The new electronic gadget that is getting popular by the day and one which would make the consumer download the book that he wants, while on the go, is the E-Reader. And for more reasons than one, the next big thing to drive consumer demand would be palmtop devices and their variants, chiefly Netbooks, the internet-enabled, stripped-down versions of notebook PC’s.

And in a growing industry with minimum market penetration and customer adoption, these hand-held devices have a long way to go and companies would only be happy to bank on big numbers in sales.

Apple has just joined the eBooks reader party with its Tablet PC. And the industry is just warming up for some serious business and growth prospects. Amazon’s Kindle Reader has been around for a while now, with its ability to bank on Amazon’s vast resources. Amazon was followed by Sony, which came up with its own variants of Ebook Readers. It is to cash in on this trend of e-readers that is still catching up, apart from its own mighty ambitions, that Google went ahead with its exercise of scanning books and presenting them in electronic formats, a strategy that was met with much resistance from competitors.

Now, Apple Tablet PC, which, it would begin to ship by the beginning of the coming year, is expected to make heads turn. And the rumour mill has it that Apple is planning big numbers on the new device that is expected to go on sale in the sub $1000 category. However, Apple Tablet PC may not be just ebook readers, though they may very well be tuned to double as readers as well.

The idea is that these tablets would be more in line with Netbooks, which are already being manufactured by the computer folks, HP and Acer. HP Tablet PC was unveiled at the Consumer Electronics Show at Las Vegas while Nokia has also entered the fray with its own series of Netbooks, which would provide limited computing functionalities while being perfect internet wizards.

With all the big names in the telecommunication industry working their way to make the consumer lay his hands on them, the coming year should be a bonanza for the tech-savvy gadget-freak, who wants to keep busy on the go.

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