After reviewing the iRex iLiad e-book reader, I have been really excited about the possibilities of combining the e-ink / e-paper display with touch and inking capabilities. InfoWorld is reporting from the Display 2008 exhibition in Tokyo on a new display "developed by E-Ink, Taiwan's Prime View International, and Japan's Seiko Epson. It combines a conventional electronic paper display with a touch panel and a newly developed control chip." E-Ink makes most of the e-paper displays with which we are familiar, including the displays for the iLiad and the Amazon Kindle.

The new control chip developed by Seiko Epson appears to be the key element of the new display. The chip can refresh the screen up to 50 times per second and can control a screen with four times the resolution of current displays, up to 2,048 x 1,536 pixels. This refresh speed increase should dramatically improve the writing experience, potentially eliminating the pen lag I saw on the iLiad.

The new display and chip are slated to release in August, so maybe we'll see devices built around this technology in the near future.

Not that I'm trying to one-up Warner or anything, but I just received a sample of an iRex iLiad e-book reader with an integrated Wacom digitizer.

Although the iRex iLiad is not a new product, given the recent reviews of the Amazon Kindle and the video we did with the Kindle and the Sony Reader PRS-500, it seemed appropriate to look at the only real pen-based solution on the market. After all, inking is the way to go!

I'll be doing a full InkShow on the iLiad in the next couple of weeks, but to whet your appetite:

• Best screen visibility -  by FAR, over the Sony Reader or the Kindle. Totally subjective, but wow.
• Larger screen - 8.1" diagonal vs. 6" diagonal
• Digitizer - allows both book annotations as well as free-form note taking on blank sheets of e-paper
• Sudoku - 'Nuf said.
• WiFi - I connected to my WPA encrypted access point at home in just a couple of minutes. Transfer files, etc. Although the reader doesn't officially support web browsing, there are solutions for that available on the web (like enabling the browser that actually ships in the system but hidden/disabled).
• File formats supported : PDF / HTML / TXT / JPG / BMP/ PNG / PRC (Mobipocket)
• You can read the full set of product specifications on the iLiad website.

Before you ask, yes, all of this goodness comes at a hefty price. The official US sales portal is eReader Outfitters who list the iLiad at $699. Yes, for that same $699 I could buy a decent laptop. But for those people who really want a portable note-taking solution, this could be an interesting slate. I plan on checking this out as more than just an e-book reader so that I can see how far into the slate computer category this can stretch.

  One of the best things I've purchased in quite some time was an e-book reader, namely the Amazon Kindle. Being new to the electronic book area, I have found the experience to be quite enjoyable. Sierra, on the other hand, has been using an e-book reader for a long time, namely the Sony Reader Digital Book, and has picked up on the subtle differences between Sony's Reader Digital Book and Amazon's Kindle. She used my Kindle for several weeks, and came away with some interesting observations. By the way, it is worth mentioning that I almost didn't get my Kindle back....

In this InkShow, Sierra and I take them both on a head-to-head comparison, looking at screens, navigation, buttons, contrast, and the book buying experience.

• Download the high res version ( wmv, 13:30, 103mb )
• Watch the embedded version below

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Splotch and I just got back from a lovely time in Mexico. That little guy really gets down with the traveling! We had a lovely time traipsing around Puerto Vallarta, Mazatlan, and Cabo San Lucas together.

Aas for the gear I took, on this trip I stuck with what are, for me, necessities and left some gear at home. Here's what I had in my gear bag:

• Fujitsu P1610: The P1610 is a great little traveling computer, but I'm still longing for my own OQO. Even smaller and more portable and easier to pack. Given the fact that I'll never go on vacation without a computer, even for a weekend, the OQO seems like a good safety net.
• AT&T 8525 cell phone syncing email from GottaBeMobile, personal, and work. My 8525 phone is the "old reliable". Sure, I'd love to upgrade to the Tilt, but work is providing this, so I use what they give me. As sexy as the iPhone is, that won't work for me. I've tried to shoe-horn my usage models into its available capabilities, and I just want more than it offers, mostly for advanced email. And it has to be a global phone, which knocks off anything non-UMTS.
• Amazon Kindle: I'm still deciding if Rob gets it back.   And just wait until he sees how his Kindle spent Christmas Day.
• Sony Reader - first generation model I've owned for a while, to compare to the Kindle. I still like this reader.
• Apple iPod Nano - in Hot Pink of course. Gotta have my tunes. The new Touch does look interesting...
• My old and trusty Casio Exilim Ex-Z4 camera. This needs replaced. Badly. I'm eying the Panasonic Lumix DMC-FX55P. My husband has a Lumix that he loves. He's an optical engineer, so he's fussy about having a good lens and the Leica lenses they use in the Lumix line are quite good.
• plus the power cables / docks for all of the above, of course

So was I happy with what I took? Moderately, yes, but I still need (expensive) improvements. In addition to the OQO, new camera, new phone, and the Kindle, I need a better power supply situation. The iGo everywhere85 looks like a good possibility for me, particularly if I combine it with the Monster Outlets to Go portable power strip. If I get the power cable tangle under control, it will help a bunch, but then I'll start noticing that I really need a 3G connection for my computer, probably through USB since I swap around a lot. I spent far too long in the lobby of a hotel in San Diego trying to get the free wireless to connect properly. It never did, so I'm grateful I had iPass to allow me to connect for free through the coffee shop.

I leave for CES on Saturday morning.  As Rob mentioned earlier, OQO is sponsoring us for CES, so I know I'll have access to an OQO Model 2 with EV-DO during the event and I'm THRILLED with that opportunity to try out what I think may be my next computer purchase. Unfortunately, little else will probably improve in my gear bag until then, but I'm hoping to find lots of new goodies at CES to fill up my bag for the next trip!

I've been using the Kindle some more over the weekend, and thought it would be good to pass along some more usage thoughts.

• I'm fearful that my Kindle will become my wife's Kindle. She has stolen it for nighttime reading.
• I took the Kindle to church this morning to see how non-intrusive it would be, compared to a Tablet PC or UMPC. It certainly fit the bill for not bringing attention to itself and being quiet. However, as nice as it is for general reading, I did not like it at all for navigating the Bible during a sermon or class.  Having to go back to the Table of Contents, select the book, select the chapter, then hit "Next Page" to get to the verse proved to be very cumbersome. It was especially cumbersome if someone was speaking and referencing multiple books of the Bible. I prefer a paper-based Bible or something like e-Sword / OneNote on a Tablet PC / UMPC for quick navigating and notetaking during church or class. For general reading, though, the Kindle will be great.
• In this video, I mentioned that the Experimental Web Browser on the Kindle worked quite well for navigating text-based websites. However, I experienced problems with Google Reader and Gmail because they required Javascript, and Javascript was not enabled on the Kindle. Well, Daniel Meyers emailed me to say that he found that Javascript was Disabled by default, but could be turned on. I turned it on, and now do not  get the Javascript errors. However, I still had problems getting Reader to work, and Gmail was just about worthless from a navigation standpoint. So, I loaded up the mobile versions of them, and the experience was much better. Recommendation: use the mobile version of Google products if you want browse Google using the Kindle. I probably won't fool with. Thanks for the tip, Daniel.
• I finished my first book, Quiet Strength by Tony Dungy, and have moved on to my second book, The Nine, by Jeffrey Toobin. My wife and I are both reading the Kindle with the book cover on. We both find it easier to hold, and that it actually feels more like a real book with the cover.
• My wife and I have used the Kindle on an off for the past four days, and the battery is at 60%. I've only charged it once, and that was last Tuesday.
• I still don't like using the keyboard to take notes. The response time from pressing the key to it displaying on the screen is too slow.
• I'm still happy that I bought it - it was a very good purchase.

My wife has taken a sudden interest in my Kindle, after buying Jan Karon's latest book "Home to Holly Springs" last night. She began reading it right away, and that experience in itself sold her on the value of the Kindle. She was reading in to the night, and told me this morning that she likes it. Yes!!

So, anticipating a potential gift for Christmas, I emailed Amazon about the ability to share books among multiple Kindles. According to this email I received from their support department, Amazon allows you to share books on up to 6 different Kindles registered to the Amazon.com account from which the purchase was made. Very cool!  My wife and I ( and potentially my four kids, if I suddenly came in to some money ) can read the same book at the same time, and only pay one price.

The licenses associated with books and other non-subscription content purchased from the Kindle Store allow you to download and view(at the same time) each item from up to 6 different Kindles registered to the Amazon.com account from which the original purchase was made.

Subscription items can only be downloaded to one Kindle.

If you register a new Kindle to your Amazon.com account, you'll be able to use the Content Manager or Your Media Library on Amazon.com to download content you've purchased from that account. You will not be able to view content on a Kindle that is not registered to the Amazon.com account from which the original purchase was made. You cannot share books you purchase with other Kindles that are not associated with your account.

According to Engadget, the Amazon Kindle managed to sell out in only 5.5 hours. Now that's fast, particularly for a device category that has never taken off. I have a Sony Reader which I like quite well, but I'd still love to try out a Kindle. Let me tell you, the Sony Reader has probably never sold out of anywhere because ebook readers have just never gotten the gadget love that they deserve. According to the Amazon website currently, if I buy a Kindle today, it will skip December 3.

Now, we have no way of knowing exactly how many Kindle's have shipped, but regardless of number, Amazon apparently underestimated the demand. I'm excited by that, because it means that maybe, finally, ebooks will become as popular as I want them to be. I absolutely love being able to take a whole library with me on vacation. When I'm on an airplane, I typically can plan on about 200 pages per hour, so I have to take along 3-5 books on a typical trip to keep me engaged. Or I can take my Sony Reader, which is smaller and easier to pack. Or maybe in the future I'll take my Kindle, who knows? If Amazon is able to figure out the DRM format wars and get something that actually works, I'll jump ship from Sony and try it out. I love the idea of being able to buy a book instantly through the Whispernet.

Rob has done a great job of covering the Kindle so far, so check out his videos for more details on this cool (sold-out) device.
Amazon Kindle Part 1:Unboxing, Part 2, Part 3

In part 3 of our Amazon Kindle series, we get up close and personal with some book reading and web browsing. In addition, to doing some requisite book reading and notetaking, I show everyone what kind of web browsing will work, and what won't work. Hint: Javascript isn't supported, so there won't be any Google Reader browsing going on. Still, being able to browse the web for free over the included Whispernet / Sprint EVDO service is a great bonus.  As I point out in the video, I'm not sure how long we'll be able to do it for free, but I'm going to enjoy it while I can. In addition, I show two documents that got automatically imported by sending them to my @kindle.com email address

Be sure to watch Part 1 and Part 2 if you have not seen those videos yet. All three videos give a more complete overview.

So the question to be answered after all three videos: would I buy one again? Yes. Having instant access to over 90,000 books is the kicker for me. Version 1 of the Kindle can definitely be improved, but free web-browsing over EVDO ( for now ) and instant access to all of those books wins me over. The Kindle is a great experience that could be improved upon with handwriting annotation. I would definitely take this places I wouldn't bring a Tablet PC or UMPC due to its non-intrusive nature. My wife wouldn't buy one because she is more of a purist. My kids, though, would eat it up, especially if they could get their text books on it. Amazon needs to lower the price to at least half to make it attractive to the non-geek market. I have a nagging feeling that more $200 of the price is going to Sprint to cover the EVDO access. So, I'll be keeping the Kindle and enjoying until version 2 comes out. Join me in welcoming me to the eBook world.

Here are some initial impressions from my family after using the Kindle tonight:

• Without showing any of them how to use it, they instinctively wanted to touch menu options rather than use the scroller to navigate and select.
• My 13 year-old son, Dax, and 11 year-old daughter, Maggie, immediately commented how useful it would be in school if they could get all of their text books on it.
• My wife didn't think she would use it - she is an avid reader. She prefers real books
• Everyone remarked how small and light it was, and how crisp the screen was.
• My step-father told me that it wouldn't be a good solution for doing a research, since he prefers to lay a lot of books out on the table at once. For me, though, it would be a good solution for that.
• I told my wife it was a great device for taking somewhere like church, since it was quiet and I had the Bible on it. She asked me why I would want to do that.

For what it is worth - impressions from non-techie folks - folks I think Amazon is trying to reach with the Kindle.

Watch Part 1 and Part 2 of the Amazon Kindle videos.

In part 1 of our Amazon Kindle Unboxing, I showed the initial boot, what it was like getting books I had previously purchased, and general first impressions. I'm still very impressed with the Kindle.

In part 2, I demonstrate the carrying case, give a quick look at the lag in typing, remove the back for replacing the battery and inserting an SD card, and also navigate to GBM using the Experimental browser over the included Whispernet / Sprint EVDO. In another video, I'll try to demonstrate more of the notetaking / keyboarding experience.

Document conversion:

I just converted a word doc and a pdf by emailing them to my @kindle.com email address, which then automatically downloaded to the Kindle.

* didn't convert the pictures I had pasted in the document
* hyperlinks converted in the word doc and I was able to hyperlink from them to the internet. Hyperlinks did not the pdf document
* the conversion process took less than two minutes

I'll do a video of it in the coming days

Enjoy!

Click To Play

ok - Here it is - The GottaBeMobile Amazon Kindle Unboxing video. We'll get you more coverage in the coming days and weeks, but hopefully this will get everyone a little insight on what to expect out of the box and how it works from a navigation standpoint. The Kindle is not ugly at all - it is actually really attractive looking and feels good to hold. The experience is really seamless for sure - although it took a few minutes, the books I purchased a couple of hours ago downloaded automatically to the Kindle without my having to get online and associate id's or whatever...pretty cool.

By the way, after I recorded the video, I experimented with notetaking - there is a noticeable lag when typing notes, which is a little bothersome. What I am liking about the Kindle already is how quiet it is, which will make it a perfect device to take somewhere when you don't want to be intrusive.

In the video, the initial boot of the Kindle was kind of slow. However, subsequent boot-ups have taken about 5 seconds.

Browsing the web: since the video, I've navigated to GBM's site using the included Experimental Web Browser and it loads up just like viewing it over Internet Explorer in Windows Mobile. The pictures are all gray scale. From what I remember ( need to check to verify ), web browsing is free using the included Sprint EVDO - pretty cool.

After watching the unboxing, be sure to check out Part 2

Click To Play

Here are some pictures of the Kindle carrying case, which clips in using the back rubber grip. The cover feels like a very nice leather bound journal:

I'm shooting the video right now, but wanted to post this first shot of the Kindle and it's box - shaped just like a book. Very cool....ok - gotta run and shoot this video for you all....stay tuned.

I've been watching Amazon's Kindle Demo video while impatiently waiting for UPS to deliver my Kindle. I've also purchased three books, while waiting, to see how Kindle handles the automatic download. Gadget arrival day will certainly try your patience.

It struck me while watching the video, how similar it is to the early Tablet PC videos, and last year's Origami videos - a guy walking around carrying a small tablet, using it in personal places - an extension of himself.

Another thing I picked up on is how much the scrolling wheel is used to select, navigate, etc. I can already tell that the lack of a touch screen and an active digitizer is going to bother me. Isn't a logical extension of reading a book being able to annotate it and mark it up using your own handwriting? Taking in to account the known battery life and outdoor screen readability issues, Tablet PCs certainly have the leg-up in the annotation department. Amazon would have really scored a coup had they implemented personalized notetaking and annotation. Maybe version 2 of Kindle will bring us that. Microsoft needs to get Amazon on the horn and begin talking up ink.

This is exciting - my first experience with a dedicated eBook device. What could be better - a Tablet PC enthusiast checking out eBook device - a match made in heaven!

My Kindle should be here any moment, and I'll be posting up a quick-look video after it arrives....stay tuned.