Thanks everyone for the info. Just need to decide if I really want another gadget or not! J

I keep repeating this but I think people still do not understand that you CAN get free books for the kindle. You get them exactly the same way you get them for other readers. You download them onto your computer in .txt format, then connect the kindle via the included usb cable and just drag the files over onto it. However, the amazon books that you pay for are downloaded via internet automatically to the kindle. This is a HUGE convenience, imo.

Here is a comparison chart for ereaders:

http://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/E-book_Reader_Matrix

If you're interested in following everything ebooks, try:

http://www.mobileread.com

and

http://www.teleread.org/

trickiewoo, I downloaded several Wilkie Colins' books to my Kindle free from Project Gutenberg last week. Here is an excellent site regarding free books for Kindle, including how to download the free Gutenberg books directly to your Kindle.

http://kindleworld.blogspot.com/2009...to-kindle.html

Yes video and other rich media definitely uses up the battery. People are used to recharging their notebooks and even smart phones daily. Sometimes more than once a day.

Maybe eReader users won't find that acceptable.

Read an article where they quoted some guy who worked for a Time Warner publishing unit. Their business is stagnant so they're supporting any eReader that comes along, hoping it would ignite sales. But they pin their biggest hopes on the rumored Apple device, because of the iPod and iPhone track record.

Question on the Sony Reader. Can you buy books at Barnes and Noble, amazon, etc and have them downloaded to them? Or are you just limited to the Sony store?

Regarding the Sony Reader - you can download any books that are in one of the approved formats (ePub is one such format). Unfortunately, the Amazon books cannot be used. Don't know about the B&N books.

Note that the Sony store has recently switched to ePub books, so one major benefit of buying from the Sony store is that your books will be in a "standard" format, and stand a better chance of being usable on another device at some point. Indeed, I would think that this means you could use the Sony books on the Nook. The Amazon books, as they are in a proprietary format, will likely remain readable only on Amazon-approved devices, primarily the Kindle.

All of the books on Sony are now in EPub format and all ones previously purchased can be redownloaded in that format as well (once books are purchased, they can always be redownloaded as many times as you want).

The new format is an open format so it's not protected to the Sony. I can download books for the Sony from my local library (a newer program but a lot of libraries are starting this), I can download books from other websites (booksonboard.com is one) though I've always found everything I wanted at the Sony store so haven't gone looking on other sites.

The Sony will read EPub, BBeB (the older format by Sony), pdf's, I believe Word documents and another format or two that I don't remember. It won't read the files from Amazon as far as I know, and I haven't looked at the Nook enough to know.

Thanks. This thread has convinced me to get a Sony Reader. Target has them on special and my mom offered to get me one for X-Mas. Wanted to research it first.

Just got my Sony Reader at Best Buy (better price than Target) and really like it so far. Easy to use and have bought 3 books for it so far.

I know this is an old thread, but I thought I would add to it rather than start a new one. I have had my sony PRS-300 (5 inch screen "pocket reader" for just under two weeks - an early birthday present. I was very sceptical, but have been completely won over.

Books in ePub format are excellent and RTF documents not bad but some PDF files I have tried have had poor "typesetting". I have read about 6 books in the last week, spending several hours at a time reading with no appreciable eye strain. The page refresh is significantly faster than I was led to believe, and the reader is very comfortable to hold.

As far as negatives are concerned, I dislike the sony library software that comes as standard - I far prefer the freeware Calibre program which seems far more intuitive and has a built in file format converter which I believe allows conversion to and from the Kindle file format (I have not yet tried this).

My other main gripe is price of books. A big UK retailler has some Ebook editions priced £3-4 more than the hard cover edition of the book - this is nonsense as far as I am concerned. I can buy recent bestselling paperbacks at Asda (part of Walmart) for less than £4 why would I want to pay any more than that for a product with no printing costs and very little in way of dstribution expenses?

Overall, I would highly recommend an ereader (or similar) to any waverers.

I noticed that the Sony pocket had been reduced to $169 (from $199) this weekend; still wavering, though, wondering if other prices will also come down in the near future. AND wondering if a netbook is a better way to go for travel-purposes. Anyone get a tiny computer and book software instead of a dedicated e-reader?

sylvia3 - I have a netbook as well, and there is a firefox plugin that does a very good job of displaying epub and other ebook files (I forget the exact name - it might have been EPUBreader).

For me, the problem is reading from a PC screen - I prefer reading while lying down to sitting up, I find reading from a computer screen for any length of time to be quite tiring, and my netbook only has a relatively short battery life.

thanks! I really want both, but can't afford toys this decade, so was hoping to kill two birds with one device (and I read actual books in bed, because they end up dropped on the floor, if not my face!)

If you want a multifunction device that you can view while lying down, you can check out the iPad in a couple of weeks.

I read in bed with my Sony - it is pretty robust. I've dropped it on the floor a bunch and once the cat knocked over a water glass and spilled all over it. No problems so far.

Sylvia, I've dropped my reader quite a few times and it's survived without an issue. If it can survive me, you won't hurt it! :)

After re-reading this thread I checked the number of books on my kindle dx. I have 300 books on it that have been placed since it came out in June 2009. Approximately 175 books have actually been read; 156 of them were read for the first time on this device and 19 were re-read. The remaining 125 books are on the kindle for research purposes. The majority of those books used for reference were free or very cheap. The rest, however... suffice it to say that I am a very good customer for Amazon. And consider every penny well spent.