Sightly OT: e-readers

Posted by Dr Andus
Jan 24, 2011 at 10:56 PM

dan7000 wrote:
I’m wondering if anyone here has experience and
>suggestions about whether I should consider an e-reader other than Kindle.

I recommend you take a look at the “iPad” and “Beyond the PDF” threads on this forum a few days ago, as there’s been a bit of discussion on there about e-readers and PDFs. I’m also shopping for an e-reader solution, specifically to be able to read and annotate PDFs. I’ve done a bit of research and I’ve concluded that none of the dedicated e-readers on the market are up to the task. So the next best thing seem to be to use a tablet PC with a PDF annotating software. Then the next question is which device and which operating system. What I’ve heard is that the current Android OS (2.1, 2.2) have been designed for phones not for tablets, so they’re not as smooth as iPad’s OS is. Also, I couldn’t find any Android software for reading and annotating PDF that could match the sophistication of GoodReader or PDF Expert on iPad (check out the reviews on Youtube for these). Then there are Windows 7 tablets. However, Win 7 was also not designed for tablets, so what I hear is that it is sluggish, takes up most of the memory, and is not so tablet-user-friendly. Though some of the higher end ones seem decent, but they’re twice the price of the cheapest iPad.

So far I’m drawn to iPad + PDF Expert combination. I suspect the price of iPad 1 will fall dramatically once the 80 or so different tablets that were announced for this year start gradually appearing the market (and once iPad 2 comes out in April).