Guest post from Nellie
As a fully qualified gadget geek and bibliophile the idea of an electronic book should be my idea of heaven. So, why was it when I first heard about the Sony E-reader the nerdy techno-geek part of me nearly fainted with joy and the book lover in me worried slightly? Like many people I wondered whether an electronic item could give me the same feeling of holding a book, the same experience of becoming so involved with a story that I forget where I am. With a price tag of £200 I decided that I would wait awhile before finding out just how good the Sony engineers had been in replicating the reading experience.
On the morning of our wedding anniversary my husband handed me a parcel and jumped up and down with excitement as I opened it. He had bought me an E-reader. Any worries the bibliophile in me might have had evaporated as I opened the box. The reader itself is about the size of a paperback book, but it feels a similar weight to a small hardback. It comes with a protective jacket that you open just as you would a cover of a book. Made of brushed metal it has an air of powerful yet understated technology. Bundled in the box is a CD with Sony’s E-library software, a USB cable and a CD with one hundred free e-books on it, mostly classics from the Penn State University Library.
Setting up the E-reader was very easy. The software installed easily and automatically, as did the free e-books. The reader itself is charged by connecting it to a PC using the USB cable, and Sony claim you can read War And Peace on it five times on one battery charge, about 7000 page turns, I wasn’t planning on testing that theory, but I have read four books on it now, and my battery indicator is still full. Adding books to your e-reader using the e-library software is very easy, you simply drag and drop the title you wish to transfer from the list to the E-reader, just as you would drag and drop any file on your computer.
The functionality is great, allowing you to bookmark multiple pages in multiple books. Books can be grouped into collections if you wish, and are also listed by title and author. The buttons on the reader used to navigate are easy to use and have a reassuringly solid feel to them. Text can be viewed using four sizes, great if you have misplaced your glasses. The E-reader doesn’t have a boot up time like a normal PC or PDA, when switched on it displays the last page you viewed in less than a second, and page turns are equally quick.
I decided as I was writing this review, I should really buy a new e-book and see how easy it was to download new titles, all in the name of research you understand. The main outlet for books for the e-reader is Waterstones, however, it will read other formats, including PDF, txt, rtf and word files and you can download from other e-book retailers. You can also put pictures and music on it if you wish, although to my mind that’s a waste of useful book space! When buying e-books the files have copyright protection on them, and you will need to download Adobe Digital, free from their website, to authorise your reader to display the book. This download again was easy and was prompted by the Waterstones site when I paid for my new e-book, Five Little Pigs By Agatha Christie. The file downloaded in less than a minute, and took less than 30 seconds to transfer from my e-library to the reader. With the ability to buy and download books that quickly, I am going to be broke in no time!
So, that’s the practicalities, but what about the reading experience? I had high hopes, as the Sony engineers are a skilled bunch and have a knack of being able to imitate emotional experiences, as demonstrated by their AIBO robots. The E-reader is no exception to this. The screen is not backlit like a computer screen as this is what causes eye strain, and when you read, it feels just like you are reading ink on paper. The screen is not reflective, so it is very easy to read outside on a sunny day. Pages are turned using a couple of buttons which are placed just where your thumb sits when holding the reader like a book. The combination of the quality of the screen and the ease with which I could turn pages meant that as I started to read Pride and Prejudice, I was immediately transported into Austen’s world. I read for about two hours and when I stopped and returned to reality I was quite shocked to find myself holding an E-reader and not a book. Sony have been very clever in understanding that the design of the E-reader itself should just facilitate the reading experience, and not be the focus of it.
Given this little gadget will hold up to 160 books does this mean the end of the traditional paper library? No, I don’t think it does. I think there is room for both technology such as this, and the traditional book. As a frequent business traveller, my E-reader will travel with me allowing me to read when I am far away from home, but those books I truly love will remain in paper format, cherished in my library. So, all of you who live with a bookworm, take a leaf out of my husband’s book and buy your loved one an E-reader for Christmas. You won’t have to do the washing up for months.
