Txtr e-reader: No vaporware if you go by this demo? I’m optimistic
What’s that again? The txtr e-reader is just vaporware? That’s what the skeptics said, and only time will tell. But if you go by this video with a German soundtrack and do a little guessing—I don’t speak German—the txtr e-reader looks off to a good start. Nice prototype.
Perhaps txtr’s Joscha Bach, a TeleRead community member, can update us and maybe even arrange for an English-language YouTube. The current video is from Cebit 2009.
The reader is to appear first in Europe. Last I knew, Wizpack was aiming for local release in the third quarter of 2009. Seems to me from afar that Joscha and colleagues have given their baby a lot of thought. Best of luck!
Basics: E Ink, ePub capabilities and other openness, WiFi, 3G. More specs here.
A modest request: Any possibility of adding some vowels to the name of the reader, so the spelling is easier to remember? And using a cap? How about Textra? Writers and copy editors everywhere might appreciate that. I must have spelled the name three or four different ways as I was writing this.
Related: Detailed TeleRead post on the txtr. So what’s changed since the January 23 post, Joscha?
(Thanks to Electricbook and to Hadrien Gardeur of Feedbooks.)
March 11th, 2009 at 11:16 am
Let me try to answer your points:
First of all, the txtr reader is definitively no vaporware (although the Techcrunch article was funny). eBooks are a hot topic in Germany, too, and we currently get a lot of local press coverage. (More info and a spec sheet is on http://reader.txtr.com)
As you can perhaps see in the video, page switching is slightly faster than on the Kindle2, and we omitted the keyboard in favor of a touch solution, to make the device much more compact. Also, we have built an accelerometer into the device, so you can use it left- or right-handed, or in portrait mode.
We are going to keep the device as open as possible; if you like, you can write your own applications for it (runs on Linux and will have a built-in Python interpreter).
The name “txtr” stems from our online platform. It is pronounced “texter”, and we are quite happy with it, because it makes for short document URLs. We have pondered many names for the device:
— “What about ‘Napalm’, folks? Our answer to the Kindle…”
— “Aargh. No, let’s call it ‘txtr rdr’ instead!”
— “But, but – we could call the firmware ‘NapalmOS’!”
— “Forget it. Let’s use the name of some important German thinker. Someone without Umlauts and who was no Nazi.”
— “‘Heine’ is taken, that’s a publisher. What about ‘Kant’?”
— “Can’t use that in English, man! American TV would change the name into ‘Beep book’…”
Eventually, we stuck with “txtr reader”, for the time being. A lot better than, say, “PRS-505″, no?
March 11th, 2009 at 1:26 pm
“How about Textra?”
If they rename it to that do you promise to not title a future blog post about it:
“Textra, Textra, read all about it!!”
March 11th, 2009 at 2:29 pm
“and we omitted the keyboard in favor of a touch solution” – Joscha
So there are note taking capabilities and Search Functions?
“to make the device much more compact. Also, we have built an accelerometer into the device, so you can use it left- or right-handed, or in portrait mode.” – Joscha
Brilliant, absolutely brilliant. Please, get them to America quickly. I buy! I buy!
March 11th, 2009 at 4:58 pm
Text input will happen through the slider interface, which is less convenient than through a keyboard (more like T9, in fact). The decision was made after we found that we rarely used the keyboard on our test Kindles…
March 13th, 2009 at 1:11 pm
Using an on-screen keyboard is fine. Nobody is going to be writing a novel with the thing, after all.
Just one query/request; paging won’t depend on swipes, I trust? Simple presses in a user designated spot would be optimum for reader immersion.
Also, while lots of supported formats is good in principle, less formats with deep/flexible user typography control on all is preferable to lots of supported formats with poor presentation controls. (Hint: true type font support in many sizes is good.)
Looks like your hardware designers have the right idea; now its up to the software folks to match them.
Looking forward to the product’s release.
March 14th, 2009 at 6:07 pm
Are all the input areas capacitive, ie, are there no physical switches?
I ask because page turn keys get quite a lot of use and I’m starting to find some keys on my BeBook feel like they are deteriorating.
Txtr looks great in the demo, good work guys.