BeBook shows 5″ reader
By Paul Biba
I want one of these!! From the BeBook blog:
Introducing the ‘mini’ BeBook (5″)
The BeBook mini, all the features of the large version and more, but a slightly smaller screen (1″ / 2,5cm smaller). Perfect for travelling, this reader fits in any pocket. Full specs and a very competitave price level will follow shortly.
April 29th, 2009 at 10:04 pm
I have the current model, and although it really could be improved in terms of design, it is good enough to get the job done.
So I’m surprised that so few changes to the design are apparent in the 5″ model – the jog wheel can be seen on the edge of the white model, but there don’t appear to be any other changes.
I really hope that this will run OpenInkPot with little work required from the developers; that would make the device well worth getting.
It will also be interesting to see if there is any improvement in the quality and speed of the display (the 6″ screens seem to be of variable quality, with some owners reporting low contrast and speckles).
April 30th, 2009 at 12:27 am
I’m generally happy with my Kindle 2, but one of my beefs is the size of the margins when reading books. Some pictures of this book that I have seen show the text going the full width of the screen — no margins.
If you do the math, you’ll see that this 5″ screen would actually show more text per page than the 6″ Amazon screen.
I have found the K2 keyboard to be surprisingly useful, but if portability is your thing you get a smaller screen size and no keyboard without giving up any screen real estate.
April 30th, 2009 at 2:18 pm
This so reminds me of the old Handera 330.
May 1st, 2009 at 10:07 am
Cute! But will it work with “Secure Mobipocket”?
May 1st, 2009 at 11:53 am
Fred: the virtually identical 6″ BoBook supports Secure MOBI.
All the “independent” ebook reader vendors are facing uncertainty at present because mobile Adobe Digital Editions (Secure ePub and PDF) is now a viable alternative to Secure MOBI on dedicated reading devices but MobiPocket still requires DRM-exclusivity. What seems likely to happen in the near term is two sets of firmware, one with Adobe and the other with MobiPocket.
May 1st, 2009 at 2:21 pm
WIRED seems to know something:
http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/04/200-e-book-reader-set-to-make-its-debut/
Under US$200?