Lincoln Crisler

I had a tech-heavy Christmas this year. Well, technically the Dell isn’t a Christmas gift since I bought it myself, but my wife shipped it out in my Christmas box, and having it around sure feels like Christmas! But I digress.

Santa Wife brought me the Sony PRS-600 Touch Reader. I’ve been waiting to get my hands on another reader since I lost my last one in September; now I can finally catch up on all the PDF ARCs people have been sending me! I read plenty of reviews before telling her I wanted one, and a common gripe is that the text isn’t quite as dark as the touch-less PRS 505. Seriously, it’s not as bad as they make it seem. I hardly notice. The touch is nice, but not as sensitive as I’d like. I have to press a little harder than I instinctively want to (every geek knows you don’t push on a computer screen, for God’s sake!). Every time I remember to use the correct amount of pressure, though, it does respond. I think I’ll get used to it. My biggest bitch is the slipcase that comes with it; the 505 comes with a leather book-cover (and the one off my old broken 505 fit the 600 perfectly) and you can buy designer covers, too, but seriously? For the amount of money these things cost, it should come with more than a slipcover.

My favorite thing about the 600 compared to the 505 is that it seems more sturdy. The 500 looked fragile, and it proved me right after one accidental drop on the sidewalk. The 600 is a little heavier, and even one of my co-workers said it looked more solid. I don’t plan on putting it to the test, but I like to feel confident in my equipment. Overall, for someone’s first e-reader, this is muy squeeworthy. If you already have the 505… well, I wouldn’t rush out, but this’ll make a nice upgrade.

I bought the Inspiron 1750 in conjunction with a promotion offered by my college. They paid for a 15” Inspiron (I give them props for not being skimpy!) but I wanted the whole shebang, so I paid the difference. Dealing with Dell came with a lot of headaches; I felt like I had been in a fight after the first round of phone calls, and then had to make a second round a couple weeks later when they cancelled the first order for no annotated reason, without telling me. Luckily, though, the computers aren’t made by their customer service staff. I’m very pleased with the product, thus far.

Materials-wise it’s very minimalist; not alot of extra trim, glowing lights, etc., and I like that. If you don’t, this isn’t for you. What it does have, though, is nice shiny silver and glossy black, so it doesn’t look cheap or anything. It has all the ports you need, but according to some other reviews, not as many as most desktop replacements (I wouldn’t know; this is my first large laptop). I’m fine with three USB ports though, and it does have a video hookup and a few other necessities. The only thing that’s a little wierd is the keyboard design; the keys are a bit larger, and they’re all flat and flush with each other. I make more mistakes than usual, but I figure it’s just because I’m used to my work computer and a small netbook (I also don’t type traditionally. Think hunt-and-peck, but fast, and without having to watch my hands). I’ll get over it pretty soon.

Windows 7 does a lot of little things differently that I really like; the taskbar, for starters, uses icons instead of rectangles with text, and there’s a widget across the top of the screen that you can pin programs to. I’ll hardly ever use my start menu again! Those are the biggest impacts the upgrade has had on me, and they’re fairly significant. I’m also having a lot of fun playing with the themes (your background can be a slideshow now; I don’t know if Vista has that).