Sony Reader Review

If you’re anything like me and you love books, you’ll love the new Reader from Sony. It has been invented especially for book lovers, the Reader is the best way to enjoy the new generation of electronic books or ‘eBooks’ as some are already calling them. Slim and compact, it lets you store and take stacks of books with you wherever you go. It’s as simple and absorbing as reading a real paper book.

The Reader doesn’t claim to replace your traditional books – it’s just a new way to enjoy reading. With the Reader you can carry far more books with you wherever you go, so whatever mood takes you you’ll have a book that matches it.

This handy little device is quite user friendly too; when you buy a Reader all you need to do is install the software that Sony supply with it onto your computer, connect the Reader with the cable provided and it’s as simple as that! Create and manage you eBook library on your pc and transfer your eBooks to your Reader exactly like you do with your music on your mp3 player. What’s even better is that you can choose from thousands of titles available from waterstones.com as they have joined forces with Sony so you can simply buy the ones you want and import them into your PC Readers library. Don’t worry; Waterstones are only Sony’s recommended retailer so you don’t just have to shop there, you can buy them elsewhere too. Only thing is I’ve found that the eBooks are not much cheaper than the real thing and the offers that are in shops are not always reflected in the eBook version. For example, Harry Potter could be half price in store but not on the eBook version.

You can store up to 160 books at a time on your Reader and what’s cool if you’re a real bookworm you can add to your collection and store thousands more using a Sony Memory Stick or SD Memory card. You can bookmark pages or magnify text on a page and your Reader will remember where you last left off – even if you don’t! Just think no more dog-eared pages! It’s really slim and light too so you can take it wherever you go and the long battery life means you can enjoy nearly 7000 page turns without recharging...hmm..that’s like reading War and Peace five times over!

Sadly the availability of new release books has not caught up with the technology, and it can be a slow process in waiting for your new Steven King novel to be released in eBook form.

The kit is great and a good job by Sony but if you like your new releases you might want to stick with the real thing.

The new Sony Reader is available now at a RRP price of £218.99