Last spring, I shared my thoughts on the first-generation Sony Reader (see SLJ March 2007 “Test Drive,” p. 23). While I found the ebook reading device somewhat flawed, I was quite impressed with its paperlike and retina-friendly E Ink display. Since then, I’ve had the chance to track the evolution of this technology by testing two other products that feature E Ink, the iRex iLiad and the Amazon Kindle.

The iLiad. www.irextechnologies.com/products/iliad. $699. Still stoked from my experience with the Sony Reader, I was literally trembling with geeky excitement when I opened up the package containing the iRex iLiad. After all, this ebook reader promised some real improvements. For starters, the iLiad boasted a bigger touch-sensitive screen (8.1 inch, 122mm by 163mm)—one you could actually jot and save notes on. Plus it had WiFi connectivity. And I was immediately impressed with the unit’s solid, European design. At $699, I expect a reader that’s built to last and, unlike some gadget guys, I really don’t expect it to be comfortable to use and still fit in my pocket. On the contrary, I’d found other digital reading devices a bit undersized. Yep, the iLiad appeared to have everything I wanted in a reader and more: enough onboard memory to store about 30 full-length ebooks; plus conveniently located slots for inserting CF and SD/MMC memory cards; an Ethernet jack, and USB port built into the AC adapter; and support for displaying common document formats like PDF, TXT, and HTML—not to mention the ability to play MP3s.

Unfortunately, after giving the iLiad its requisite three-hour initial charge-up, I discovered that, while the device was certainly a very fancy cake, it could definitely have used a few more minutes in the oven. Though the unit boasted built-in WiFi, you couldn’t do much with it except update the reader’s firmware. What? No way to suck down wireless content? Indeed, the wireless “iRex Delivery Service” mentioned on the iLiad packaging and referenced in its literature didn’t seem to exist at all. And, judging from the newsgroup and blog posts from disgruntled early adopters, I wasn’t alone.

I was disappointed with the write-and-save functionality, too. First of all, the ability to add marginalia and highlights to ebook content just doesn’t appeal to me that much—though I do recognize the potential in education. It’ll need some tweaking, though. E Ink displays refresh quite slowly, so there’s a distracting lag between the stylus making contact with the screen and the handwriting materializing behind it. I found it pretty hard to get used to, and I noticed that the device was sluggish on other fronts as well. Boot-up seemed to take forever and page refreshes took longer than on the other E-ink devices.

The first iLiad that I tested turned out to have power management issues, too, requiring a recharge after just a few hours use—far from the 10,000 page turns one is told to expect to enjoy between charges. Clearly defective, the device finally locked up completely and could not be reset. Irex promptly sent a replacement.

Have I given up on the iRex iLiad? I prefer to remain hopeful. The device has all the components to become the finest high-end reader on the market by the time it becomes widely available in North America. It’s already the best at displaying PDFs and the only one I’ve used that supports handwritten notation. If iRex can capitalize on these strengths, iron out the bugs, and tap the unit’s existing WiFi for PC-free content delivery, it could certainly be an ebook contender.

The Kindle. www.amazon.com/kindle. $399. Oh, so you’ve heard of it? I won’t pretend I’m scooping anybody on Amazon’s Kindle. So first things first: is it really that ugly? Initially, it looked to me like something Atari might have released circa 1981. But now that I’ve actually used it, I have to admit that I’m finding it almost cute—albeit in a Battlestar Galactica kind of way. Likewise, the lower-third thumb keyboard drew fire as being ungainly, but functionality trumps aesthetics.

The keyboard, like just about everything else on the Kindle, just plain works. Not only can you use it to find on-the-fly word definitions using the built-in dictionary and detailed background material via Wikipedia, but it’s the key to accessing what makes the Kindle so superior: the best catalogue of instantly downloadable ebooks anywhere. Instead of WiFi, the kindle uses Sprint’s WhisperNet EVDO network to connect to its ebookstore from virtually anywhere in the continental U.S. with cellular-like access—for free. While on the road, I downloaded a memoir written by a certain presidential hopeful in seconds and enjoyed it, for a reasonable $8.50. The Kindle’s clickable thumbwheel with its corresponding vertical LCD display makes navigating a diverse variety of texts and menus as easy and intuitive as I can possibly imagine.

Is the Kindle perfect? By no means. The cover is bulky and unstable and it doesn’t support popular formats like PDF and TXT unless you e-mail them to Amazon for conversion ata nominal fee. Not only is that kind of clunky, but some might find it monopolistic à la iTunes. Truth is, in its present form, the Kindle stands out for its elegant navigation, but mostly because of the wealth of titles Amazon makes instantly available via free wireless delivery. The question is can anyone compete with that?

For a visual comparison of the Kindle and the iLiad, see the video version of this review.