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Cybook 3 initial thoughts
Feb. 9th, 2008 03:13 pmSo after the initial shipment being hijacked and Lost In France, the second shipment was sent by Bookeen on Thursday. According to Fedex it would arrive before 10:30am on Friday. Hah, yeah, right. Like that'll ever happen; overnight from France and FedEx deliver? Bwahahah.
At 9:25 I got an email about failed to deliver because I wasn't home to accept it.
OK. So FedEx _did_ do what they said they would. Annoyingly the door label they left didn't say what day they'd redeliver and the web site wasn't updated until 9:54pm saying the package was back, so I got Tori to take me to the depot to collect it on Saturday morning (fighting road works; they literally took away the whole bridge that we needed to cross!)
Now I ordered the "deluxe" package; the reader, leather case, spare battery, 2Gb SD card, portable charger, headphones. So I was a little worried when FedEx gave me a light "medium" sized box. As Tori was driving home I opened the FedEx box and pulled out the single Cybook box. Aww crap; they didn't send me everything. Opened that box and... oh! Everything _is_ in here!
Wow, that reader is small. I mean, small. And so light that I thought the battery in the box was the one that needed to be installed. But, no, it powered up. According to their specs, it's 0.3" thick and 6oz. Now it is wider and taller than a normal paperback, but it's so much thinner and lighter. Even fits into the pocket of my lightweight jacket. To give some sort of idea, it's the same height as your standard DVD case, not quite as wide, and only half as thick.
It felt just like how I expected a datapad from Star Trek:TNG to feel; just the right heft and balance and size to be held naturally with no stress. Despite the thinness there's little give; it doesn't feel like it'd snap in your hands by accident.
OK, let's turn it on. Hold the power button down for 2 seconds and a splash screen shows. Hmm, it stays on this screen for 15 seconds. Then it switches to a second screen where, presumably it's scanning for media. This takes another 5 seconds. That's after I cleaned out the internal flash and removed the demo books and images, leaving just 5 books. On the 2Gb flash card I put the 161 Baen Ebooks I have and that media scan took 24 seconds. So, for me, overall boot time is somewhere around the 40 second mark. That doesn't sound much, but it's a lot longer than it takes to open a real book to a bookmarked page.
I think Bookeen need to add a "keylock" mode where controls are disabled but the device is still on standby mode. If I put the pad down (ugh, it's gonna be hard not to refer to this as a datapad!) for a while it's nice that the screen is still where I left it, just like a real book. But after 15 minutes (tunable) the machine turns off. Unfortunately I don't want to turn off the "autooff" mode because the controls are too easy to hit by accident if I put it in my bag or coat. So we need a "keylock".
Navigation through books is also a little clumsy when dealing with a large number of books. Where coverart is available (eg in PRC files), the Cybook will create a thumbnail image and store this on the SD card or internal memory. Creation of these thumbnails are "on demand" (eg as you go to the index page), so initial movement through the 166 books was quite slow. But eventually they've all been made and movement is quicker. BUT... we're still navigating 166 books in bulk. You can change the index page to 5, 10 or 20 books per page but the more books you put on the less detail you see from each book ("The Best o..." isn't a great title, which is all I see at 10 books per page).
Now that's with 166 books, taking up 135Mb of the 2Gb SD card. I have definite doubts as to the scalability of the user interface in the current form.
I think Bookeen need to add a tree navigation option. My Ebooks are stored hierarchically by author/series, so allowing me to go through my library that way would be good. At least the media scan _does_ search sub directories!
Epaper... this technology is very neat. It's quite readable. I don't think quite as readable as real paper, and the contrast isn't very good so grey-scaled images aren't too good (especially when reduced to thumbnails for covert art!) but it's neat and results in quite nice readable pages. (A brief primer: it takes power to move "ink" particles to the right place on the screen, but once there it requires no power at all to maintain the image. Cool, huh?). One downside is that the screen needs to "flash" between pages. The Cybook allows you to turn this off, but this can result in ink remaining where it shouldn't; the page needs to be forced to black between refreshes or else ghosting can occur. Apparently all epaper readers suffer this issue (I noticed someone on the subway with an Amazon Kindle a couple of weeks ago and his did the same thing). Now the flash isn't quite as bad as I originally thought it might have been because it's at the same time as your eye is scanning back from the bottom of the page to the top again. A "white" page would be less intrusive, but I guess the technology just doesn't work that way. It takes somewhere slightly over 1 second to go from one page to the next.
In a way the Cybook is almost developed for left handed use; you want to leave your thumb over the navigation pad so you can hit left or down to get to the next page. If you rest the pad in the web between thumb and finger of your left hand then the thumb is naturally in place. If you use your right hand then I find I'm holding it more by the corner with the little finger providing the supporting balance (which isn't a problem given how light the machine is!) with the thumb joint being in the right place to press the controls, or with the thumb flexed. Not quite as nice.
The main button controls themselves are the most annoying part of the cybook thus far; they don't always register presses (especially the central OK button) and you have to press more firmly. Because the CPU and subsystems are frequently in sleep mode it's not always clear if the machine is just slow to respond (waking up, writing data to flash, whatever) or it just hasn't received the keyclick. Conversely the side controls ("mp3 mode", "menu", "return", "delete" - the last currently non functioning in this software version) appear too easy to hit and I've found myself hitting the buttons by mistake when picking the device up off the table.
ETA: Actually the main button controls may be noticed, but the software is ignoring it. I just pressed "down" and noticed the green light showing activity... but no page change. Hmm!
Now the accessories; mostly I got the deluxe package because I wanted a case to carry this around in. Unfortunately the leather case increases the thickness to slightly _thicker_ than a DVD box, and it's a sleeve design with cover, with cutouts for the screen, controls etc. These never work that well, and it looks like the cybook is slightly off center inside the sleeve. When the cover is open it looks like a book and I'm tempted to hold it that way but then my hand is nowhere near the controls, so the cover needs to be folded completely around. There's resistance to that, but this might be because it's new.
It also came a spare battery (the battery compartment is held on with a small screw and the battery clips in with a small fly lead). A set of earbud style headphones (this device can play mp3s, but I very much doubt I'll use it for that; that's why I have my iPod Classic 160Gb). A standard USB cable. A 2Gb SD card (the cybook can not use SDHC, only SD, so my spare 16Gb SDHC card wasn't much use). And a travel power charger. Now this is also tiny. It's actually a mains to USB power adapter; the output looks like a USB port where you just plug in your normal USB charging cable, and is smaller than an egg. Now I have a similar charger for my iPod Classic (infact they look identical, except the Cybook one has retractable power prongs for better portability) so I might have a two-for-one travel charger!
Last week I read "At All Costs" (David Weber) using my cellphone (PPC 6700, the HTC Apache) as an ebook reader. It was quite easy to use one handed while standing on the subway; one hand holding the bar for support and one hand holding the phone and navigating. Battery life sucked. Each night I'd find my place in the dead-tree edition so at night I'd read that (phone on charge).
This week I plan on reading "Shadow Of Saganami" using the Cybook to see how that compares. I'd like to use the Cybook in bed as well. We'll see how well that works with my bedside light and the way I typically read in bed :-)
At 9:25 I got an email about failed to deliver because I wasn't home to accept it.
OK. So FedEx _did_ do what they said they would. Annoyingly the door label they left didn't say what day they'd redeliver and the web site wasn't updated until 9:54pm saying the package was back, so I got Tori to take me to the depot to collect it on Saturday morning (fighting road works; they literally took away the whole bridge that we needed to cross!)
Now I ordered the "deluxe" package; the reader, leather case, spare battery, 2Gb SD card, portable charger, headphones. So I was a little worried when FedEx gave me a light "medium" sized box. As Tori was driving home I opened the FedEx box and pulled out the single Cybook box. Aww crap; they didn't send me everything. Opened that box and... oh! Everything _is_ in here!
Wow, that reader is small. I mean, small. And so light that I thought the battery in the box was the one that needed to be installed. But, no, it powered up. According to their specs, it's 0.3" thick and 6oz. Now it is wider and taller than a normal paperback, but it's so much thinner and lighter. Even fits into the pocket of my lightweight jacket. To give some sort of idea, it's the same height as your standard DVD case, not quite as wide, and only half as thick.
It felt just like how I expected a datapad from Star Trek:TNG to feel; just the right heft and balance and size to be held naturally with no stress. Despite the thinness there's little give; it doesn't feel like it'd snap in your hands by accident.
OK, let's turn it on. Hold the power button down for 2 seconds and a splash screen shows. Hmm, it stays on this screen for 15 seconds. Then it switches to a second screen where, presumably it's scanning for media. This takes another 5 seconds. That's after I cleaned out the internal flash and removed the demo books and images, leaving just 5 books. On the 2Gb flash card I put the 161 Baen Ebooks I have and that media scan took 24 seconds. So, for me, overall boot time is somewhere around the 40 second mark. That doesn't sound much, but it's a lot longer than it takes to open a real book to a bookmarked page.
I think Bookeen need to add a "keylock" mode where controls are disabled but the device is still on standby mode. If I put the pad down (ugh, it's gonna be hard not to refer to this as a datapad!) for a while it's nice that the screen is still where I left it, just like a real book. But after 15 minutes (tunable) the machine turns off. Unfortunately I don't want to turn off the "autooff" mode because the controls are too easy to hit by accident if I put it in my bag or coat. So we need a "keylock".
Navigation through books is also a little clumsy when dealing with a large number of books. Where coverart is available (eg in PRC files), the Cybook will create a thumbnail image and store this on the SD card or internal memory. Creation of these thumbnails are "on demand" (eg as you go to the index page), so initial movement through the 166 books was quite slow. But eventually they've all been made and movement is quicker. BUT... we're still navigating 166 books in bulk. You can change the index page to 5, 10 or 20 books per page but the more books you put on the less detail you see from each book ("The Best o..." isn't a great title, which is all I see at 10 books per page).
Now that's with 166 books, taking up 135Mb of the 2Gb SD card. I have definite doubts as to the scalability of the user interface in the current form.
I think Bookeen need to add a tree navigation option. My Ebooks are stored hierarchically by author/series, so allowing me to go through my library that way would be good. At least the media scan _does_ search sub directories!
Epaper... this technology is very neat. It's quite readable. I don't think quite as readable as real paper, and the contrast isn't very good so grey-scaled images aren't too good (especially when reduced to thumbnails for covert art!) but it's neat and results in quite nice readable pages. (A brief primer: it takes power to move "ink" particles to the right place on the screen, but once there it requires no power at all to maintain the image. Cool, huh?). One downside is that the screen needs to "flash" between pages. The Cybook allows you to turn this off, but this can result in ink remaining where it shouldn't; the page needs to be forced to black between refreshes or else ghosting can occur. Apparently all epaper readers suffer this issue (I noticed someone on the subway with an Amazon Kindle a couple of weeks ago and his did the same thing). Now the flash isn't quite as bad as I originally thought it might have been because it's at the same time as your eye is scanning back from the bottom of the page to the top again. A "white" page would be less intrusive, but I guess the technology just doesn't work that way. It takes somewhere slightly over 1 second to go from one page to the next.
In a way the Cybook is almost developed for left handed use; you want to leave your thumb over the navigation pad so you can hit left or down to get to the next page. If you rest the pad in the web between thumb and finger of your left hand then the thumb is naturally in place. If you use your right hand then I find I'm holding it more by the corner with the little finger providing the supporting balance (which isn't a problem given how light the machine is!) with the thumb joint being in the right place to press the controls, or with the thumb flexed. Not quite as nice.
The main button controls themselves are the most annoying part of the cybook thus far; they don't always register presses (especially the central OK button) and you have to press more firmly. Because the CPU and subsystems are frequently in sleep mode it's not always clear if the machine is just slow to respond (waking up, writing data to flash, whatever) or it just hasn't received the keyclick. Conversely the side controls ("mp3 mode", "menu", "return", "delete" - the last currently non functioning in this software version) appear too easy to hit and I've found myself hitting the buttons by mistake when picking the device up off the table.
ETA: Actually the main button controls may be noticed, but the software is ignoring it. I just pressed "down" and noticed the green light showing activity... but no page change. Hmm!
Now the accessories; mostly I got the deluxe package because I wanted a case to carry this around in. Unfortunately the leather case increases the thickness to slightly _thicker_ than a DVD box, and it's a sleeve design with cover, with cutouts for the screen, controls etc. These never work that well, and it looks like the cybook is slightly off center inside the sleeve. When the cover is open it looks like a book and I'm tempted to hold it that way but then my hand is nowhere near the controls, so the cover needs to be folded completely around. There's resistance to that, but this might be because it's new.
It also came a spare battery (the battery compartment is held on with a small screw and the battery clips in with a small fly lead). A set of earbud style headphones (this device can play mp3s, but I very much doubt I'll use it for that; that's why I have my iPod Classic 160Gb). A standard USB cable. A 2Gb SD card (the cybook can not use SDHC, only SD, so my spare 16Gb SDHC card wasn't much use). And a travel power charger. Now this is also tiny. It's actually a mains to USB power adapter; the output looks like a USB port where you just plug in your normal USB charging cable, and is smaller than an egg. Now I have a similar charger for my iPod Classic (infact they look identical, except the Cybook one has retractable power prongs for better portability) so I might have a two-for-one travel charger!
Last week I read "At All Costs" (David Weber) using my cellphone (PPC 6700, the HTC Apache) as an ebook reader. It was quite easy to use one handed while standing on the subway; one hand holding the bar for support and one hand holding the phone and navigating. Battery life sucked. Each night I'd find my place in the dead-tree edition so at night I'd read that (phone on charge).
This week I plan on reading "Shadow Of Saganami" using the Cybook to see how that compares. I'd like to use the Cybook in bed as well. We'll see how well that works with my bedside light and the way I typically read in bed :-)
