Hasta La Gadget!

Barnes & Noble might be pushing the Nook as hard as it can, but the retailer has always said it wants to build a reading platform across devices, and it’s making a big step in that direction with the launch of its eReader for iPad app today. The app allows Nook users to download most of their content to the iPad — the books all work, but some periodicals like the New York Times and Wall Street Journal aren’t available yet — and there’s a nice bookshelf view with jacket art and a library search function, which the Kindle app and iBooks don’t have. As with the Nook and other B&N clients, the iPad client supports LendMe for certain titles, but there’s no in-app purchasing — selecting “add books” from the bookshelf view kicks you out to the browser, just like the Kindle app. We’re not sure if this is an Apple restriction or a design decision, but we were told B&N is looking into adding in-app purchasing in a future release.

As for reading, eReader is actually quite flexible — you can customize the page, text, highlight, and link colors any which way you want (we made some hideous combinations), and there are some nice presets themes as well, ranging from “The Printed Page” to an inverted setting called “Night Light.” You can also set books to display using the publisher’s settings, and there are the usual line spacing and justification options as well. The only issues we had were with page turns and rendering — flipping from portrait to landscape too fast would result in some brief wonkiness, and flipping pages too quickly would eventually stall the app and lead to a brief load time. Neither was a deal breaker, but there’s clearly some room for polish here — we’re sure B&N is planning to iterate this rapidly, so we’ll see what happens. All in all, though the eReader app is a worthy competitor for your iPad ebook dollar — as long as iBooks has the only in-app store it’ll remain our favorite iPad reader, but if you’ve already purchased Nook content this is a solid free addition to the ecosystem.

Continue reading Barnes & Noble launches eReader for iPad app, we go hands-on

Barnes & Noble launches eReader for iPad app, we go hands-on originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 27 May 2010 00:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Pandigital’s best known for its hard, hard work in the game-changing digital photo frame world, but the company’s feeling a bit froggy of late. It’s latest leap is into the burgeoning e-reader market, and unlike those from Barnes & Noble and Amazon, this one’s sporting a 7-inch LCD — you know, now that Apple has suddenly made that “okay” again. At any rate, the forthcoming Novel boasts a full-color 800 x 600 resolution touchscreen, inbuilt WiFi and dimensions of 5.5- x 7.5- x 0.5-inches. The highlight here is the partnership with B&N, which gives this guy access to the bookseller’s eBookstore, not to mention the ability to share content via LendMe. Pandigital also throws in 1GB of internal memory, an SD / MMC card slot, orientation sensor, and the rechargeable battery is said to be good for a mediocre six hours on a full charge. The $199.99 Novel should be out and about next month supporting PDF, ePUB and HTML formats (yeah, there’s a web browser), and in case you were wondering, it’s based around Android and gets powered by an ARM 11 processor. Did Pandigital — of all companies — just out a remotely interesting e-reader? Yes, yes it did.

Continue reading Pandigital intros 7-inch Novel e-reader, nabs access to B&N eBookstore

Pandigital intros 7-inch Novel e-reader, nabs access to B&N eBookstore originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 24 May 2010 08:00:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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ASUS sells tons of laptops through Amazon.com. Amazon happens to offer a Kindle for PC application. Heck, why not team up and pre-install the app on the ASUS netbooks and laptops that are sold through the online e-tailer? Sure makes a lot of sense to us, and apparently it did to both Amazon and ASUS. Starting today, select laptops — including the Eee PC 1005PE and UL30 — will be sold with the e-book app loaded up. Frankly, we’re not the biggest fans of pre-installed software cluttering up fresh screens, but this sort of partnership surely makes sense with certain devices — in particular, convertible tablets that you’d use to read. You know what would also make sense? ASUS preloading some sort of Amazon application on its Eee Pad. That’s just us playing make believe, but it seems like the two companies are certainly talking. We’re set on getting our fill of ASUS tablet news at Computex next week, but in the meantime hit the break for the full Amazon / ASUS PR.

Continue reading ASUS and Amazon team up to pre-install Kindle for PC on netbooks and laptops

ASUS and Amazon team up to pre-install Kindle for PC on netbooks and laptops originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 24 May 2010 00:01:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Looks like this one’s been sitting around in the shadows for awhile now, and in fact, we can’t even find the bona fide manufacturer of this here device. Boasting a 7-inch LCD (since when were those deemed fit for reading on?), built-in rechargeable battery, multimedia player, image viewer, optional FM radio, USB 2.0 connector and a user interface that almost looks a wee bit like Android at a glance. Regrettably, there’s no pricing or availability details to be found (nor any indication of an inbuilt wireless module), but we’re guessing the mystery owners here wouldn’t try moving this one for too much.

EB710 e-reader rocks an LCD, intriguing user interface originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 16 May 2010 13:24:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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E-readers as a whole best be watching their backs (or planning a wave of new functions, one), but it’s safe to say that having color displays would give ’em a leg-up on the retina-killing, battery-draining LCD-based alternatives. Plastic Logic is still working to get its first e-reader (the decidedly not color QUE, for those curious) into the paws of consumers, but already the outfit is planning for the next big thing. Achim Neu, Director SCM, recently spoke at the International Electronics Forum, reportedly stating that his company is aiming to “have a manufacturable color display by the end of 2011 and move it into volume production in 2012.” Details beyond that were scarce, but still, 2012 seems a long ways out — if Qualcomm can get its color Mirasol panel into shipping products, there’s a better than average chance that none of this will matter.

Plastic Logic plans 2012 launch for color e-paper display originally appeared on Engadget on Thu, 13 May 2010 12:55:00 EST. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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