enTourage eDGe Reviews

While I am very impressed by this device, let me start by saying that it is not for everyone. For those just looking for an e-reader for casual reading with a big screen, there are cheaper (and lighter) devices out there such as the Kindle DX. For those looking for a multimedia tablet, there are better devices for that purpose, such as the iPad out there. But for those of us who work with technical or academic PDFs, or need to annotate PDFs that we download, the Edge is a godsend.

Some people have described it as an iPad stapled to a Kindle. That is not really true (and even if it were, it’s much cheaper than the sum of those devices would be). For one thing, there is a lot of interaction between the e-reader side and the LCD side. You can zoom in on diagrams or photos on the e-reader side and transfer them over to the LCD side so that they’re in color, and this also allows you to continue through the pages of the document on the e-reader side while still having the image on the LCD side to refer to. Also, you can transfer web pages from the browser on the LCD side to the e-reader.

The Edge also comes with a Wacom stylus which allows you to write notes directly on the PDF or EPUB document in the ereader, and then save the document with the notes. Also you can write notes on “blank paper” in the e-reader and save those as PDFs. The only problem I have with the annotator is that with the factory default settings, it takes about half a second for the ereader to catch up to the stylus pressure, but you can tweak the settings to get rid of most of this lag. Also, the inherent limitations of grayscale e-ink mean that you can’t easily tell which color you’re writing in, so sometimes you have to go to the settings page to make sure you’re using the right color.

On the LCD side, this is roughly your average Android tablet, with all the pros and cons that entails. Google only allows access to the Android marketplace for smartphones, so the Edge (like any Android tablet) does not have direct marketplace access. You have to download apps from Entourage’s own app store or from one of the alternative Android app sites such as SlideMe. In practice, this is a minor inconvenience since most popular apps are available at alternative sites. One annoying thing about Android apps is that a lot of them assume a smartphone size, ie, they don’t take up the full screen available on the Edge, but again this will be true for any Android tablet.

Finally, I’ll address the aspect of the Edge that most negative reviewers endlessly harp on — the weight. Yes, it is about 3 lbs and I would not want to be lying on the beach holding it up above my head for long periods of time. Like I said, if you’re looking for an ereader for casual reading, there are cheaper and lighter devices out there. The Edge is still lighter than a laptop or the average textbook, so the talk about having to “lug it around” is pretty silly. Another commonly criticized aspect is the battery life — about a day with the LCD shut off and the ereader on, and about 6 hours with both on. Both of these are worse than the ereader and tablet competitors, so if you plan on using the device away from power sources for long periods of time, that’s another con to consider.