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Asus Plans Dual-Display E-Reader

Posted by kdawson on from the blurring-the-lines dept.

adeelarshad82 writes "Yet more confirmation has emerged that Asus plans its own e-book reader. An Asus representative in the UK appears to have confirmed this, with the additional details that there may be a value-priced as well as a premium version. The article guesses at the price point for the low-end model — around £100 ($192). Unlike current e-book readers, which take the form of a single flat screen, the Asus device has a hinged spine, like a printed book. This, in theory, enables its owner to read an e-book much like a normal book, using the touchscreen to 'turn' the pages from one screen to the next. Asus showed off a prototype of the device at the CeBIT trade show in March." Reader NeverBotedBush adds, "Asus's e-reader will likely have color touch screens, a speaker, a webcam, and a microphone, along with the capability to make inexpensive Skype calls." The color screen rules out using E Ink technology, so long battery life seems to be unlikely.

8 of 199 comments (clear)

  1. Still not going to be Mainstream... by Afforess · · Score: 4, Insightful

    ~$200 may be low-end, but that's still not mainstream. E-books still have a lot of cons they have to get past, and a 200 entry fee isn't helping. As a college student, I would need to be able to resell books, but e-books are "rentals" where I can never sell them, without selling the account. IMO that's the biggest reason E-books are still on the launching pad, many (college) books are bought for $120, but resold for $80, so effectively, I payed for a $40 book. With E-books, it's the same price, but I can't sell them. Once we can buy and sell e-books like used books, I may look into it, but that and the high entry cost basically guarantee that I'll never buy one.

    --
    If our elected representatives no longer represent us, do we still live in a Democracy?
    1. Re:Still not going to be Mainstream... by sayfawa · · Score: 4, Insightful

      Why would college students who download gigs of mp3s/month have a problem with downloading some "illegal" pdfs? Just search for physics or math on any torrent site and see what you get. I now have digital copies of not only every physics text I've ever owned, I have digital copies of every physics text I've ever heard of.

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      Free the Quark 3 from asymptotic confinement! Bring your charm! Don't get down! All colours and flavours welcome!
    2. Re:Still not going to be Mainstream... by langelgjm · · Score: 4, Interesting

      I doubt it will be mainstream, but not for the same reasons as you think.

      Strike 1: it's not e-ink/e-paper. So, that makes it what, a dual-screen tablet? Cool, but e-ink is what makes e-readers so great, and so much better for reading, than tablets or laptops or netbooks.

      Now, $200 isn't bad, compared to $299 for the Kindle 2, or more for the DX. So that's a plus. As for the college students and the price of books... I sympathize to a point. I would definitely not purchase standard undergraduate texts in electronic form. They're a ripoff in paper form to begin with, but at least you can resell them (if only for a fraction of what you paid if you were unfortunate enough to buy new).

      As a grad student, though, you'll find your reading habits changing. It's somewhat discipline dependent, but everyone will be reading articles, mostly in PDF format. Kindle DX, etc., are superb for that. I've also purchased two books for a class from Amazon for my Kindle. In both cases, they were cheaper than any used copies I could find. I know I can't resell them, but I don't anticipate selling that sort of book anyway (it was inexpensive to begin with, and I will probably need it for reference when studying for comps).

      In the meantime, I've found at least one book for a class on a torrent site, and I do things like copy all my typed notes to the Kindle. Is it saving me money? Absolutely not. But I don't have to print out hundreds of pages or be stuck at a computer to read things, and that alone is worth it for me.

      --
      "Anyone who [rips a CD] is probably engaging in copyright infringement." - David O. Carson
    3. Re:Still not going to be Mainstream... by sayfawa · · Score: 4, Funny

      For your viewing pleasure.

      --
      Free the Quark 3 from asymptotic confinement! Bring your charm! Don't get down! All colours and flavours welcome!
  2. That's Great, But... by Quothz · · Score: 4, Insightful
    TFA doesn't address the real questions: What formats can it handle? Will it only be able to handle some bizarre custom, DRM-protected format? Will it primarily deal with some bizarre custom, DRM-protected format? Will Asus have remote control to fiddle with my files? Will it gather data about me, what I'm reading, and/or who I'm calling on Skype?

    I refuse to get excited until I know whether it's More of the Same (TM) or not, shiny features be damned.

  3. Awesome, I think? by binarylarry · · Score: 5, Funny

    I keep reading the post over and over, trying to figure out how they hide the words "...includes the words "Don't Panic" written in large letters on the back."

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  4. Dual Screens = Opportunity by BBCWatcher · · Score: 4, Interesting

    Why not make one screen E Ink and the other more conventional color (LED-backlit, TFT)? If you want the long battery life and don't care about color at a particular time, keep the color display powered off. Otherwise, if there's an illustration or photo that you want to see in color, drag/swipe the picture/page over to the color display and spend some battery juice. Bonus points if the entire color display is simply a snap-on accessory that you don't have to buy and don't have to carry everywhere.

  5. Re:Feature Creep by MrMista_B · · Score: 4, Insightful

    Also, it isn't a computer if it has a microphone, webcam, color screen, and the ability to connect to a global network. :)

    You forget that as technology advances, so must our names for things.

    That, and it sounds like, well, you wouldn't want the product - however, I, and I think many millions more, /do/, just as it is.