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Being a keen reader and having over 500 books at home, I thought it was about time that I jumped on the digital reader revolution. After spending what seemed like weeks deciding whether to get the Sony reader or the Kindle, I finally decided that I would get the Sony PRS 600.

Why Sony?
Well, I have always trusted Sony to deliver quality products at reasonable cost and they have always served me very well. I have never had any problems with any of my Sony equipment and I just had that extra bit more confidence in this product than I did with the Kindle.



First Thoughts
Amazing, amazing, amazing! I was so amazed that I threw away many of my books which were cluttering up my bookshelf at home (excluding my Lord of the Rings collection of course). I got the Sony PRS 600 for Christmas and immediately flew to Finland for my holiday. I was there for 2 weeks and the battery survived the whole time on only it's first initial charge. In this time I read 3 books which, totalled together, had over 1500 pages. Very impressive!

I also like the fact that I can makes notes on the books, this is very good especially for younger readers who may be reading books for their coursework or exams, allowing them to make extensive notes which are easily revised.

One added feature is the ability to draw pictures using your Stylus. For me this came in handy sitting in the airport when our flight was delayed and my 4 year old son needed something to do.

Pros and cons
Well, let's start with the good things.

Battery Life - The battery life is incredible, with up to 7500 hours of reading per charge which makes this an incredibly sufficient reader when making those long journeys.

Formats - Sony have allowed owners to be able to add books in various different formats including PDF, Word, TXT, RTF as well as the standard EPUB formats which allow you to download books from stores. Allowing the use of PDF and Word files is one of the things which clinched the deal for me. This means that I can convert a lot of my office work into PDF files and take it with me on the go, saving me precious time when on my way to meetings etc.

Readability - Overall, it is very easy to read a book on this. One of my main concerns when purchasing this was how it would feel in comparison to reading a book, I can say now that I definitely prefer handling a Sony reader than a book. No more having to hold the pages down, or dog ear the pages to remember where I was and I won't even get into issues with Hardbacks!

No wireless - Many people disagree with me here, but I firmly believe that everybody has a right to their own opinion. To me, this is a reader for reading books. I don't want to be distracted from it by being able to go online with this, I have my IPhone for that!

The Bad Things...
No Backlight - I think this would have been a good thing to have as an option. At present if you are in the dark, the only way you can read is by purchasing one of the covers which includes a light. Although I have purchased one and love it, it is very expensive and not all users will want to spend so much.

Power - One of the things that shocked me is that Sony only provides you with a USB cable with which to charge the reader with. I believe that they should have also supplied a power cable with this, but it can be purchased, but again, at an extra cost.

Cost - Expensive! Although for me I feel that it is worth the space that I have saved and will save in the future I think that unless the cost of these starts to go down, they will not be as successful as they have the potential to be.

Accessories
Not a wide range of accessories are available yet but I believe that will change as more people start to use them. The two main categories of accessories come down to covers and power. For power you have two options - a car charger or a power cable. For covers there are a range of various covers and my favourite one is this one here but at a cost of anywhere between £35 and £50, it is a lot to ask after forking out for the reader itself. However , the reader does come with a slip cover included.

Conclusion
Overall I am very pleased with my Sony Reader. It's just what I wanted, and it's just a shame that I didn't get around to buying it sooner. Even now that the iPad has been launched, I am happy. The iPad is not a reader it just has a reader function and I feel that it is not quite enough for what I want. I would highly recommend this to any serious reader, as well as the first book that I read on it which was Eye of the World by Robert Jordan!