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Sony Reader: Pocket Edition
The Sony Reader: Pocket Edition is lightweight, easy to set up and aside from puchasing books, free online reading material is plentiful.
I maintain that there is nothing like the beautiful array of smells that one experiences with new books, old musty, dusty books, freshly printed magazines and newspaper print. Glorious!
But I'm not one to stand in the way of progress or to withstand back pain for that matter, from carrying around heavy tomes or waiting in line at the bookshop.
Granted I am being a touch over dramatic - most people carry around one book at a time and the experience of getting lost in rows of fascinating new books is not one to be replaced by downloading a bunch of electronic ones online, but the year of the e-book has arrived and I for one, welcome my new alien overlords, I mean e-book readers.
As with most people in possession of a good smart phone, I have an e-book client - mine is the Kindle app for the iPhone - and I have gone as far as to pay for and downlaod Amazon.co.uk e-books and read them on this tiny screen. Not the optimum electronic book reading experience.
Gadgetrepublic.com has previously reviewed the first Sony Reader to come on the market and while it was a pretty good experience, the all-new Pocket Edition is a welcome change.
Mere minutes to set up
From unboxing to transferring your purchases, it takes no more than a few minutes. The software is included on the device itself (PC and Mac compatible) and one USB cable is all that is needed for both charging and transferring data.
Unlike the Amazon Kindle you cannot download wirelessly, which would be a complete bonus, but what I did like about the Sony Reader e-book site was that aside from having links to paid e-books from Waterstones, WHSmith and Borders, there were also visible links to free e-books from Project Gutenberg, Manybooks.net and Feedbooks.com.
Persuing Project Gutenberg showed that many free e-books were in the e-Pub format, which displays well on the Sony Reader.
It is simply a case of importing books into your desktop Reader Library application and dragging and dropping them onto the connected device.
One little glitch was that upon registering inside the Reader Library it only allowed me to choose from either Canada or the US as my place of residence but as I said you can download your e-books through the links provided on the Sony Ireland site.
My Pocket Edition was a little pink number and has an expensive-looking brushed steel finish. The device itself is not touch-enabled, so navigating your way through books and the main menu is done with numbered buttons to the right of the screen and a home button and directional one at the bottom.
There are also buttons dedicated to bookmarking your reading material and magnifying the text should you need to.
Features
The Reader is monochrome but does display black and white images as well as text, and you can drag and drop your own text, Word files or PDFs in there, too.
The device itself has a 5-inch screen and the e-ink technology displays very well, it looks as though you're looking upon laminated paper more than an electronic display and can be read at all angles and in direct sunlight. There is no reading in the dark, however, as it is not backlit.
As a compact version of the original Reader, there isn't vast storage but you can fit up to 350 books on there and the battery life is impressive - if you charge it fully it can last up to two weeks. Perfect for the frequent traveller, student or anyone who loves to read.
Price: €179 from Easons bookshops nationwide.
Photo: The Sony Reader: Pocket Edition
Review courtesy of Gadgetrepublic.com , Ireland’s top source for gadget news and reviews.