NanoNotes and electronic dictionaries

[Wolfram Kahl]

On Thu, Aug 22, 2013 at 10:24:11PM +0200, Paul Boddie wrote:
> Recalling the heritage of the Ben as an electronic dictionary...
> 
> http://en.qi-hardware.com/wiki/File:Ben_proprietary_sw.jpg
> 
> ...I was intrigued to encounter the following product:
> 
> http://shop.telegraph.co.uk/v8087
> 
> [...]
> There's a selection of these kinds of things here:
> 
> http://www.franklin.com/dictionaries?limit=30
> 
> Some models of dictionaries and translators have colour screens and possibly 
> approximate to the Ben a bit more closely.

I always would have liked a Nanonote with the User-HW-interface
(that is, case, screen, keyboard) of, for example:

  http://www.besta.com.sg/products/CD739S.html

These are the nicest small clamshells I have seen so far,
and they come at prices >$400,
but if you consider that that is also the price of the OpenPandora,
there might actually be quite a few geeks out there willing to pay that ---
combining the ideological aspects of the Ben with a machine
that would be actually and conveniently useful to a wider user base.

(The  newer product

  http://www.besta.com.sg/products/CD1088S.htm

 actually runs Android 2.3 and has its screen size advertised as 800x480;
 for the CD739S they only say ``5in screen with 16:9 ratio'' but don't
 mention the pixels --- nowadays I would hope for at least 1028 x 600...)


Wolfram