Chino, Calif. – Sungale,
a China-based maker of digital photo frames and other CE products, will enter
the e-reader market in November with its Cyberus-series Smart Info Engine, which
features a 7-inch color LCD touchscreen, portable media player (PMP) functions,
and WiFi access to web-based audio, video, news and email.
The $279-suggested
device, promoted as the first universal portable media device, will be available
through Amazon, Sungale’s Web site, and other online and brick-and-mortar
retailers, the company said.
The device lacks a
full-fledged web browser, but the company plans to include one in its
next-generation device. It reads books in text and PDF format, and in a planned
free software upgrade, users will be able to read books in the ePub format, a
spokesperson told TWICE. Although it features Wi-Fi, it doesn’t download books
via Wi-Fi. Users download books via PC, then side-load them to the device for
viewing on its 800 by 480-pixel display. Content is stored in embedded 1GB
flash memory and in removable SD/MMC
memory cards.
Wi-Fi is put to use to
take advantage of preloaded Wi-Fi applications, including audio and video
streaming, weather report by ZIP code, RSS feeds for news updates, news from
Yahoo or Google, real-time stock quotes, Internet radio, Picasa photo-site access,
Gmail alerts, driving directions and YouTube.
The device also
display images in JPG, TIF, PNG and BMP formats; plays MP3 audio files; and
plays AVI video files. Other
features include notepad, calendar, clock and alarm.
