“Download eBooks at your fingertips”
Bookeen introduces the Cybook Orizon
The new touch-screen, WiFi-equipped ebook reader
photo: M. Grigoriev
Bookeen, the European leader of the ebook reader market, will launch its next-generation reading device, the Cybook Orizon in mid-October. Suggested retail price is 229.99€.
Thinner than a newspaper and lighter than a book (245 g – 8.6 oz), the Cybook Orizon boasts a non-glare, multi-touch screen with reading quality close to that of paper.
Thanks to its integrated Wi-Fi connectivity, the Cybook Orizon lets you very easily download your book in a few seconds.
Its sleek lines (it’s just 0.29’’ – 7.6 mm thick) give book lovers an elegant tool for a unique reading experience.
The Cybook Orizon was developed in its entirety by Bookeen’s engineering teams in France.
A new generation of ebook reader, packed with innovations
Turn the pages with your fingertips. The screen incorporates “Caress touch ePaper” technology. “For a long time, we’ve been trying to incorporate a touch technology that didn’t compromise the screen’s readability. With Cybook Orizon, it’s a done deal. No glare at all, the Cybook Orizon stays readable in full sunshine.” announced Michel Dahan, cofounder of Bookeen. “Just touch the page lightly, and everything becomes simpler, more intuitive.”
Annotate, highlight text to remember key points as you read, adjust the character size simply by moving your fingers, thanks to the screen’s multi-touch capability. “We wanted to make a reader you can use as soon as you get your hands on it. So for us, it was simple: make it multi touch from the beginning,” says Bookeen cofounder Laurent Picard. “Thanks to the touch screen, you’ll find it’s easy to use, and a pleasure to interact with.”
All that technology is packed into a device the thickness of a magazine. “Getting it down to 0.29’’ (7.6 mm) was a true technical challenge. Our engineers worked hard to make it that thin and at the same time adhere to the highest standards of durability,” Michael Dahan points out. “The result is better than expected. We managed to build the thinnest ebook reader in the world.”
Your books immediately available
The Cybook Orizon has a built-in WiFi module. You can download a book in a minute or so without having to use your computer. “With Cybook Orizon, we wanted to give users immediate access to books directly from Cybook. For premium content, we did a lot of work on buying dynamics to make the process extremely simple for the user,” says marketing director Jean-Luc Satin. Cybook Orizon is a real alternative to American competitors, but this time with a European based catalogue.”
Bookeen will address all major European countries. Bookeen will bring every local Book catalogue to the Cybook Orizon, enabling European customers to buy their books in their own language. To enable his European bookstore, Bookeen collaborates with major players in digital book distribution in Europe.
We will begin with France. French customers will enjoy access to most of the French digital catalogue: 25,000 titles issued by 185 publishers.
The same set will be rolled out at the end of the year in many European countries, such as Italy and Spain.
The Cybook Orizon allows direct access to a catalog of free books, and 150 classic books are embedded for the user to discover and enjoy reading on the Cybook Orizon.
Internet access: surf the net unrestricted
The Cybook Orizon is also equipped with an unrestricted web browser that allows you access the web site of your choice with no limits, and download content that’s readable on your device.
The Cybook Orizon will be available for pre-order starting September 25 at bookeen.com and retail partner sites.
New information will be available in the next few weeks via www.bookeen.com, Facebook and Twitter.
The Cybook Orizon will be available in black and white.
About Bookeen
Bookeen European leader of the ebook industry develops and markets ebook readers in over 70 countries. The founders, Laurent Picard and Michael Dahan, engineers and book lovers, participated in the development of the first electronic book in 1998. In 2003, they created Bookeen, and in October 2007 successfully launched their first ePaper based ebook reader, Cybook Gen3. Since then, Bookeen has enjoyed uninterrupted growth. At its Paris facilities, Bookeen brings together an R&D team known worldwide for excellence and innovation. In October 2010, Bookeen will launch the Cybook Orizon, the first touch-screen ebook reader with built-in WiFi, which offers simplified access to ebooks. Bookeen plans to extend its book download service to all European countries in which they operate by the end of the year.
Data Sheet : Bookeen Cybook Orizon
Size 6’’
Screen
Monochromatic – 16 grayscale
Touch screen epaper- SiPix technology
Résolution
800 x 600 pixels – 167 dpi
Memory
2 GB (1,500 to 2,000 books)
Maximum storage capacity
1 microSD memory card slot (8 GB max; up to approximately 8,000 titles)
Connectivity
Wi-Fi (802. 11 b/g/n)
Bluetooth (2.1+EDR)
Micro-USB port
Synchronization with PC
Yes
Synchronization with Mac
Yes
Audio/video functions
Reads the following text formats : Adobe ePUB/PDF (with or without DRM), TXT and HTML files; photo formats: (16 level greyscale) : JPEG, GIF and PNG
Plug-in port
Micro USB 2.0
Additional content
150 books included.
Power supply
Rechargeable (via USB cable) lithium-polymer battery
Battery life
Up to 10,000 consecutive pages / approximately 3 weeks
Multi-touch Screen
Bookeen touch interface
Multi-touch function to enlarge or reduce character size with the fingertips
Annotation, note taking, and highlighting functions
Direct access to content download platform
Additional book reader 3.0 software features
-Motion sensor (automatically adjusts to portrait or landscape mode),
- Right- and left- hand interfaces
- 12 font sizes, extra fonts available
Dimensions (l x w x h) en mm
(4.9’’x7.5’’x125.7 x 189.49 x 7.6 mm
Net weight (grams)
245
Hi, I bought the Orizon because I need the bluetooth connection but it’s not there, in the Bookeen site it’s wrote that the Ebook Orizon has that, someone can help me?
Hello,
I bought a Orizon in december and am very happy with it, but as many persons, I think the dictionary feature really lacks for now (cause I like to read foreign books to improve my language skills. Even if you do not have any timeframe for its implementation, do you have any clue about it? Is it currently under dev or only a vague project?
Regards
Lucas
Hello Giovanni,
Thanks for your message. I will have to ask our dev team about those details and let you know.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello Filippo,
thanks for your message. Bluetooth will be added via a firmware upgrade, we will keep you posted about the availability here.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello Lucas,
We know that dictionary lookup is a very important feature to many of our users, so it is currently under dev and our team is actively working on it. I can’t give you a timeline at the moment for availability of this feature but of course as soon as we’ve got some information we will post it here.
thanks for your message. We’re very glad to know you’re happy with your Orizon.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello,
I am in Germany and I am considering to prefer the Orizon over the Sony PRS 650 since I wanna have the WiFi to download books without the PC.
However, the built-in browser seems a bit uncomfortable to do so. Do devices shipped to Germany come with a built-in bookstore that is linked to the German catalogue already? How many titles are available? And: How does DRM work if I download directly to the Orizon?
Thanks! Sascha
Hello. I would like to buy the electronic reader, although, like Lucas said, an important feature is the dictionary, Don´t have you any dictionary that could be used in this electronic reader? Thanks for your future answers.
Hello folks,
I just discovered Cyberbook Orizon yet it is one bit short of complete bookworm’s ecstasy – smart looking zipping skin cover. Are you planning on introducing one? (as you did with Opus). Thanks for any reply.
Hi,
I’ve just ordered a Cybook Orizon and will recieve it next week, but I am having second thoughts (I still have time to cancel the order) because I’ve thought the supported format list includes DOC and PPT (must have seen it on some other reader’s spec sheet) and now I realize Orizon doesn’t even support RTF! There are cheaper alternatives in my country and some of them have at least CHM, RTF and DJVU support.
I was hoping to be able to read from time to time some professional documentation and most of it is in DOC and PPT format. But even without DOC and PPT, come on guys… no RTF?
My questions are:
1. Any plans for DOC and RTF?
2. Any plans for RTF?
3. Can the firmware be customized by users to add these?
4. If for DOC and RTF you could invoke licencing problems, I wonder how come Iriver Story and others had no problems offering these?
Correction to my previous message:
1st question: any plans for DOC and PPT?
regarding the 2nd question – I cant emphasize enough how important is in my opinion RTF support. I am almost sure this would be a very easy feature to implement and unlike DOC, RTF is an open format.
I don’t know about other people, but me, I just couldn’t believe my eyes when I saw that RTF is not available….
Many of my books are in RTF format, while other are in PDF (with no PDF reflow these are useless) or CHM and DJVU (not supported).
I realize that I have the option of converting from RTF to ePUB but I have no ideea if this can be done in a convenient manner and keeping the diacritics.
Hello
I wish to purchase an ereader. I love what I have read about the Cybook Orizon. The only drawback seems the lack of a Dictionary.
Is the a keyboard on the screen? It was not mentioned or shown on the utube videos.
How suitable is the Cybook Orizon for the Australian market?
Thanks
Hello Sascha,
thanks for your message. Bookeen is proud to tell you that we have just launched our German-language bookstore, with currently 35000 titles available. We’ll be announcing this here on our blog soon as well. To access it, from inside the library, go to “Account” then “Content Language” (in french : “Compte” then “Langue du contenu”).
The DRM depends on the publishers, Cybooks can support Adobe DRM and you simply authorise your Orizon to your Adobe ID (you can do this directly from the Orizon) and once it’s authorised the first time you can just purchase and download directly on the Cybook. Make sure to use the same Adobe ID you are already using elsewhere!
I hope this answers your questions.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello Martin,
thanks for your comment. We are currently working on a “made in Bookeen” dictionary format to use until the official epub dictionary format is finalised. We will keep you posted as soon as we have some information about when it will be available! We know how important dictionary support is to our readers, and we have taken your requests seriously.
Happy reading,
Bookeen Team
Hello Michal,
I’m not sure what you mean by “zipping skin cover” but we do have a stylish and protective case available for the Cybook Orizon in our store! Take a look in the accessories category then Covers. We don’t sell skins for the Orizon but you may be able to find those online.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello Paul,
thanks for your messages. We do not currently plan to add DOC or PPT support to my knowledge, likewise CHM and DJVU support are not planned. PPT in particular is not very suitable for small e-ink reading devices. The good news is if you have doc or rtf files you would like to read you can very easily convert them to the epub format. You can do this automatically using Calibre (free download here http://calibre-ebook.com/) or if you would like more control over the result you can use a real epub editor; we recommend Sigil, which is also free and can be downloaded here: http://code.google.com/p/sigil/. You can get assistance for both of these on the mobileread.com forums if you have any questions. Pdf is problematic ; even with reflow it is not at all suited to reading on smaller devices unless it was specifically formatted for your display. And djvu presents the same problems. The best thing to do is avoid pdf whenever possible, and if you can get those documents in another format or try to convert the pdf, you’ll have better results.
I hope this helps you.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello Carol,
thanks for your message. The Cybook Orizon is absolutely suitable for the Australian market, as Australian and other english-language booksellers have adopted the industry standard format supported by Cybook, EPUB. We will happily ship to you directly in you order online from our site, if you can’t find a local reseller.
There is a soft keyboard, which is displayed when necessary depending on the activity (to make notes, enter a url in the browser, etc.).
We know that dictionary support is very important to our users, and we are hoping that IDPF will soon formalize the official epub dictionary format. In the meantime we are working on a “Made In Bookeen” solution, and we will keep you posted as soon as we have some news about that.
I hope this answers your questions!
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello.
I wish to purchase an ebook reader and have cut the choices down to the Bookeen Orizon and the Sony PRS650. For my needs, the Orizon is lacking dictionary lookup and text search within documents, both of which are present on the Sony device making it the clear favourite. However I am impressed with the willingness of the Bookeen Team to respond to customer requests and feedback and issue firmware updates with new features.
In previous posts you have stated that you are working on implementing dictionary lookup and text search, but I see no mention of either in the recent firmware update. The concern I have is that if and when the features do become available, they may not meet my needs. For example, I would require that both functions work with all loaded documents including PDF’s, not just books purchased from the Bookeen catalogue. Some manufacturers restrict their devices in this matter.
A final concern I have is one of timing. There must surely be a replacement for the Orizon out soon. (how soon?) Can you guarantee that the features will not just be left out as development is switched to the replacement device?
Any comments on the above concerns will be much appreciated.
Thanks in advance.
Hello Kevin,
thanks for your message. We are always interested in feedback from our community of users and we do our best to improve our products based on this feedback. Dictionary lookup and text search are in development specifically in response to the overwhelming demand for these features; however I unfortunately can’t give you a calendar date for their availability. We decided to issue this latest upgrade without waiting, so that our users could benefit from the other features which were ready, immediately.
These features will certainly work with all epub books including books bought outside of the Bookeen ebookstore. We feel that the choice of a bookstore should be up to the reader, not imposed by the device manufacturer, so you are always free to read books from anywhere on your Cybook with no restrictions. However, I do not know whether implementation is planned for pdf format as well. We cannot guarantee that these features will work on all pdfs, because not all pdf files contain readable text; some of them are scanned images of text in which case it’s impossible for a machine to read them and this of course is problematic for things like text search and dictionary lookup (unless you do this manually).
I’m afraid I can’t give you any information about future Cybooks at this time, but of course we’ll keep you posted here as soon as there is some news! But, to respond to your specific question, our policy is to support our previous models with new features as long as they are materially compatible. We are currently working on an upgrade for the Cybook Opus, for instance, although this model was developped before we introduced the Cybook Orizon.
I hope this answers your questions.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
I want to buy a Orizon in a week. But I have some hesitations about it’s dictionary feature. I have to read foreign books and l need a dictionary while reading them. Do you have any projects about a new firmware including a dictionary feature.
Had my Orizon for about 2 weeks now, and have upgraded to firmware 3.1 via the website. Also using Calibre and Sigil software packages on Windows. Although the unit is now running better than originally, there is still much work to be done on the upgrade front, before it can be said to be highly usable and reliable. A few points to note:
1) The ‘Currently Reading’ only seems to show one book. But what if you are currently reading a novel, 2 reference books and 3 news papers (courtesy of Calibre).
2) When you download say news papers via Calibre, they appear on the Home page at the beginning. But when you ‘see all’ they appear somewhere towards the end, but among the library of books that are supplied with the Orizon. This is despite doing a date sort, which seems to default to displaying latest dates last and doesn’t have a reverse sort.
3) I have a plain text file about 732K bytes long, which I would like to keep in that format and read on the Orizon. Unfortunately, although the file loads okay initially, and starts to page through okay, the Orizon will lockup completely if the page forward is used too frequently, or if the ‘Goto’ page is used. This requires a hard reset, which is quite tricky when fitted in the leather cover.
4) It would be useful if there was more basic information on the Orizon website regarding initial setting up and organisation of the internal libraries. I have attached to a PC, and can see various files on the Orizon. But can folders be created arbitrarily or must they be in a certain structure. Are there preference/ configuration files that can be edited by the user. Currently, when I select ‘Folder View’ I can only see News items. How do you select other folders i.e. the folder with the supplied books.
Hello Yalcin,
thanks for your message. We are currently working on dictionary feature, however, I’m afraid I can’t give you any timeline for this yet.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello Colin,
thanks for your message. Concerning the “Currently Reading”, with the latest firmware, you can slide this from side to side with your finger (like turning a page) to scroll through 5 titles. The row of grey dots at the bottom of this zone indicates where you are in your list.
You can create folders to suit your needs. To go up a level in the folders, just touch the name of the current folder at the top of the first page of the folder list.
For other technical questions please contact our support directly, they can give you more detailed help: http://www.bookeen.com/en/supportcontact/
I will pass along your suggestions to our dev team.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hi! I’ have a Cybook Gen3 for years now [which I bought from your website directly] and I just *love* it!!! Even the plastic battery cover is broken but somehow I keep it together it with a scotch tape and I keep using it
… I’ve tried Sony PRS-650 (the ir touch one) [no one handed operation], Kindle DX [the big one, too heavy] and I didn’t like those … the things that I really love about your Gen3 are (VERY IMPORTANT FOR ME):
1- weight of the device with 180gr (178 to be exact) is the PERFECT weight and I’m saying this by reading on the device for certainly more than 100 hours (how many hundred or even thousands I don’t know!!!)
2- one handed operation (also for looking up words in the dictionary) [i use the device 80% of the times in bed]
Just one point that because of the Gen3′s eink display’s refresh rate and overall device speed (and interface design) looking up words in a dictionary is not that much of a pleasant experience [let's put it this way
] … but then again I use the dictionary A LOT on Gen3
if it had the following features I wouldn’t hesitate to get it and I would prefer it to Kobo touch, Kindle, Sony touch, Kindle DX and even Nook touch.
That space next to the dpad is absolutely needed for holding the device comfortably VERY WELL DONE.
The features are:
which is not possible in this version of the hardware 
1- dictionary (usable with D-pad with a cursor like Gen3 AND using touch [like double-tapping a word] … if you’re in bed and tapping words is difficult you’d go for the Dpad, otherwise you’d go for the touch
1a – I wish my Mobipocket format dictionaries would be portable to the new device I have more than $80 worth of dictionary and encyclopedia which will be useless if I buy a new device
2- I wish the weight would be the same 180gr
Hello Armen,
thanks for your message! We’re very happy to know you love your Cybook Gen3 so much! I will pass along your requests and suggestions to our dev team. For information, we are working on a dictionary solution because we know how important that is to many of our users but unfortunately for licencing reasons we are not allowed to include Mobipocket support and epub support simultaneously on the same device; Mobipocket does not allow this. We know how frustrating this is for readers who have already invested in a large mobi library and then make the switch to epub. You may want to ask on MobileRead.com forums if there is any way to convert your mobi dictionaries to epub format.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
hi there,
i read in a review that the cybook orizon comes with a free cover for the e-book. what is the cover made from
- plastic
- leather
- leather-look material
also, what is the body of the cybook orizon made from
- plastic
- metal
i look forward to your reply.
cheers.
I am considering to buy a Cybook Orizon.
Is there any update on the development on the dictionary feature for the device?
Thanks.
Hello Harry,
thanks for your message. The Cybook Orizon comes with a protective neoprene case. You can see a photo of it by checking the Orizon page in our online store.
The body of the Orizon is made from plastic, however we have added a metal reinforcement inside the body to protect the Orizon from torsion and make it more robust, in spite of its ultra-thin profile.
I hope this answers your questions!
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hi
I bought a Cybook Orizon recently but the reader is unable to read books in the .mobi format. Will there be a firmware update that will make the Orizon ebook reader compatible with Mobipocket DRM files exclusively as was being released for the Opus and Gen3?
Regards
Griet
Any news on the dictionary feature.
Cheers
I’m very much enjoying the Orizon, but I am starting to really miss the ability to search in documents, both epub and pdf. I know you have mentioned in a few replies that this was being worked on earlier in the year, but can you now give an update, and hopefully some sort of time frame? The Orizon makes a great companion for Internet-based research, I love not having to read it all on a computer screen, but the lack of search functions stops it being quite so useful.
Please will the cybook orizon work in Nigeria? Will I be able to buy ebooks online on it? I recently had to return my Kindle back to Amazon as it has proved non-functional in Nigeria.
Regards,
Lekan
Hello Lekan,
thanks for your question. The Cybook Orizon will work anywhere in the world, and you can buy books on it if you have a wi-fi connection from any bookstore selling epub books.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello Griet,
Orizon supports only EPUB format, which is the industry standard. If you have some mobipocket files, you can convert them to epub using free tools like Calibre http://calibre-ebook.com/ if you remove the DRM first (a google search will help you find information about that).
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hi,
I received my first Cybook Orizon this week and I strugle to get connected to the internet. First of all; bying a product where the first thing to do is to update the software (from 3.0 to 3.1) is not satisfying. After searching the internet I found this blog, which is a very good service. I have managed to update to version 3.1, but I am still not able to open any web pages. It seems that I am connected to my wifi, but browsing for e.g http://www.google.com results in “Unable to find host”. My laptop works perfectly on the same wifi. Any idea of what the problem can be?
Regards
Krogh
Hello Mr. Krogh,
please contact our support directly for assistance with technical questions: http://www.bookeen.com/en/supportcontact/ Thank you!
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Any chance, that some of the updates/features for the Odyssey, will be made available on the Orizon ?
Ys
Thomas
Hello Thomas,
yes, there will be a port of some of the features for the Odyssey towards the Orizon, via a firmware upgrade. I don’t currently have any information about the timeline for that, but we will announce it here of course.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Hello, I’m from Spain and I just bought a Orizon. I have read through the manual and the problem is that the library there is no search option. Not so bad if you have 100 books (because you can put in a vision of 20) but if you spend 1500 is slow page by page until you reach the desired title. Are you going to include a search option in the future? Thank you a lot.
Hello Mawa,
yes, a search option is planned, but in the meantime if you have a very large library we recommend you sort it using folders. Connect your Cybook to your computer, and create folders for your books in whatever configuration is convenient for you (for instance, you can make folders for different genres, or alphabetical folders to sort by author name, etc.) then be sure to activate Folder View in the library options via the menu.
Best regards,
Bookeen Team
Is there still any hope for future updates on the Orizon ?
Especially I would like to be able to use pdf-reflow, as pdf-books is not as readable (often scroll 3′rd of a page, next page, 3′rd…) in the current version.
A new feature I would wish for, is a “secondary power-off”, when leaving the Orizon in sleep-mode. I notice that it powers up to change picture from time to time. And I would suggest that after a predefined period it would power off (could be 5 days or such).
Ys
Thomas