The Sony Reader Pocket Edition, PRS-300, is now available for order at Amazon. The price for the Sony Reader 300 Pocket Edition is just $199.
The main features include the low price, a 5″ screen with 8 shades of gray, the thin and light design, and availability in various colors.
Sony is contrasting it with the Kindle 2, which might not be the best decision given Kindle 2′s wireless capabilities and Free Internet Access.
Sony Reader Pocket Edition PRS-300 – Video, Video of the Manual
First, a Sony Reader Pocket Edition review video –
Here are relevant parts of the manual –
It seems it’ll be a worldwide release, although not sure if every country will get the new Sony Readers at the same time. The countries mentioned are US, Canada, UK, France, Germany, and Netherlands.
- You can look at the Sony Reader 300 manual in PDF or get the Sony 300 manual’s Kindle compatible version.
- The first hint we got of the Sony 300 was from a user at the Sony Insider Forums who found service manuals for the Sony Reader 300 and 600.
Sony Reader PRS-300 – Key Details
- Priced at just $199. Very aggressive pricing.
- Sony 300 has a 5 inch screen.
- Very light at 7.76 oz (220 g).
- Very thin at .4″.
- Sony Reader 300 will be available in Red, Black and Silver.
- Lots of buttons -
A circular scroll wheel type button for navigation, 4 buttons below the screen, and 5 buttons on the right side of the screen that are sub-divided into 2 parts each.
- Can only be recharged via AC adapter (or so the manual seems to say).
- 440 Mb of storage capacity.
- Battery Life of the Sony Reader 300 is 7,500 pages of BBeB format books or 6,800 pages of ePub format books.
- Dimensions of 4.25″ by 6.25″ by .4″.
- The colors are going to be blue, pink/rose and silver -
Sony Reader PRS-300 Pocket Edition
Sony Reader 300 – My Thoughts
This seems like the lower end, no touchscreen, fits in your pocket version. It’s actually called Sony Reader PRS 300 Pocket Edition and retails at $199.
My guesses were (got the price right 
) -
- $200 price tag. Was right on the price – it’s $199.
- Has no wi-fi and guessed that wrong.
- The buttons on the right side are used for either tabs or to select an individual line.
- The buttons on the front clearly are for Home, Enter, Menu and something else.
- The scroll wheel button is obviously for navigation, it also has icons which indicate it has dual functions much like a camera’s controls where down can be pressed twice to delete and so forth.
Sony has definitely made things interesting. The Sony Reader 300 suddenly becomes the most portable eReader around, and since it’s at $199 it might win a lot of the lower end of the eReader market. The Kindle 2 is still better value for money (in my opinion) due to WhisperNet and Free Internet Access.
Filed under: eBook Reader Devices Tagged: | sony reader, sony reader 300
Isn’t the most portable ereader at that price point the iPod Touch, with Kindle.app, B&N eReader, Stanza, or any of the other options installed? That’s what’s been in my pocket for a year, and I’ve read more on it than off paper. I’d never buy a stand-alone eReader, and only have a stand-alone cell phone because I can’t pay for the data rates. iPod Touch it is, thank you very much.
I wasn’t aware iPod Touch was an e-Ink device..
True, but I’ve noticed that if I use the iPod Touch’s reader (Stanza, for me) for long-ish periods of time, my eyes start to water and hurt– similar to what I experience when using a computer for a long amount of time. The reader’s E-ink technology is supposed to look just like paper, so there will be little to no eyestrain. I don’t have an eReader yet, but I looking very closely at this one.
[...] new $199 Sony Reader 300, and the $299 Sony Reader 600 were mistakenly put on pre-order at JR.com for a few hours. This was [...]
[...] big additions to what we already know (see Sony 300 details and Sony 600 Reader details) [...]
Does anyone know if the PRS 300 will natively read Mobipocket (mobi or .prc) files that are unprotected? I have my entire collection in Mobipocket form. Currently I am using a Blackberry Curve 8330 to read the ebooks, but it is a little small for me so I am looking into getting a reader.
The Reader doesn’t handle mobi files natively, but they are easy to convert with the Calibre software.
BTW, the 4 lower buttons on the 300 are Home (main menu page), Back (go back a level in menus, e.g., to book menu from a book page), Bookmark (to set/erase bookmarks), and Magnification (to change font size).
Just got the prs-300 and so far am very annoyed with it. The machine itself is alright but i dont know if it’s my laptop or the reader but the books are refusing to sync to the reader. The status icon is showing it is doing something but the transfer files icon is not spinning and no progress is being made, am I doing something wrong?
It takes a few tries sometime.
Have you validated the reader software, the reader, etc. ?
Can anyone help? We have just purchased the Sony PRS 300, we registered on the sony website and managed to download the free 100 books ok. We then had to register with Adobe DRM, we did this and have a username & password. We then purchased a book online from WH Smith but for some reason we cant download it onto the E reader… we get getting a message saying that the computer needs to be registered with adobe to authorise download… we are registered and cant seem to move forward with this problem!
any help appreciated
Chris
You have to use Adobe Digital Editions.
Use Adobe digital editions to transfer files to the Sony – you can’t just drag and drop.