ViewSonic VEB620 eBook e-reader hands-on from Taipei

Today we attended a ViewSonic press conference in Taipei where the company used the event to launch a range of new eBook e-readers appropriately held at the eslite bookstore.



First up Mike Chen, a ViewSonic product manager for its digital media business unit, introduces the cheapest of its new e-readers, the VEB620 eBook. But when we say cheap though, don't let they confuse it. It comes packed with features and the only thing it really misses out on is wireless connectivity, so you will either need to use a microSD card or copy books etc over via USB from your computer.

The unit will go on sale in Taiwan in a week or so with a street price of 6,990 NTD - which works out to be around 217 USD at today's exchange rate. The device comes with a six-inch screen with 16 levels of grey that is capable of an 800 x 600 resolution. It weighs in at a rather light and comfortable eight ounces or around 227 grams. It was really nice to hold and is made using soft plastics that feel good.

It comes with a single half watt speaker than can playback MP3s that are stored on the built-in 2GB of storage or on an installed microSD card and you can even listen to the music while you are reading a book. We were told this unit uses a 1GHz CPU, but we were not told which one and that the OS is based around a Linux operating system.

Watch the video above for a full hands-on and close up look at the newly launched VEB620.