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iRex 1000 series, from US$649 up: Links to detailed specs
September 22, 2008 | 10:02 am
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By David Rothman
Sporting glorious 10.2 inch screens, the iRex 1000 series has been officially unveiled—at prices of 499 Euros on up. Make that US$649, with orders accepted now even if the econo-unit appears not to be in stock at the moment.
A press release (PDF alert), e-mailed me from iRex, tells of capabilities for unsecured PDF, HTML, TXT and JPEG, among others, and the iRex site also mentions Mobipocket.
Complete with Mobi references, you can find detailed specs for the DR1000 here and for the $749 pen-equipped DR1000 S here. A third model, the $849 DR1000 SW, will include not just a stylus but also WiFi and Bluetooth and be on sale later this year.
Shopping links: iRex Shop and international list of retailers—including eReader Outfitters, listed under "U.S. and Canada." EO sells not just iRex readers but also, via affiliate arrangements, 40,000+ titles for them. Store owner Jeff Paleczny’s involvement with e-paper dates back to his days with Philips Electronics.
Related: Earlier TeleRead coverage, New York Times item, MR and Techmeme roundup.
Technorati Tags: eReader Outfitters
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Comments:
David,
I was present at the press release this afternoon. The iLiad 1000 looks good, feels much lighter than the ‘old’ one and you can operate it both right- and lefthanded or with the stylus.
The new processor is much smarter then the current one, it hibernates downto 0 MHz when there is no activity. So batterylife should be prolonged. It holds just one battery (fixed), in stead of the two in the old iLiad, but it should last longer.
And what’s more, they did a complete rewrite of the software. It is based on Linux 2.6.x and it has a Windows-like interface. Full A4 documents are perfectly readable.
Target is B2B. At the moment the basic model (read-only) and the read-write model are available. The Connectivity model (with WiFi and Bluetooth) later this year.
The device is made out of plastic, no metal parts. The screen is still glass. But I saw a crash test, it fell from more then a meter, but after that it operated without any glitch whatsoever
Robert
As a long time Iliad owner I’m disappointed to see that they have still priced the machine so high and split what were the machine’s attractive abilities. The main attraction in order of importance to me was wifi, stylus input, and battery life. Thus I can’t see the point of their cheapest option (just a reader), nor the second (reader + stylus), and the last (reader,stylus,wifi) is ridiculously priced with the various netbook and laptop competitors in that price range. They could have dominated the market once upon a time. So I waited and guess it’s an AspireOne for me. Might as well have a real machine … unless of course it’s possible to hack the reader version into a fully capable tablet .. hmmm.
Is there a site that describes the “iRex 1000″ document search functions? My understanding is that the Iliad really didn’t have the ability to search mobipocket or PDF documents.
Mike,
For the first time, as far as I can recall, Euro prices are quit a bit lower then the $ prices. The basic model sells for euro 499 and the read-write model for euro 595. Connectivity version price is not yet final. Consider import. OK, still a lot of dollars, but quit an impressive reader.
Comparing notebooks and ebookreaders. Pfffh, let’s say apples and dogs ?
I will not buy an “e reader” until they have the following virtues / capabilities: a price so low that there’s no reason for me to overlook them in favor of a tablet computer. I will not buy an e-reader unless they can: be used to ” index” what I am reading and to save & index my “saved highlights”indexed by date, subject, comments, etc.; print from the book so long as with “attribution” or per “fair use” rules; give me the ability to bookmark or “dogear” a page; give me the ability to annotate a passage and to mark with quotes for use; give me the ability cut and paste / save to a new document / email ; be part of an electronic community involving what I am reading; be able to increase brightness of the screen enough; be able to use in color, etc. In short: present a reason to move from Adobe on a high end tablet with power and wireless and good old “paper” and pen.
You’ll also note that I need an “ereader” to be better than the actual experience of reading a real book / mag real and “making my it my own / using it / transforming the substance of what I read” or else why spend the money? The value just isn’t there yet to buy an ereader.