Sony Reader Pocket Edition (PRS-300): special opinion

I could not decide on a device for reading electronic books. After much deliberation and wandering around the forums and blogs, my choice narrowed down to two devices:

- Sony Reader Pocket Edition
- PocketBook 301+

It seems that Pocketbook wins in all respects, and yet I stopped at the reader from Sony. Now, after a month of active use, I can say with confidence that I was not mistaken: all those flaws about which they write so much are irrelevant, or they are advantages.
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Design and construction

What can I say: it's a Sony. Cute appearance, neatly assembled. The front panel is aluminum, and the back is made of soft-touch plastic. It weighs 220 grams: heavier than competitors, but it does not cause any discomfort.

Screen

Vizplex, a diagonal of 5 inches (600x800), 8 grayscale. The competitors have six-inch screens with the same resolution. But in this case, the screen size does not have the same value as when choosing a laptop or phone. For example, take 2 paper books:

Is there a fundamental difference between reading books of different formats? Not. The only difference is that it is more convenient to take a compact book with you to read in transport or on a walk. With the reader the same story: due to the smaller screen, the device is more compact and more mobile.

True for a comic screen is not enough, I think that 6 inches will also be enough.

Fans of comic books should pay attention to the Sony Reader Daily Edition (7.1 ') or even wait for the release of PocketBook 901 (9.7').

Control

In addition to the 4-position joystick to move through the menu items and 4 additional keys (home page, return to a higher level, bookmarks, change the font size), Sony added number keys to quickly navigate to the desired item: unusual, but very convenient . The fact is that redrawing the menu while moving takes some time (a feature of the e-ink display), so using the numeric keys speeds up the work.

Of course, using the touchscreen is even more convenient, but as we know from a review conducted by Nepofigist , touchscreens are less contrasting. In general, management is actually not so important, since the main action when using the device is page turning.

Memory

No memory card support. Internal memory - 440 MB. Is it a lot or a little? I think it’s enough: after downloading 50 books (I’m going to read more than one month), there are still 405 MB free.

Functionality

The absence of an audio player and photo galleries for me personally is not a disadvantage. I have no idea why to look at the photos on a black and white screen and how you can use a device with such dimensions as a player.

The lack of support for the FB2 format (the most common in our area) is also an artificial problem. There is a wonderful program for organizing the library Caliber . She knows perfectly well that Sony Reader does not support this format and automatically reformats the books when downloading to the device in ePub or BBeB (LRF), you will not even notice.