Good point. I did not realize that these ebooks had grown to where you could get highly technical reference books for them. That would indeed be a great use. I thought the available content was more limited, and mostly geared towards recreational reading. Do these ebooks supports things like diagrams, or are they limited to plain text?

From my understanding, anything in the actual book will be on the digital version.

Some e-readers will allow you to highlight data, makes notes/comments. Obviously bookmark areas.

The Kindle is right now the leader in e-books. IMHO it will only hold its place until the next defining leader comes out. Whether that is the Nook or the mythical Apple iTablet, who knows. Sony gave a good run, but its a distant runner in this race.

An excellent point you raise. One of the reasons I asked the question is to hear how people use them and why.
My initial hankering comes from my geekineess. These things just look cool. But I also like the idea of being able to carry a bunch of books in one small and lightweight package as I'm usually reading 2 or 3 books at the same time. Plus, being able to carry pdf versions of all my e-gear manuals would be a bonus. I too stare at LCD screens all day but I've seen the Kindle and Sony screens in the stores and they really look to be easier on the eyes.

As for the tablet products, I'm yet to be convinced they're a worthwhile investment for general usage. I've tested a lot of them for clients over the years and while I think they're great for a specific task set, they just confirm my opinion that multipurpose tools aren't really good at any one thingg. Just my bias. I prefer tools made for the task.

The screens are supposed to be easier on the eyes, but most everyone who has and carries an ebook seems to also carry it along with a laptop so I just don't see the point in carrying another devide around. But then I also think about backups, etc. If I have a laptop with documents/books/whatever on it and an ebook with books on it now thats two things I have to backup, where if I just keep the ebooks on my laptop they get backed up along with it.

I read Lights Out as a .pdf on my desktop pc a few months back and it killed my eyes. It was terrible and I work on my laptop for work a couple hours a day.

The e-ink format is much easier on the eyes. Eye fatigue is really a non-issue in this case. There is no backlight or harsh screen glare. The background is a brownish grey like a paperback book. I spent quit a bit of time reading from Kindle, Sony, Nook and none of them caused me any eye strain or distraction.

The true debate on these should be on battery power. IIRC all those I mention will last several days on a charge. I know the Nook is rated to last about ten days with wifi turned off.

When comparing to tablets, remember these will be essentially netbooks/notebooks or in the case of the Apple Tablet a giant iTouch. Those batteries are judged on hours of charge, not days.

I don't have an eBook reader because I'm happy with my Palm PDA, which is much more versatile. IMHO, all these eBook readers are just a great gift for our grandparents - that's all they're really good for.

What's killing me most about them is that I have to use a flashlight to read in the dark!

at least I am used to reading with my headlamp already

Personally, I've held off on an eBook reader. $300 buys quite a few paperbacks! I also can't stand the thought of paying more than paperback price for a license to read a book. If you "buy" an eBook from Amazon, you don't truly own it. It is restricted to only work on their particular reader, and they can revoke that license whenever they feel like it. Read this article - a publisher decided to pull some books from distribution, and it was deleted by Amazon from the readers' kindles. http://news.cnet.com/8301-13860_3-10289983-56.html

The only place I buy eBooks is http://webscription.net - the Baen (science fiction publisher) eBook service. They sell for less than paperback prices, with no DRM, and in whatever format you like. Once the rest of the industry adopts that model, I'll consider an eBook reader!

I am a potential ebook purchaser. The idea of easily carrying around my entire library, plus assorted manuals and guides, is pretty attractive. It looks like waiting a bit is prudent.

Wow. If these ebooks are tied to a particular device, what if your device breaks and you have to buy a new one? Or what if your device ends up being on the losing end of some kind of ebook format war?

If the publishers do not have a fix for these (common) scenarios, then there's no way I'd buy an ebook reader. I did not realize that ebook content providers were tieing them up with onerous DRM like the music companies did. I'm not against publishers protecting their content, but not to the point where they expect me to pay more, be inconvenienced, or be literally screwed out of stuff I purchased legally just because my device went bad.

Now learning this about ebooks has made me forget about researching any of the features, because the restrictions are too onerous to make even the most stellar device worth considering.