What is an E-book reader?

What is an E-book reader? (or why use a dedicated E-book reader?)

Ever hear of  ‘technology convergence’? It’s all the buzz. Your average mobile ‘smartphone’ can probably provide the functionality of more than a dozen seperate units of yesteryear.  Many young people don’t wear watches these days, well think about it, why would you? It only does one thing! However, what is less well understood is that the argument for converged technology only applies to small pocket size devices. The argument doesn’t necessarily work when we reach devices of tablet size. Sure, they can combine a few functions, which can be useful, but it may be master of none. Its not a good PC (poor I/O, low performance), it’s not a good watch, it’s not a good telephone (too big) etc. etc.

This is where the savvy realize that if you really just want the best device to read books on, the device must provide the most comfortable evironment. For example, a screen that looks like paper, can be easily read in sunlight, does not strain the eyes by glaring emitted light at you all the time (after an entire day in front of a computer we might prefer some kinder way to read a screen). So, Tablets and PC’s can do the job of becoming an e-reader, but for some needs a specialized e-reader provides so many more advantages, including:-

• A reflective display that is kind on the eyes and works in sunlight
• Battery life typically weeks, not hours between recharges
• Light weight and compact design (lighter and thinner than a paperback)
• Can hold your library of thousands of e-books
• Unit design of buttons for easy page-turns and optimised for reading operations.
• Remembers exactly where we last were
• Can download new books without hassle

So when we go out, or go to bed, our smartphones will be near to hand but the e-book reader will be the one item that neither a tablet, a PC, or a phone can do very well.