sony e-book reader pricing and launch date announced on [technabob]

sony e-book reader pricing and launch date announced

posted: September 26th, 2006 3 comments author: technabob

Sony has officially announced that their long-awaited e-book reader will be hitting the streets this October for about $350 USD.

The Sony Reader features an innovative high contrast E-ink display, capable of allowing up to 7,500 pages to be displayed without a battery recharge. The display is designed to be read from just about any angle, and won’t wash out under daylight conditions (although I’d love a backlight for nighttime reading).

It’s hard to tell from the picture, but the Sony Reader is only about the size of a large paperback book at 6.9-inches high by 4.9-inches wide by .5-inch thick.

Out of the box, the player has sufficient (64MB) memory to store about 80 eBooks. Plenty of additional storage can be gained by adding a Memory Stick or SD memory card. In addition to displaying Sony’s book format, the Reader can also be used to view Adobe PDF files, JPEGs and even has audio playback capability for MP3 and AAC files.

Included with the Reader will be access to Sony’s CONNECT online store with over 10,000 eBook titles available for download. Sony has also announced that they will be including a $50 certificate toward eBook purchases with initial shipments of the Reader through December.

This is looking like it could be one of the must have gadgets for this holiday season.

3 comments comment

1. KennyP | September 26th, 2006 at 10:12 pm

Hehe. “Reading.” That’s adorable.
2. James | October 2nd, 2006 at 5:29 am

Have Sony announced a European release date/price?
3. technabob | October 2nd, 2006 at 6:17 am

Sorry, I haven’t been able to find out a European release date. My understanding is that there were some issues with publishers that needed to be ironed out earlier this year that resulted in a delay for the European market though.