14 DAY TRIAL // E-book readers had already become a promising market even before Apple launched the iPad, but it further fueled the popularity of books in electronic content through its ability to operate in e-reader mode. Seeking to use the strong flow in its favor, Samsung has announced that it is launching a WiFi-equipped e-reader. As the second such model from the company, the e-reader is dubbed SNE-60/60K (or E6) and can both view books in electronic content and allow users to take notes.
Samsung has already formed a partnership with major Korean newspapers in order to enable subscribers to automatically download their news articles. The company is also working with Kyobo Mungo, a chain bookstore in partnership with which the e-reader was actually developed. The bookstore chain will provide the device with the required online content, so that buyers will have a large collection of books and other content to choose from.
Unlike the device that was showcased at CES, the new, 6-inch SNE-60/60K will have WiFi connectivity, which is considered essential in the promotion of e-books. The internal storage capacity is of 2GB, the equivalent of 24,000 notes or 1,400 books. Users can read the content either with the help of the stylus of simply by rolling the front slide up. In addition, the words can be immediately looked up in on-board Korean-English and English-Korean dictionaries through a simple tap of the stylus.
The paper-like protection screen of the e-reader lets consumers feel as though they are writing with real pen and paper, when in the process of taking notes. The stylus also enables users to make annotations in their reading sections, news articles and images. Further versatility is provided by the product's support for PDF and ePUB file formats.
An extra ability of the SNE-60/60K is the text-to-speech (TTS) function, which reads audio books aloud with accurate pronunciation. This content can be listened to through earphones thanks to the built-in headphone jack. Not only that, but to make audio capabilities complete, Samsung even threw in MP3 support, so that purchasers could enjoy their favorite music while reading. Of course, such consumers should take heed not to fill up the entire memory with songs alone.
Samsung plans to start marketing its new device beginning with February 8. The price is currently suggested to be of around $399.