Doesn’t it seem like all of a sudden e-book readers are all the craze these days? With the relative success of the Amazon Kindle, the continued push by Sony with the Sony eBook store and Reader devices, and the upcoming Barnes & Noble e-reader announcement, e-books have clearly garnered a great deal of press recently. Now on the heels of the impending B&N announcement comes the “Alex” – a new e-book reader device by a company called Spring Design and based on the Google Android OS.

Similar to what is expected out of the Barnes & Noble e-book reader, the Alex features a dual-screen display design with the upper section being a monochrome electronic paper display (EPD) and the lower section being a color LCD display. Users can read their books, documents, subject matters at hand on the top display and then bring up images, video clips, notes etc related to the subject matter on the lower display.

Other features of Alex include:

• Full Internet browsing with wireless connectivity support over Wi-Fi and 3G networks (EVDO/CDMA and GSM)
• SD card support for data storage
• Provides the web as a “handy reference library” – allowing users to capture and cache web content from their online experience on their LCD display and then also view it on the EPD display
• Insert images, videos, and notes as “web grabs”
• 6 inch E-Ink EPD display and 3.5 inch color display
• Comes with earphones and speakers

Spring Design is currently in conversations with major content partners and plans to release the device to selected strategic partners by the end of the year.

[Check it out]

Technorati Tags: Spring Design, Alex e-book reader, Android e-book reader