Its not perfect. Barbara Babcock was recognized as 2 different faces, 00058 and 00061 and in the episode naked time, Majel Barret was recognized as Chapel and a random character, the only difference was hair up or down. Nice to know that a haircut can confuse it. I hope they don't start using something like this for profiling. Its not ready.
I am currently running the beta on several of my home machines. I can assume you, most emphatically, it does NOT suck. Other than the loss of the classic start menu, which I got over, there is nothing about it I would go back to XP for, and that includes speed.
if you had browser security set high, you did have to at least click to allow it. If you got caught in a drive by install, then you had browser security set low, shame on you.
its not a valid comparison. If I want the latest trek novel, I want the latest trek novel, and the fact that it will not allow me to do TTS is not going to have me think to myself..."well, since I cen't get that novel, let me get the latest star wars novel, that's an acceptable substitute." They are not equivalent. If I want the latest trek novel, then it is buy it or not, it is not buy it or buy something else, and in that case, I would buy it.
Did you look at Dell's site? They have the Asus MyPal for $279 and several models of their Pharos line (most with GPS). They are all windows Mobile, but they are PDAs. You can always hit eBay and pick up a used Axim X51v.
yeah, I use libprs500 almost exclusively, but it won't convert the DRM encumbered formats, though I believe C-Lit will remove it from Lit files you have legitimately purchased then LibPRS can convert it.... Sony really needs to hire Kovid Goyal, it might not be pretty, but Libprs500/Calibre is the best thing to ever happen to their hardware.
What format do you purchase from Fictionwise: Gemstar/Rocket, Secure Adobe Reader (digital edition), Secure Mobipocket (.mobi), Secure MS Reader (.lit), or Secure eReader. I know there is software out there to handle conversion from unlocked LIT and unlocked MOBI to lrf (calibre/libprs), and the latest firmware allows the PRS to handle digital editions, but that really bites as far as the formatting goes. Their selection of books in Rocket format is slim. Have you found a way to "unencumber" the secure formats? I'd love to be able to buy books from other online booksellers and put on the 505 (which I agree had a much better form factor than the Kindle).
The only problem with clamAV is the lack of on access scanning capability. I don't mind running a scan every so often, but its much nicer when the file is scanned as I access it.
Just outta curiosity, what country are you in? I know that the state of broadband here in the US is deplorable, just checking out what country I should be looking for real estate in;-)
I did not mean the list for either to be exhaustive, or a format comparison between the two, but rather to illustrate that both are too open for them to be offered as a loss leader. As long as it can read freely available formats, if sold below cost, there would be a lot of folks who bought them to use just for the open content. I own the Sony and have not purchased any material from Sony. If the device had been offered as a loss leader, without lock in to only use content from their store, they would have lost money on me. I'm sure I'm not the only one.
when I got my iPhone, I hacked it and installed the book reader app on there. I then transferred a few books over to read. I actually read 3 novels on my iPhone. It was not too bad. I own the eReader now. It only took seeing one, and reading from it one time to realize that the iPhone was no comparison.
for that to work, there would have to be complete lock in. You can read HTML, txt and probably doc files on the Kindle. The SOny device can read PDF/BBeB/Txt/RTF/HTML and with some help from available software CHM/MOBI and a half dozen other formats.
my eReader charges from damned near dead to fully charged in under 30 minutes via the USB port of any computer, and they are not lying when they give battery life expectancies in the thousands of page turns (the devices only use power when changing pages, not while displaying them) so a full charge will likely last you 4 or 5 novels, assuming you read a novel a day, if your power goes out on Monday and you are a day or two since your last charge, you will be good until around Tuesday, at which time you carry it to work with you, plug it in, and you are good to go until the power comes back on. I don't know why your device would suddenly have nothing on it either, The data is stored in flash or on SD cards, so that is not affected by the battery running out. I have dropped my reader, and its been okay, tough you are correct, I have heard of problems if dropped hard enough that have warranted a display replacement (they don't repair them) that runs about $30.
I've had mine for nearly a year. I have read a few Adobe digital editions borrowed from the library, but other than that, I have not put DRMed books on mine. I'm not locked by anything.
If you can ask this question, you have not actually read anything from an eInk based device. I'm not being a smart ass. I thought the same thing and I used to read books on my Toshiba e805 which has a full VGA screen with a dpi as high as the iPhone (one of the best looking displays ever put on a PDA). Then I saw eInk. Like someone above, I also own the Sony, not the Kindle, and for remarkably similar reasons. If you have ever read anything on one of the eInk devices, you don't go back. You buy a booklight for when you want to read in the dark, and you never look back. I now use the iPhone as a PDA, and the eReader to read books. The Toshiba is in its case, sitting on my shelf somewhere.
knock offs have been around for years. I'm 40, and I remember getting knock offs as a kid. The plastic was softer and the bricks were not completely solid (they had small holes between the pips on top. My parents had always bought us Legos, then one Christmas, we got these huge, 2000+ piece buckets of some knockoff. They fell apart. My dad played with the kids' Legos too, as I am sure many of us dads do today, so we will notice that the really cool r2 d2 we spent 2 hours building for our kids just simply falls apart when they move it. We never got anything but true Legos afterward. I will never buy my kids the knockoffs for that reason. I think that you have to give the consumer a little credit on this one. If this were a new toy, the store might be different, but today's dads grew up with these things, and we still play with the kids because Legos are just so damned cool, and WE would not want to play with the knock-offs. Don't expect Lego to go out of business any time soon. We are not the only people in the world to think that Lego makes a superior product. Every person who has ever played with both the real thing and a knock-off know it.
I know its bad form to reply to your own post, but I forgot one other issue to mention. In spite of what they say in the article, the page turn time is not 2 seconds. It was that slow with the original libre and PRS 500, the 505 has it down to a second or less. If you hit the next page button as you are hitting the last line, its all good.
I had a PDA that I used for reading eBooks, the Toshiba e805 with its beautiful 640x480 screen. The problems always seemed to be battery life (3.5-4 hours with screen set to near minimum brightness) so you really had to charge it every day, and distractions (real easy to get distracted while reading, go to look something up, then get distracted surfing the net). Because of this I bought a Sony PRS-505. No regrets. I bought a $2.50 book light, and guess what, I can read a night too. The screen is like reading paper in daylight. I charge it about once every 8-10 books.
Before I bought it I could never manage to really find time to read for enjoyment, I got tired of carrying multiple books, so I welcomes eBooks, but I got tired of forgetting to charge the PDA every night.
Great battery life, multiple books, looks great in sunlight and a cheap booklight makes it readable even at night. Great buy and as a dedicated reader its damned near perfect.
Its unfortunate how powerful that lock in really is. There are so many MP3 players out there that are so much more functional, and sound better. The Cowan offerings, and even Creative's Zen Vision series (M30, M60 and W) are much better (sound and video quality), and support a shitload more formats than anything form Apple. The lock with iTunes purchases becoming worthless bits if you switch away from Apple makes most of those offerings a non starter.
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Its not perfect. Barbara Babcock was recognized as 2 different faces, 00058 and 00061 and in the episode naked time, Majel Barret was recognized as Chapel and a random character, the only difference was hair up or down. Nice to know that a haircut can confuse it. I hope they don't start using something like this for profiling. Its not ready.
I am currently running the beta on several of my home machines. I can assume you, most emphatically, it does NOT suck. Other than the loss of the classic start menu, which I got over, there is nothing about it I would go back to XP for, and that includes speed.
if you had browser security set high, you did have to at least click to allow it. If you got caught in a drive by install, then you had browser security set low, shame on you.
its not a valid comparison. If I want the latest trek novel, I want the latest trek novel, and the fact that it will not allow me to do TTS is not going to have me think to myself..."well, since I cen't get that novel, let me get the latest star wars novel, that's an acceptable substitute." They are not equivalent. If I want the latest trek novel, then it is buy it or not, it is not buy it or buy something else, and in that case, I would buy it.
In Soviet Russia, the gostse.cx domain buys you. But its a lie, you don't own it... all your goatse.cx domains are belong to us.... next.
All your memes are belong to us, with Hot grits
Did you look at Dell's site? They have the Asus MyPal for $279 and several models of their Pharos line (most with GPS). They are all windows Mobile, but they are PDAs. You can always hit eBay and pick up a used Axim X51v.
yeah, I use libprs500 almost exclusively, but it won't convert the DRM encumbered formats, though I believe C-Lit will remove it from Lit files you have legitimately purchased then LibPRS can convert it.... Sony really needs to hire Kovid Goyal, it might not be pretty, but Libprs500/Calibre is the best thing to ever happen to their hardware.
What format do you purchase from Fictionwise: Gemstar/Rocket, Secure Adobe Reader (digital edition), Secure Mobipocket (.mobi), Secure MS Reader (.lit), or Secure eReader. I know there is software out there to handle conversion from unlocked LIT and unlocked MOBI to lrf (calibre/libprs), and the latest firmware allows the PRS to handle digital editions, but that really bites as far as the formatting goes. Their selection of books in Rocket format is slim. Have you found a way to "unencumber" the secure formats? I'd love to be able to buy books from other online booksellers and put on the 505 (which I agree had a much better form factor than the Kindle).
government .... they are big black boxes now
Now, not its a big black man not a big black box. No comments about his wife, please.
The only problem with clamAV is the lack of on access scanning capability. I don't mind running a scan every so often, but its much nicer when the file is scanned as I access it.
Just outta curiosity, what country are you in? I know that the state of broadband here in the US is deplorable, just checking out what country I should be looking for real estate in ;-)
Very old anecdote. Likely older than you. Don't make shit up.
I did not mean the list for either to be exhaustive, or a format comparison between the two, but rather to illustrate that both are too open for them to be offered as a loss leader. As long as it can read freely available formats, if sold below cost, there would be a lot of folks who bought them to use just for the open content. I own the Sony and have not purchased any material from Sony. If the device had been offered as a loss leader, without lock in to only use content from their store, they would have lost money on me. I'm sure I'm not the only one.
when I got my iPhone, I hacked it and installed the book reader app on there. I then transferred a few books over to read. I actually read 3 novels on my iPhone. It was not too bad. I own the eReader now. It only took seeing one, and reading from it one time to realize that the iPhone was no comparison.
for that to work, there would have to be complete lock in. You can read HTML, txt and probably doc files on the Kindle. The SOny device can read PDF/BBeB/Txt/RTF/HTML and with some help from available software CHM/MOBI and a half dozen other formats.
my eReader charges from damned near dead to fully charged in under 30 minutes via the USB port of any computer, and they are not lying when they give battery life expectancies in the thousands of page turns (the devices only use power when changing pages, not while displaying them) so a full charge will likely last you 4 or 5 novels, assuming you read a novel a day, if your power goes out on Monday and you are a day or two since your last charge, you will be good until around Tuesday, at which time you carry it to work with you, plug it in, and you are good to go until the power comes back on. I don't know why your device would suddenly have nothing on it either, The data is stored in flash or on SD cards, so that is not affected by the battery running out. I have dropped my reader, and its been okay, tough you are correct, I have heard of problems if dropped hard enough that have warranted a display replacement (they don't repair them) that runs about $30.
I've had mine for nearly a year. I have read a few Adobe digital editions borrowed from the library, but other than that, I have not put DRMed books on mine. I'm not locked by anything.
If you can ask this question, you have not actually read anything from an eInk based device. I'm not being a smart ass. I thought the same thing and I used to read books on my Toshiba e805 which has a full VGA screen with a dpi as high as the iPhone (one of the best looking displays ever put on a PDA). Then I saw eInk. Like someone above, I also own the Sony, not the Kindle, and for remarkably similar reasons. If you have ever read anything on one of the eInk devices, you don't go back. You buy a booklight for when you want to read in the dark, and you never look back. I now use the iPhone as a PDA, and the eReader to read books. The Toshiba is in its case, sitting on my shelf somewhere.
knock offs have been around for years. I'm 40, and I remember getting knock offs as a kid. The plastic was softer and the bricks were not completely solid (they had small holes between the pips on top. My parents had always bought us Legos, then one Christmas, we got these huge, 2000+ piece buckets of some knockoff. They fell apart. My dad played with the kids' Legos too, as I am sure many of us dads do today, so we will notice that the really cool r2 d2 we spent 2 hours building for our kids just simply falls apart when they move it. We never got anything but true Legos afterward. I will never buy my kids the knockoffs for that reason. I think that you have to give the consumer a little credit on this one. If this were a new toy, the store might be different, but today's dads grew up with these things, and we still play with the kids because Legos are just so damned cool, and WE would not want to play with the knock-offs. Don't expect Lego to go out of business any time soon. We are not the only people in the world to think that Lego makes a superior product. Every person who has ever played with both the real thing and a knock-off know it.
guess I should not have clicked the post anonymously box when I said my UID was under 400k :-D
I know its bad form to reply to your own post, but I forgot one other issue to mention. In spite of what they say in the article, the page turn time is not 2 seconds. It was that slow with the original libre and PRS 500, the 505 has it down to a second or less. If you hit the next page button as you are hitting the last line, its all good.
I had a PDA that I used for reading eBooks, the Toshiba e805 with its beautiful 640x480 screen. The problems always seemed to be battery life (3.5-4 hours with screen set to near minimum brightness) so you really had to charge it every day, and distractions (real easy to get distracted while reading, go to look something up, then get distracted surfing the net). Because of this I bought a Sony PRS-505. No regrets. I bought a $2.50 book light, and guess what, I can read a night too. The screen is like reading paper in daylight. I charge it about once every 8-10 books.
Before I bought it I could never manage to really find time to read for enjoyment, I got tired of carrying multiple books, so I welcomes eBooks, but I got tired of forgetting to charge the PDA every night.
Great battery life, multiple books, looks great in sunlight and a cheap booklight makes it readable even at night. Great buy and as a dedicated reader its damned near perfect.
No, a forum on MS vacuum cleaners would not suck, it would blow.
Its unfortunate how powerful that lock in really is. There are so many MP3 players out there that are so much more functional, and sound better. The Cowan offerings, and even Creative's Zen Vision series (M30, M60 and W) are much better (sound and video quality), and support a shitload more formats than anything form Apple. The lock with iTunes purchases becoming worthless bits if you switch away from Apple makes most of those offerings a non starter.