Sony PRS-505 Portable Digital e-Reader System (Silver) by Sony
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Digital camera reviews of Sony PRS-505 Portable Digital e-Reader System (Silver)
Digital camera Review: A Great Buy - Still
Summary: 4 Stars
I purchased the Sony 505 before the release of the current PRS-300/600 mainly as a experiment to see if I would enjoy reading material electronically. So far so good. The e-Ink is easy on the eyes. Much has been said about the reading material available for the PRS 505. I have found no shortage of material, especially once I found "calibre". I am able to download news from various news papers and magazines, enough to satisfy my needs. There are a number of websites that provide public domain books free of charge ([...]is the best of the lot). And yes, I have purchased books from Sony eStore and and other eBook Stores. Sony, with its latest version of the eReader Software (3.0) has made it compatible with MAC users. Synching the reader with your MAC or PC is easy. I highly recommend the "Custom Cover and Light" from Sony. It has proven to be a valuable tool for late night reading. I rated the eReader 4 stars mainly because it is missing some items that are available in the PRS-600, touch screen, note taking, highlighting and the 505 page turning lags a little occasionally. Other than that the eReaders from Sony are great. The conversion of Sony material to ePUB formats is a real plus. The Sony's ability to read multiple formats is it's greatest strength. The eReader world needs to settle on a standard and ePUB from Adobe could easily be that standard. If you are wondering about eReaders, now may be the time to buy, the prices on the 505s are coming down on left over eReaders and you may still be able to locate one (PRS-505). I am waiting on the "Daily Edition" from Sony before I make a decision on which model to upgrade to as my next reader.Digital camera Review: A Great Product
Summary: 5 Stars
I am very pleased with the Sony E-Reader. I haven't experienced any down side to it. I chose the Sony E-Reader over the Kindle due to the fact that our cell phone reception is spotty. I didn't want to trust that method to download books into a reader. Reviewer comments about the Sony Library being hard to use have some merit, but it's more about patience than it being a real problem. I haven't downloaded any PDF files, but had not anticipated doing so. I bought the reader strictly for books. I'm pleased to find so many books available, more every day, in the Sony format, and at places other than just Sony itself. One of the hardest things I've done is trying to pick my free 100 Classic books from Sony. Delivery of the reader was very quick, 5 days before anticipated. I have no regrets about this purchase.Digital camera Review: A Huge Disappointment.
Summary: 2 Stars
I was very happy when I first bought my Sony Reader, from which I had high expectations. However, since the beginning I noticed that the background was too dark for my sight. Given that brightness/contrast can not be adjusted, I decided to buy the light, which in my opinion was a terrible investment as the glass is not transparent but rather blurry. So, in the end I could not read properly. The only way I found to read with some comfort was by increasing the letter size to maximum, which I personally do not like. I thus ended up returning everything. I hope Sony solve this important issues by the next generation of its ebook reader.
On top of this, the charger is an essential component that should come with the Reader and not being sold separately. As Sony is handling the different components being sold individually turns its reader too pricey for the quality of the item. I have to add that I was surprised with the poor quality of this particular eReader being Sony such a well regarded company in terms of quality products.
Thanks
Digital camera Review: A good reader, a reasonable price
Summary: 3 Stars
This was a fantastic find for me. Both as a professional and as an avid reader. It is however, a device designed for a very specific purpose. That wasn't meant to be a negative though. Just a comment for those ready to use the device for unusual pursuits.
Much of what is criticised about this reader is a lack of understanding by the user. Formatting is a big issue with these types of devices. If anyone is apt to stray from standard formats, they will do so at their own peril. This device is engineered very specifically. The PDF files are designed for low MB, properly formatted pages. These can be generated from almost any format with a little effort and some understanding by the user.
I tested the device by loading the Summa Theologica (a 39,000 page book) converted from ascii to a bare bone PDF format of 18 MBs. The load time was reasonable, and documents this large can readily and easily be divided and organized into parts of 2-3 MBs.
The great plus about any reading device is the myriad of free academic content available. Project Gutenberg springs to mind immediately, with over 20,000 free downloads in ascii vanilla text format is a great resource for formatting into the eReader.
I also wouldn't buy an ac adapter if you already have an iPod ac adapter. I use mine to charge the eReader, my iPod, my cell phone, and sometimes my wireless mouse (I'm weird like that).
Digital camera Review: A joy to use and an almost perfect "reader"
Summary: 4 Stars
I've now been using my PRS for about 3 months. I have it with me every day, it has just become one of those devices I must have with me. I'm the type of person who is either reading something or in between books, so the reader saves me a lot of shelf space and saves me trips to the bookstore.
Pros:
- Text is sharp and the contrast is impressive. Even images look great on it, so there's no need to worry about books with charts or illustrations.
- Generally a very long battery life. An advantage to "electronic paper" is it takes no power to maintain an image on the screen, only to change it.
- The display excels in lighted conditions. There is no washout in the sun, so you can read outdoors with the reader as easily as you could with a paper book.
- The design pretty well preserves the experience of reading a book. The cover fits securely onto the device, and there are page turn buttons on the right and lower left corner, which allows you to hold it and read in whatever way you prefer. I like to hold the reader in my left hand and flip the pages with my thumb.
- Multiple ways to organize your books. You can search by author, title and date, but the great feature is the ability to create Collections. For example, I'm currently taking classes in Criminal Justice and created a Collection called "Law and Crime" containing articles I loaded for quick reference.
- Image and audio support. While not essential, it's nice to have other features.
- Memory stick and SD support. The internal memory is a bit on the cramped size, but these make up for it. Files loaded on memory cards are almost seamlessly integrated into the interface (you get an icon next to files to let you know they are located on a card). The cards supported allow you to expand storage by up to 10gb, which is far, far more than I anticipate needing.
Cons:
- The battery acts a little funny, and maybe this is just due to my own ignorance on the subject. For example, I hooked the reader up to the USB port while the computer was booting up, and the battery went from 2 bars to 0, giving me a low battery warning. Is it possible for the computer to DRAIN power from the device? I assumed it would either charge or not charge.
- The load time for files is on the slow side. I'm referring to the time between selecting a book and being able to read it, not to the delay between page flips. It may take up to 30 seconds for a large book to load into memory, which seems excessive to me. Also, if you have a memory card inserted it can take a long time for the reader to load the interface upon disconnecting from the computer. Once or twice I thought it had frozen, but was actually just taking a very, very long time.
- I'm hoping Sony improves the page turn delay. It's new technology and I know they improved the delay from the previous model, but it's still not ideal.
- While I understand the technology doesn't allow backlighting, Sony should consider installing a front light similar to the one Nintendo used on their Game Boy. A switch to turn the light on and off would preserve battery. It's not a big deal to get a book light, but I don't care for the glare on the screen this causes.
- The Collections feature was inspired, but I think it should work for images and audio files in addition to books.
- While memory card support is "almost seamless" as I said earlier, I noticed that you can't create a Collection that contains books both in internal memory and on a card - it's either/or. This is a minor shortcoming, but it would be nice to be able to use Collections to link to all sources.