Review e-Book Readers

You're likely familiar with the name of this company because of the electronic translators and other digital products that they make, so when Franklink got into the e-book reader market, it made complete sense. The Franklin eBookMan EBM-911 is called an e-Book reader, but there's more to it than that. Not only does it do a great job of reading digital e-books, but it also has some of the functionality of a PDA, which makes this device a real winner. Instead of calling it an e-book reader, it might be more appropriate to call it an entertainment device.

When you first get your hands on a Franklin eBookman you might think that it's a PDA because it looks much like a Palm PDA. With a 200x240 pixel screen, it's easy to mistake it for a PDA and it goes have some functions that are common to a PDA. For example, if you want to sync your Outlook contacts and email with Intellisync, you can certainly do that with the eBookman. Even though it does have this functionality, it cannot connect to the internet, which is a disappointment.

For a low price the eBookman really gives you a lot for your hard earned dollars. With 16MB of internal storage, you can store books and newspapers, but with the SD slot in the back you can quickly add much more storage. The eBookman has the ability to play MP3's as well which makes it great for audio books and adequate for music if you choose. It's certainly not going to sound as good as your iPod, but if you don't want to carry two different devices, it will do.

The eBookMan EMB-911 was originally released all the way back in 1999 and when it was first released it was really a great product as there just wasn't much competition. As technology advanced and more and more companies started to develop e-book reading devices, the eBookMan became obsolete and is not longer in production. You may have the option of purchasing one of these devices used through websites like eBay. If you're a casual e-book reader and you don't need to store a large number of e-books, the Franklin eBookMan is still a decent value if you can find a deal. Since the Kindle and other similar products have flooded the market today, the eBookman-911 may not be worth as much as it once was, but this certainly doesn't mean it's useless. For example, if you like the small form factor rather than a larger 6 inch or 9 inch screen, this device is a good fit for you.

Ever since the eBookMan ceased production, a very talented and loyal following as kept the eBookMan alive by releasing various programs to run on this old gem. It certainly wasn't because this was an inferior product that this device is not longer in production, but it was due to poor marketing by Franklin. It appears now that they may have been a little too early to the game since other big companies are just now starting to get into e-readers and they're selling well.