Franklin EB-500 Rocket eBook

List Price: $199.99

Features:

• Ergonomic, ambidextrous design, about the size of a paperback
• Weighs only 22 ounces
• Stores about 4,000 pages--the equivalent of 10 novels
• Speech-quality audio for documents published with audio content
• Long battery life--17 to 33 hours per charge

Customer Reviews:

I'm impressed! [Posted on 2000-03-03]
I really love my reader. The BEST part is I can actually read in bed, which was something that really turned my opinion on e-books around. The books are a lot cheaper than regular books, I stumbled on Crossroadspub.com and am amazed at that and other sites decent prices and availability of e-books. No more out of stock books! The only bad thing about it is the weight. It does get heavy after awhile. Hopefully they'll change that in the near future!

Useful where I didn't think it would [Posted on 2000-03-13]
This is a very useful product, particularly for downloading lengthy texts from the web. I have found it very useful for studying annual reports, speeches from CEOs, etc. The software allows simple downloading and then one can carry these useful texts with you. Fabulously useful!

My only regret is that it will not read PDF files. Currently, a number of the really useful things that I get come in PDF format. Right now -- in order to down load a PDF file you have to e-mail out and then download the file after a translator reworks it. This has not worked well.

This is a terrific product! [Posted on 2000-03-28]
I have had one of these for about two months, and am totally hooked on it. It has some readily apparent advantages (portability, ease of use, etc.), but some advantages that are not so apparent--it has focused my reading on some classics that I missed earlier in my reading life (as most e-texts are currently non-copyrighted materials; I finally got through Moby Dick) and it has helped to improve my computer skills (to get the absolute most out of it, you need to be able to do some somewhat sophisticated computer stuff). Probably its best feature for me is the portability factor--I can carry a wide variety of texts, articles, etc. on the rocket book in a single, easy to use package. Since I read both voraciously and omnivorously, this is a real plus. I also like the feature that allows different screen aspects (4 way print)--one setting is good for reading in bed, another for reading in a restaurant, etc. The one drawback is the comparitively small memory--if you want to maintain/save some of things that you have read, the 2MB memory quickly fills up. But I think that the value and utility of the product overall outweighs this quibble.

Well worth having "if". [Posted on 2000-09-06]
My Rocket eBook is most enjoyable in the dark hours of night if you have problems sleeping as I do. No more flashlights and no lamps on to disturb your partner. It travels just great.. the battery seems to last forever, you don't even need to pack your charger if a weekend trip. The "only" complaint I have is the lack of Best Sellers available and especially, the cost of the few that are. We all have the common sense to realize that if the publishers are NOT spending their money on printing, shipping, etc., they should be able to pass on these savings. At any discount store, we can get printed versions of a Best Seller for about $15.00.. Any new book should be available for this $15.00 or less. psv

If You Can Find It, Buy It! [Posted on 2001-06-13]
I love my eBook! When I travel, I sometimes have 40 titles in it, and never run out of things to read. I especially love the way I can download free books from the Gutenberg Project and other public domain sites and load them into the reader. I can download HTML pages, and portions of web sites and have them to read. The backlit screen is very easy to read and requires no external light. You can adjust the light to accomodate a dark room or direct sunlight. I collect web pages and e-mail I've not read yet and upload them to the book. I have bought a few current titles from booksellers, with no shipping and immediate delivery too. Now the downside: It's so easy to get lots of good literature free that authors and book sellers are missing out on a cut of the profits. After all, if you want to read Mark Twain, why pay for a copy when it's all over the Internet, free? So they've stopped making this wonderful gadget, and the replacements from RCA actively discourage you from loading your own materials into the ebook. You can still find the software to do it, but you need to search for it. They also keep the prices very high,...for an ebook! I think this means the format is being driven out of the market slowly. This could eventually limit new, non-public domain book availability, but there will be thousands more freely available books too, plus all the reading you normally do on your computer screen, such as this web page. It will continue to be possible to use the ebook for that. Unless they come up with a PDA with a large, very readable backlit screen, with long-life batteries and highly ergonomic usability, it'll still be easier to read a Rocket ebook!

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