Sony PRS 500 is an obsolete, second generation eReader which advanced the state of the industry by leaps and bounds in its day. As the first e-ink display sold in the US, many users found it revolutionary, marvelling at the crispness and the fact that you could comfortably read in direct sunlight.
The Sony PRS 500 Reader was released in September 2006, only in the US, and was the follow-on to the first mass produced e-ink reader, the Librie, which had been released only in Japan in April 2005. The PRS 500 was in turn superceded by the PRS 505 in October 2007, and then again by the current PRS 300 in August 2009.
Physically, the PRS 500 had many (arguably too many) buttons--two small silver page turn buttons on the left front, and a big thumb button for turning pages. There was a dedicated mark button for bookmarking, and 10 buttons to navigate by 10% increments through a book, or to choose numbered screen options. There was also a size button to alter zoom and text size. Likewise, there was up/down volume controls for the music player, and an on/off slider switch, and the covered memory card slot.
The unit only has 128 MB of memory available, but this was easily augmentable via MMC/SD/SDHC or Memory Stick Pro Duo.
Audio had improved over the Librie, with MP3 and AAC compatibility as well as headphone support, but there were no speakers.
Connecting: Like most early eReaders, the Sony PRS 500 Reader had no wireless connectivity, and relied on a USB 1.1 cable for connecting to a computer and transferring ebooks.
However, as a plus over the popular Amazon Kindle 1 which debuted around the same time, Sony did make it much easier to get access to many open source or free ebooks. Sony also allied with content partners including Random House, Simon & Shuster, Harper Collins, Libri.de, Thalia.de, Online-Artikel.de, Thalia.ch, and stauffacher.ch to provide options at its own Connect ebook store. That said, if you wanted a copyrighted book, Sony's eBook Library trailed Amazon dramatically in terms of book titles available for download. Likewise, the service was only for PCs, so Mac users were left in the cold.
For those who still own a PRS 500, Sony has offered to update it to include support for ADE ePUB--you simply send the unit back and they'll upgrade it.
Accessories: The PRS 500 had various covers and accessories for sale when it was popular.
Price: The PRS 500 retailed in the US for $329.
The PRS 500 is now obsolete, but as the first US e-ink eReader it helped to greatly advance the industry.
eBook Reader Basics