Is it time to start burning your books? Given the hype surrounding last week’s launch of Amazon.com’s electronic book reader you’d be forgiven for thinking so. But the “ebook” concept has a long way to go before anyone but the most ardent gadget fan starts clearing their bookshelves.

The $399 (£194) Kindle device can store about 200 electronic novels, allowing readers to flick from the latest John Grisham thriller to Richard Dawkins’s antireligion diatribe with just a few button presses. Amazon has made more than 90,000 ebooks available for download from its American website, and it claims books can be downloaded in less than a minute using the Kindle’s built-in mobile phone technology, which avoids the need for fiddly PC connections or hunting for a wireless internet connection.

So far, so good. But where the Kindle – and all other ebook devices – start to fall apart at the seams is the reading screen. Unlike the displays you find on mobile phones and laptops, the Kindle’s diminutive 6in screen uses a new display technology called “electronic paper”. This technology redraws and then fixes the screen every time the reader turns the page, meaning that even when the device’s power is turned off, the page is still displayed.

Despite Amazon’s claims, it is not “as easy to read as printed paper”. Amazon refused us access to a Kindle, saying it wouldn’t work in the UK. This is because the device is not compatible with the UK’s mobile phone standard, so although you could read books already stored, it would not be possible to download new material. But we’ve experienced the same technology on devices such as iRex’s iLiad (www.iliadreader.co.uk), and while electronic paper is easier on the eye than a computer screen, it still lacks the sharpness and clarity of the printed page.

Electronic paper is monochrome, meaning that all text and – worst of all – pictures are rendered in ugly shades of grey. It also suffers from “show-through”, where the contents of the previous page aren’t completely erased when a new page is turned, occasionally making them hard to read.

Also, ebooks lack the convenience of a book. You might think they’d be the ideal alternative to lugging a caseful of books on holiday – but they wouldn’t last long next to the pool. The Kindle will still need recharging every other day because of the power-sapping mobile data connection. Turn off the mobile data and put the device on read-only mode, and it might last a week, claims Amazon.

And what about the cost? Aside from the purchase price and the cost of keeping its battery charged, you have to pay for the books. The price of a bestseller or new release is $9.99 (£4.86), which is about $5-$10 cheaper than Amazon sells the printed books for. But Amazon is cheekily charging $2 for out-of-copyright titles such as Dickens’s Bleak House, which are available free from internet libraries such as Project Gutenberg (www.gutenberg.org/wiki/Main_Page). And because the Kindle can’t be connected to a PC or the internet, owners cannot download the free titles available to other ebook devices.

Amazon is also charging Kindle owners up to $14.99 (£7.29) a month to read newspapers, and 99 cents to read blogs – both of which cost nothing on the internet. Inventing a way to charge people for free stuff? Now that’s what I call a technological breakthrough.

DIGITAL DJ
Tonium Pacemaker DJ MP3 player
£355
www.pacemaker.net

It’s taken digital technology a long time to catch up with that last bastion of vinyl, the nightclub DJ, but now it has. The Tonium Pacemaker is the equivalent of two turntables and a mixer (plus records) all in a palm-sized gadget. This equipment is aimed at serious DJs and features a thumping great 120GB hard drive. The Pacemaker can play back music in a variety of digital formats but unlike, say, an iPod it also performs most of the functions of proper DJ turntables such as cueing up the next song, adjusting the pitch for beat-matching, and mixing between two tracks using its touch-sensitive cross-fader. In brief tests, the Pacemaker proved highly effective, albeit more suited to a house party than a huge club. Price aside, its principal snag is that a chap fiddling about with an MP3 player looks less impressive than the physical theatre of two decks. Available in February.

GREEN CONSCIENCE
The Wattson electricity monitor
£150
www.firebox.com
0844 922 1010

The techno-boxes festooned about most living rooms mean electricity is being consumed faster than a Russian gas baron can neck caviar. The Wattson enables you to see exactly how much you are using in real time and can help cut down those bills. Once a monitoring sensor has been clamped onto the cable leading from your home’s meter, the 7in-wide Wattson box shows total electricity consumption in either watts or pounds sterling. Its lights change from blue to red to show at a glance how decadent your power usage is. Cheaper meters abound, but few are as stylish or fun.

POWER TRIP
GroundSurf electric skateboard
About €1,500-€2,000 (£1,079-£1,439) available February 2008
www.groundsurf.com

Geeks in France have won our 2007 award for the coolest application for a mobile phone: an electric skateboard that can be controlled via Bluetooth from your handset. Called the GroundSurf, its maker claims the three-wheeled board is inspired by surfing. It is driven by an electric motor between the two front wheels. The speed is controlled either with a mobile phone (using the navigation control), which sends instructions wirelessly to a receiver on the motor, or more conventionally by body position: lean forward to speed up or back to slow down and stop. We haven’t tested it but the technical specs look impressive. Unfortunately it won’t be ready for Christmas.

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