned that you need to email amazon for their automated service to convert pdf's and other formats for you, and pdf's are experimental at the moment. it sounds like they are really locking you into the amazon service as it won't read any of the other standard ebook formats (.lit being a biggie for me). I can see how the audio stuff for you though would be great as you can just have it read the book for you which sounds pretty awesome.
Oh and it has a 4 week battery life if you turn off wifi too... amazing.