News - Asda touts £52 e-reader

[HEXUS]

While Amazon unveils Kindle software update preview.

Read more.

[tickleonthetum]

Now this ASDA reader is more like it! No flashing black when turning pages, no need to buy a booklight to read it at night, full colour, video, music and only £52!! Bargain. I can live with reduced battery life in exchange for the cheap price, no flashing black and the other extras. I expect battery life will also depend on what you use it for. If just books it will last longer, if movies then less so.

Well done ASDA!!

UPDATE
Here is a link to some specs. & details: http://hubpages.com/hub/ViewQuest-Me...5-Media-Tablet

SPECIFICATION:

Chip solution: RK2728

Display: 5" TFT, 800x480

Battery: Built-in Polymer 1800mAh

eBooks: ePub, PDF, FB2, TXT, DOC, PDB, HTML, WTXT

Music: MP3, WMA, FLAC, AAC, WAV, OGG, APE

Video: WMV, RM, AVI, RMVB, 3GP, FLV, MP4, DAT, VOB, MPG

Images: JPEG, BMP, GIF

Memory: 2Gb internal

Transfer: USB 2.0

Audio: Built-in speaker, headphone jack

Accessories: USB cable, AC adapter, headphones, user manual

Dims: 149 x 104 x 10.6mm


Features

* The perfect travel companion
* Play videos on the 5" widescreen
* Read eBooks in portrait or landscape modes
* Backlit for night time reading
* Built-in speaker for music, video or audiobook playback
* Store and view your photo collection
* Built-in voice recorder
* Power saving mode to reduce eye strain and improve battery life
* Does not support DRM Files

The Table at the bottom of this article (http://www.thisismoney.co.uk/bargain...moretopstories) quotes a battery life of 6 - 20 hours.

Looks good to me!

[superscaper]

If it doesn't have an electronic ink screen of some sort it's not a proper e-reader. You may as well read a book on your mobile or laptop. Talk about eye strain. If I'm getting something that's an e-reader then the primary purpose is to read text. TFT/LCD is definitely not conducive to that. It's a neat media tablet, and you can read ebook formats on it, I don' think that makes it an e-reader any more than it does than calling it a TV.

[tickleonthetum]

I don't like the e-Ink readers as the flash to black that comes with every page turn sets of my migraines, but a normal monitor does not. Also, the difference is this is a multi-function device:

* E-Reader
* Video Player
* Music Player

The more functions that can be combined the better... or do you want to lug around a TV, Desktop PC, Laptop, Tablet, E-Reader, Movie Player, MP3 Player, etc. every where you go? The point is it IS an E-Reader and as such is in direct competition with the likes of Kindle and nook but a lot cheaper, which can only be good for us consumers as it will encourage development and price reductions.

The ultimate would be to have a small lightweight touchscreen tablet that can do everything and do it as well as a full blown enthusiast level PC! At worse 2 of them, one pocket/novel sized, and one larger (say A4) sized. One day maybe it would even be possible to store the little one in the bigger one aid transport...

[Nerval]

If it doesn't have an electronic ink screen of some sort it's not a proper e-reader. You may as well read a book on your mobile or laptop. Talk about eye strain. If I'm getting something that's an e-reader then the primary purpose is to read text. TFT/LCD is definitely not conducive to that. It's a neat media tablet, and you can read ebook formats on it, I don' think that makes it an e-reader any more than it does than calling it a TV.

That about says it all really.
The whole point of an ebook reader (I've had one for two years now) is that you can read books on it for hours on end with no more eye strain than with a normal book.
That's where e-ink without the back light comes into its own.
The ASDA device is just a 5 inch LED screen.

The page transition on e-ink readers does seem to bother some people, though there's an alternative "dissolve" mode without the flashing on mine, that may be better.

And about having one device that does loads of things, it normally does them all badly. If you read books a lot, there's currently nothing better than a proper ebook reader.
It's just ASDA chasing the sales.

[scaryjim]

Except that setting a sensible backlight level allows many people to read without eyestrain, and the screenwipe/reset process of e-ink does cause eyestrain for some people, so neither system is perfect. I read ebooks on my Android phone and can do so comfortably without eyestrain for as long as I could read a normal book. Given that many people in this country spend 8 hours a day reading text on a backlit screen, I find the whole "backlight == eye-strain" argument disingenuous. Excessive backlighting causes eye-strain, yes, but an appropriate backlight doesn't.

If you can read electronic books on it, it's an e-reader. It may be an e-reader amongst other things, but it's still an e-reader. Will a £52 e-reader be as good for reading ebooks as a £152 ereader? Well, probably not, but ultimately you get what you pay for and Asda's offering looks like a decent device for the price, to me.

[crossy]

Except that setting a sensible backlight level allows many people to read without eyestrain, and the screenwipe/reset process of e-ink does cause eyestrain for some people, so neither system is perfect. I read ebooks on my Android phone and can do so comfortably without eyestrain for as long as I could read a normal book. Given that many people in this country spend 8 hours a day reading text on a backlit screen, I find the whole "backlight == eye-strain" argument disingenuous. Excessive backlighting causes eye-strain, yes, but an appropriate backlight doesn't..

Agree with this 100%. Looked at the Sony device at length in my local Waterstones and tbh I found it very, very poor visually. I much prefer the old eReader software I had on my Palm Tungsten and iPod Touch, (actually that's what I ended up using the iPT for most of - at least until Barnes & Noble killed eReader). Plus - and this is a big deal for me - the Palm/iPT are pocket-sized, whereas most (if not all) of the current crop of ereading devices are bag-sized, which are a lot less convenient. (for me at least).

If you read books a lot, there's currently nothing better than a proper ebook reader. It's just ASDA chasing the sales.

Nothing better than an ebook reader? Nah, try a proper book - you know, old style, paper pages and all that...

But I think you've identified a good point - yes, Asda ARE chasing the sales. But then again, if you lose/drop something priced at £50 then it's bl**dy annoying/infuriating but that's it. On the other hand, if you lose/drop that £200 Sony device then that's a real hardship. So I'd politely argue that, for that reason, while the Asda reader is an inferior device, it's cheapness means it's more likely to travel on holiday with you.

(Tickleonthetum - thanks for posting that comparison chart - now I can see why the Kindle is so popular. Seems like a far better device than the more expensive Sony. Although I think I'll stick with my well thumbed Dale Brown and Tom Clancy collection for the moment)

[superscaper]

In response to some comments if they relate to what I'd said. I read a lot, I just cannot read for any real length of time on any kind of monitor/TV/LCD. It's ok when coding, short documents etc, but anything substantial such as novels it's literally a pain for me. And I am also a migraine sufferer myself so any arguments about migraine I know that's a completely personal thing and can be triggered by almost literally anything, the screen refresh doesn't bother me but then it's the time in between changing pages that I'm interested in. This has nothing to do with the blacklight for me but simply clarity and readability of the text. The text on my e-reader (Kindle 3G) is actually more well defined than some print books I've seen. And yes it is worth having it as a separate device for me, it's small, portable and unobtrusive, anything else well that can be covered by netbook/laptop. I see no incentive to eliminate the need for a dedicated e-reader until they can properly incorporate electronic ink display into other devices/hybrid displays (the colour nook goes some way towards this).

[TheAnimus]

Why compare this to the £152 kindle with 3G, why not just the £111 version?

Basically the kindle is double the price, has the benefit of wifi, the amazon DRM market place (as few publishers allow non-DRM content).

Then eInk, I understand someone complains about it causing migrains but that is not true for the vast majority of people.

You can read eInk in the direct sunlight, and those complaining about the lack of a back light, I was always taught its bad to read in no ambient light, I don't know how true it is, but certainly using a laptop without any drives my eyes to triedness.

[mcmiller]

has anyone actually used one yet? I'd like to see it a review of it...