Sony PRS-700 Ebook Reader

Ebook Reader - Sony PRS-700 Digital Book Reader Review

How good is the Sony PRS-700 Ebook Reader?

Sony's Ebook Reader upgrade, which is the main competitor to the Amazon Kindle Ebook Reader, is the RPS-700. It is small and lightweight, weighing only 285 grams. Like other portable ebook readers, also called digital book readers, it is the size of a paperback book.

The Sony PRS-700 Ebook Reader has the touchscreen functions that people have come to expect from portable ebook readers and are similar to those on the iPhone. To flip a page for example you slide your finger across the screen. The screen measures 6 inches and has zoom in and out features. For the text you can choose between 5 options.

It has a built-in LED light, support for memory cards – SD and Memory Stick Duo, and the option to write notes.

The PRS-700 can store approximately 350 ebooks and more if you use the Memory Stick or SD Card. The battery will allow up to 7,500 pages of continuous reading.

It has been available since October and costs US$400.

Sony timed the launch to coincide with a month-long ebook promotional campaign related to National Book Month. Ebook sales teams were deployed across the U.S. to promote the PRS-700 ebook reader and at one event in New York, Dave Farrow, a memory expert and speed-reader, lived in a shop window for a month reading ebooks using the Rs-700. Sony donated a library of 100 electronic books to a school for each page that Farrow reads.

According to Sony the PRS-700 features "high-resolution, high contrast electronic paper display technology" which means it is almost like reading ink on paper.

According to Gizmodo, however, the "improvements" that Sony made to their ebook reader have "taken away the very essence of the Reader—the easy-on-the-eyes screen" which they say is a fatal design flaw, and in certain conditions the screen picks up so much ambient light it becomes impossible to read.

So it would probably make sense to actually check out the screen on the PRS-700 before buying one. The Amazon Kindle Ebook Reader has not had such criticisms levelled at it, but at the moment it is very hard to find a new one as Amazon did not order enough of them and they are sold out, largely as a result of Oprach calling it her "favorite gadget".

There is also the Onyx Boox to consider which is due to be shipped in April 2010.