What do we have here? Something that looks like a family of iPods at first glance. Well that seems to be the way the Cool-er ebook reader is being positioned in the market. Funky colours, smooth curves and a ‘cool’ name. A ebook reader with some street cred perhaps.

The Cool-er is a pretty nice device for the money but it does lack some of the ‘cooler’ functionality of the Sony Readers and Kindles. However, you get what you pay for. So if your just looking for a handy sized portable e-reader, without many of the bells and whistles, this could be the e-reader for you. The jury is out on whether the competative price justifies some of compromises but my gut feel is that this will be the popular Christmas present this year, especially amongst the everyday man (probably more women) so expect to see alot of them popping in and out of handbags on buses and trains in 2010.

It’s the lower price that will attract those who just want a reliable and convenient e-book reader. You don’t get the built in wireless with this reader so it’ll have to be plugged in to a USB to download. However, apart from the reading functions I think the future Cool-er fans will enjoy the ability to add MP3 music, and benefit from the PDF support and SD card slot. Whilst the Cool-er looks pretty cool and sits in the hands nicely, like the iPod, it’s not that easy to use from first pick up but you’ll get used to it like any new gadget. My main problem when comparing it to some other e-readers is that because it lacks a keyboard you have to fiddle around with the somewhat clumsy scroll wheel that doesn’t provide a natural enough page turner for me, especially when you have it in landscape format (a nice to have function). Maybe I’m being too picky though. The interface will take a bit of getting used to to, especially if you’ve used other ebook readers such as the newer Kindles or Sony Readers but you’ll get the hang of it and won’t give it a second thought.

The 6″ Vizplex screen is impressively good. You’ll be able to read for long periods without headaches. The matte finish appearance is just right too and the lettering has a good quality, and rounded off form that you’d get from the good old paper page.

The MP3 player on the Cool-er will come in handy for those audio book fans who don’t always want their eyes glued to the screen. You can play them from the SC card slot. The trouble with the music though is that you haven’t got easy access to the controls whilst reading a book so you might get a tad frustrated at the need to exit your e-book to skip a tune.

Be careful Mac owners too.  Loading e-books up via the mini USB from Macs does have some compatibility issues. It still all works with Macs but you’ll find all those messy meta data files that you might have experienced with other external drives and devices. You can use the SD card slot though too of course.

When it comes to the actual eBooks, you get 25% reduction on books at coolerbooks.co.uk but don’t be too blown away. With some comparison research you’ll soon discover that it’s still not that cheap. Some I saw on coolerbooks.com were as much as double that of Kindle ebooks from Amazon, especially the newer ones. The selection at cool-er store isn’t as good as Waterstones and Amazon either but that’ll change as this cool cat on the market rockets in popularity.

I shouldn’t be saying this but I will. One of Cool-er’s other upsides is the support of PDF docs so that you can load up torrented and downloaded e-books simply. So, if you’re into pirate stuff then there’s not much hassle with this ebook reader.

In summary, you don’t get the breadth of detail and finishing of the more sophisticated ebook readers like the Amazon Kindle and the newer Sony Reader, but you’re not paying the price either. At £189, your playing in the middle to lower end of the market but it might be all that you need from an e-reader. For the techno geeks out there though, it probably won’t satisfy your craving for the really ‘cooler’ bits of kit, but it also won’t do your image any bad either.

Cool-er Specifcations:

Weight: 6.2 ounces
Screen size: 6 inches
Dimensions: 7.2 inches by 4.6 inches by .43 inches
Levels of greyscale: 8
DPI: 170 pixels per inch
Type: EInk Vizplex
Touch screen: No
Manufacturer: PVI
Operating system: Linux
Storage: 1GB
Memory: 128MB (internal)
Processor: Samsung S3C2440 ARM 400MHz
Battery Life: 8,000 pages per full charge
Battery: Li-Polymer battery (1000 mAh)
Memory Expansion: SD (up to 4GB)
Wireless: No
Languages: 8
Formats: JPEG, PDF, EPUB, TXT, MP3 (2.5mm headphone jack with a 3.5mm converter included for standard headphones)