USA Today “Personal Tech” columnist Edward Baig reviews Amazon’s new e-book reader, the Kindle, and compares it to Sony’s e-book reader.
Once you get used to reading James Patterson, Michael Lewis and other authors on a light paperback-size electronic reader, it’s less odd than you think. You eventually forget how you’re reading, and get engrossed in the writer’s creation. I reached that conclusion after testing two devices: the wireless Kindle that Amazon.com released last week; and the non-wireless Sony Reader Portable Reader System PRS-505, the second edition of a contraption I reviewed a year ago.
The machines are pricey: $399 for the Kindle, $300 for the Reader. And you’re probably thinking, what’s wrong with the old fashioned paper-based books we’ve been reading for centuries? The devices use gray-scale electronic ink technology, which does a fine job replicating reading on actual paper - notwithstanding the moment it takes for pages to refresh. Neither 6-inch screen is back-lit. You can’t read in the dark. Displays are meant to reduce eyestrain and preserve the battery.
Baig thinks e-book readers have “a surprisingly promising future.”
Me? I’m holding out for one that can be recharged via solar power.
