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Asus DR-950 coming this Fall, will run Qt apps

TBH, I thought they had decided to pass on the design. We’ve seen a lot of new devices from Asus since this showed up in January.

A new page turned up on the Qt website the other day. (I know it’s new because my search filters usually find stuff in the first couple days after it’s posted.) This page was written to promote the fact that the DR-950 uses Qt, so there isn’t much in the way of new details.

Using Qt 4.5.1 and the Qt WebKit open source web browser engine, Asus designed and built the DR-950 to stand above the generic 'crowd' of me-too eReader devices that are starting to spring up. As such, the product ships with a stack of extra applications, including a web browser and a handwriting-recognition system where individual letters are drawn into a box or the user selects the option of an onscreen keyboard.

"After our successful use of the Qt framework to build the UIs for the Asus EeePC and the Asus Touch Videophone, our production path for the Asus DR950 eReader’s interface was clear from the start. Our strategic product development plans also embraced Qt for application builds to run on this unit and the creation of an online Qt-based eBook SDK for third-party book vendors to target the device. With Qt on board, our customer and partner-facing proposition is one of the strongest around and I am confident that we will quickly adopt new services into our eBook platform," said an Ellis Wang, Software Product Marketing Director of Asustek.

This is good news, for 2 reasons. Asus are open to the idea of third party apps on the DR-950, and there’s already a community of developers working in Qt. This could be so much better than Irex Iliad (which often felt like the third party development was done despite the wishes of Irex).

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Comments


anon September 25, 2010 um 1:20 pm

I’ve been watching this product for a while and would like it to see the light of day *soon*.

The weight, pen input, and hopefully the price make it far more attractive than the DX.


Richard Adin September 25, 2010 um 1:39 pm

Nate, my current plan is to buy the Sony 950 when it is released because I didn’t think the Asus 950 was going to see the light of day. Any idea how the 2 devices will compare? (Aside from the obvious differences like size.) I’m wondering which which will be the better reading experience. Also, any idea what formats the Asus will support?


Stefano September 25, 2010 um 2:12 pm

When Asus showed it at CeBIT 2010 there was no stylus at all. It’s got a 9″ SiPix screen and no 3G, but WiFi (if I remember well). Sony and Kindle devices have pearl screen (definitely better, I fear).


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