Review

By Andy Walker, Cyberwalker Media Syndicate

If you like to travel light and fast, then luggage space is always at a premium. With all that down time on planes, trains and automobiles, it's also a good time to catch up on your reading, business or otherwise.

Multiple books, magazines and newspapers are heavy so it makes logical sense too take them along digitally if you can.
That's where the RCA eBook makes sense.

The paperback-sized device (model REB1100) is designed to carry and display a bookshelf of electronic books and newspapers around in one simple package.

At 18 oz, it is a little heavier than your average book, but it offers more features.
The stylus-driven gadget has a backlit monochrome screen that measures 5.5 inches diagonally. It can display text in two font sizes and four orientations for left or right hand reading as well as two landscape settings. You turn pages using two buttons.

The text of any book on the device is searchable and can be bookmarked and annotated. There's also a dictionary that will define words you might not understand in the text.

One problem here: In search mode, the device pops up a control panel that covers the first line of the page you are on. If the word you want to look up is in this line it's impossible to get to.
Sure you can scroll the text, but it moves in chunks and not line by line. A fine-tuning scroll dial would go a long way to making the device more user friendly.

The eBook has a 20-hour rechargeable battery and can carry up to 8,000 pages or about 20 novels. A smart media card expands storage space from 8 MB to 72 MB to give you the ability to store 72,000 pages or 150 books.

A free on-line personal bookshelf, hosted by Gemstar (which owns the eBook technology), can hold books that have been purchased when they are not on the device.

The digital books or other publications can be downloaded onto the device via a computer with a USB port and Internet connection. The gizmo's built-in modem can also dial into Gemstar directly to buy books and retrieve previously purchased titles.

Books cost about the same as their paper counterparts, which given the physical savings seems like a short-sighted strategy, but the good news is there are more and more titles being released each season in the eBook format. One would hope that the savings to the publisher will eventually be passed on to the reader if electronic books take off in popularity.

The eBook's dialup feature calls a 1-800 number, which was not working for a few days when tested. Therein lies the flaw in this technology. If you can't get new books or retrieve electronically shelved books without hassle, then this technology isn't much use.

This gadget is desperate for a wireless connection. Let's hope that in the meantime RCA and Gemstar do something to remedy the dialup problems.

The RCA eBook is available in Canada at Future Shop. In the US, get it at Circuit City and Best Buy or on-line at Barnes & Noble.com .

Price: $299 US / $499 CDN
More info: www.gemstarebook.com
Reviewer's rating: 3.5/5
Comments: This is a luggage friendly book technology that is easy to read and has great search and dictionary features. However the proprietary nature of book retrieval from Gemstar's electronic bookshelf service puts your reading habits at the mercy of the company's servers.

Specifications:
Weight: 18 oz.
Size: 5" x 7" x 1.5"
Screen: 5.5" diagonal monochrome LCD touch screen display (320 x 480 resolution)
Modem: 33.6 Kbps v.34 capable modem
Memory: 8 MB flash ROM (enough for 8000 pages); expandable via Smart Media to 72MB (70,000 pages)
Battery life: 20-40 Hours of continuous use with rechargeable, non-removable lithium-ion battery