BeBook Mini eReader first impressions, price and competition comparison

BeBook Mini eReader for $199

For those not familiar with the BeBook Mini (which I think would be most of us), it has a 5-inch, 600×800 resolution, E-Ink screen capable of 8 levels of grayscale. It weighs about five and a half ounces and measures roughly 6″x4″x0.4″. The Mini supports the gamut of files: PDF, mobi, prc, ePub, lit, txt, fb2, doc, html, rtf, djvu, wol, ppt, mbp, chm, bmp, jpg, png, gif, tif, rar, zip, mp3 and RSS. It has 512MB of internal storage with a SD card slot that makes it expandable to 16GB along with a USB 2.0 and a 3.5mm audio jack for mp3 playback. One full charge of the battery is rated for 7,000 page flips.

Engadget posted a some hands-on impressions and found that it was a quality, easy-to-read device that was up to task. It was light and easy to handle, had quick refreshes and the menu was simple to navigate. The most important downside is that there’s no Wifi or 3G capability meaning you have to connect to your computer to download new material.

There’s also a question as to how the BeBook Mini compares to the other eReaders in the price range…

The Sony Pocket Edition Reader is the same price and has the same screen size but offers a nicer design and more familiar brand name. However the Pocket Edition only has 512MB for storage whereas the BeBook Mini has a SD card slot that can expand the storage to 16GB.

Climbing the price ladder we find the Astak EZ Reader at $250 which has gotten some exceptional reviews. The Astak EZ Reader and BeBook Mini are about tied when it comes to specs, storage and screen size, but Astak takes it by a nose thanks to its text-to-speech ability.

In addition there’s the COOL-ER eReader and Cybook Opus eReader who both wear a $250 price tag and offer their own pros and cons.

The biggest contender is the Kindle which recently had a price cut dropping it down to a more affordable $259. The Kindle is the standard by which all other eReaders are judged.

The main questions for BeBook: will eReader buyers be exposed to their products and will they buy them over more known brands even if they’re higher priced?