looking for large-format ereader with annotation, ideally cheap without wireless

February 16, 2010 10:12 AM

looking into large format ereader for academic pdfs - a-la kindle dx (but I'd like to annotate, and cheaper would be cool)

I'm a med student, and we get all our lectures and outlines in PDF, so I'd love to have a thin-and-light with an eink display to save my eyes from burning. the kindle DX is pricey especially for its inability to annotate or zoom. any suggestions?

optimally i'd just throw pdfs on a SD card, so cheap options without wireless are good.

eink is a must - my eyes bleed from reading off an LCD all day, so a tablet isn't of interest (including ipad). a sub-200 eink of 10" or larger would be sweet. the displays that switch from LCD to eink look cool but do people know when these are coming out?



http://www.entourageedge.com/devices/entourage-edge.html
looks interesting but still pricey.

http://www.irextechnologies.com/irexdr1000
don't know much about this guy but looks cool

posted by lrodman to computers & internet (5 answers total)

Hey, I'm a grad student in a similar position, and while it doesn't use e-ink, the Asus T91MT does almost everything else you ask for. I've had mine for a couple months now and remain thoroughly impressed.
posted by The White Hat at 10:21 AM on February 16, 2010

Recently, last comment is very good.
posted by themel at 11:10 AM on February 16, 2010

I have a Kindle DX and I really like it, all things considered. I think though that there's so much good stuff coming out in this field that the longer you can wait the better, because every couple months a big step forward is taken. Sounds like you might be best with one of the new hybrid screens (like the Pixel Qi stuff for example).
posted by glider at 11:26 AM on February 16, 2010

According to the Irex Wikipedia page Irexes may have serious issues with power management. I have no personal experience one way or the other, but it's something to consider.
posted by scalefree at 11:37 AM on February 16, 2010

I have a Kindle, and I'm puzzled why you think you can't add notes. Maybe you have many reasons for not wanting a Kindle, but if that's a sticking point, you can add notes and you can highlight text. You can then see all your notes (.pdf of the user guide, see Section 3.5: "Annotations and Clippings"), even on the web, and they are backed up. You can also change the text size, although I don't know if that's what you mean by zoom or if you wanted to look at pictures more closely (text size is in the user guide, Section 6.2 "Other Features").
posted by Houstonian at 5:38 PM on February 16, 2010