I own a Sony PRS-350 bought from Best Buy last January for $139 plus tax. It's a purchase for which I still have no regrets. I first started reading ebooks on my computer back in 2004, but it took 2006 or so before I started amassing more ebooks then physical, or dead tree, books. By the time 2008 rolled around, my dtb budget was almost 0. I still stop by Half Price Books if anyone else suggests it, but I've probably bought 10-12 physical books in the last year, maybe.... You can contrast this with the 18 ebooks I bought online yesterday or thing about the 8 or 9 boxes full of books in the cupboard under the stairs. Yes I like books.
So why did it take so long for me to buy a dedicated ebook reader?
Probably the technology. I bought my Cowon D2 back in 2007 which was a touch-screen mp3 player with a text reader on it's 2.5 inch screen. I was quite content to use that as my ebook reader/music player(really crappy video player) until the radio stopped working and I dropped it in water causing the touchscreen to become discolored and almost completely unusable. :-( this was in 2010 so it lasted a good 2.5-3 years. After it's demise, I tried reading on my phone, a ancient and ridiculously slow Tmobile Wing. It was okay, but mostly I read on my netbook, a MSI Wind, until getting the Android bug in April and buying a Archos 5 IT. The A5IT was okay, but I never did find a ebook reader application that I loved with it and it ran out of battery quickly and it was simply another device to carry around. le sigh. Then I got my Behold 2 in August and thought, now I can use this as a phone and ereader. Alas, that never happened. Maybe I'm just not meant to reader from a small screen?(Other than the 2.5 Cowon one lol) So as you can tell, I've spent years resisting buying a dedicated ereader. Every device I own is a jack of all trades, but master of none type device. :-(
So then it occured to me that I have a major birthday coming up in October and I really wanted to go on a cruise. This provided the impetus to finally commit and buy the ereader. I spent weeks in exhaustive research before concluding that I can't go backward and get a non-touchscreen device. That made the decision much simpler, especially since the Sony PRS-350 was on sale and came with a free case. Frankly, it's been years since I bought a non-touchscreen electronics device so when I was looking at all these e-readers which required the use of buttons, I was not impressed.
Review
This 5 inch e-reader fits into my hand. I can just swipe my finger across the page to go to the next one or to go back. I still use the physical buttons a lot though since they are right where my fingers are when I'm holding the device. The screen has little glare, but it does seem to attract dust. That bothered my at first, but I don't notice it anymore. I don't notice the flash when I turn the page anymore either. For the $140 I paid for this, I've received many hours of amusement and have still only paid for about $30 worth of books.
One of the pros of this device is that you can check out books from the Library with it. I also get a lot of books from Project Gutenburg and buy cheap books from Smashwords.
A negative for some people will certainly be the lack of wifi or 3g. I don't miss it because I use Calibre to organize my books on the computer and I'm never far from a computer. I'm not even close to filling the memory on the device and have over a hundred books on it.
I usually look for books by either author or time loaded onto the device, with the occasional search via title if I can't remember the author. You can also add tags to the books in Calibre which will make groups on the device and you can navigate by those tags instead.
One weak point in the design on the e-reader is the stylus. I rarely used mine and it still broke last month. I figure I'll live without it and glued it onto the e-reader since the ereader doesn't look right without the stylus.
It also doesn't come with an ac adapter and doesn't work with all the other ac adapters you may have in your home with the same connection. I had 3, a non-name from ebay, a samsung one from my phone, and one from my Archos 5 IT. Only the Samsung works properly. The no name will not allow me to use the reader while charging, but will charge it and the Archos one doesn't work at all.
All in all, a great device. It feels solid and has given me few problems in the last few months. I'm now a believer in dedicated ebook readers.
That said, as of a couple of weeks ago, I started reading ebooks on my phone(a rooted and androidified HD2) in the interests of carrying fewer devices around and ensuring that my Sony PRS-350 lasts a long time, the stylus has already broken and the silver is starting to rub off the forward button. Neither of these things effects my enjoyment of the device and it probably not typical. I've probably read well over a hundred books on the device in the 4 months (I average at least 1 book per day) so someone who reads 100 in a year would see the damage much slower than I do.
So what's next for this blog?
I'm going to be reviewing the 18 books I bought from Fictionwise and any others that are particularly inspiring in my collection. I will also begin reviewing Android ebook reader applications. Since this blog is also about life, some of that my infiltrate as well. ;-) Tomorrow I'll be reviewing The Frog Prince's Daughters.
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