back to article iRex Digital Reader DR1000S

iRex extended its electronic book line back in September last year, but it's taken us more than a couple of weeks to get used to its new DR1000s Digital Reader and understand that this is really a new class of product, rather than an evolution of the smaller readers of the past. iRex Digital Reader iRex's Digital Reader …

COMMENTS

This topic is closed for new posts.
  1. Jeonat
    FAIL

    WiFi

    For that price, I think I'd want WiFi and a web browser!

  2. Jelliphiish
    Grenade

    Apple

    will build something like the iphone but bigger and with 50 other extra functions..and a prettier screen with colour.. this thing has some uses but when that mooted iTablet or whatever they're going to call it comes out with full Mac Os and such, this might look a little too like a dinosaur/niche product.

    nice enough but too early in this market to justify purchase..

    also, i'm not a HappyAppleSlapper, i don't own a single product of theirs. I can just see better things coming and the most likely source would be the Tw@tablet.

  3. Bad Beaver
    Paris Hilton

    So...

    ... according to your history of rating with its 50% baseline that is really just 10%, eh? That's quite harsh. So the interface really needs to be improved and it doesn't come for free. Battery life seems fine if you take into account that it is not a dumb reader. The smaller model still looks more interesting, WiFi and all.

  4. kwnewton

    Interesting device-- almost more of a tablet PC than an eReader

    I wonder how this will stack up against the Plastic Logic document reader when it comes out. PL are being very copy about the price.

  5. reader09
    Unhappy

    An owner's opinion (after 3 months)

    The author of this article is correct about the interface, it is bad. Really bad!

    I have gotten somewhat adjusted to it's limitations after a while so that it is not quite as bad as when you first begin using the device; I guess I've just stopped trying to use the device for certain task to avoid the user inferface weaknesses.

    I think the current UI is fundamentally broken, I don't think it can be "fixed". I think it would be best to completely redesign it from scratch. There is no feature of the current UI that I like. I hope an upcoming firmware release will introduce a replacement interface, but I have not heard any news that iRex is planning that.

    An example of a limitation that I find completely maddenning is it's inability to easily jump to some arbitrary page number. This makes it impractical to make use of an SD card loaded with a bunch of technical reference manuals. My most common usage is not supported by the UI: I would want to open a book and go immediately to the index. even if I've never opened the book before within the reader. I might moveup and down a page or two to find the topic I'm looking for, and then jump to some arbitrary page. I have found this series of tasks so frustrating and impractical to complete that I have not even attempted my 2nd most common book task: going back to the index, and then jumping to a different arbitrary page if the first one didn't contain what I was looking for.

    The hardware is great, the rendered pages are very easy to read, and I think all my complaints (I have more that are unmentioned) could be solved in firmware.

    The device is really good for reading materials where you start at page one and continue forward one page at time. For now I am only loading it with materials that I intend to read that way.

    The device would be killer if it could be made to behave more like a real book. It won't come close until it becomes easier to jump to an arbitrary page number.

  6. Anonymous Coward
    FAIL

    iRex need to stop taking the proverbial and slash their prices

    This gadget is way too expensive, the price should be under £100 before I'd even look at such a pathetically under featured device, only 1GB, that's nothing! Even most businesses would choke at the price here, you can get a damned sweet laptop for that price, even a tablet, or a fliptop!

    I bought a 'netbook' because I could see it was vastly better value than these overpriced e-ink toys.

This topic is closed for new posts.