Buying Denshi Jisho, don't know sh**

[Madier]

Hello forums,
I want to buy "Denshi Jisho" but I don't know ANY japanese, and there are no helpful reviews for people like me on the Internet.

Before you say I'm out of my mind: It's a present! For my girlfriend. She knows Japanese quite well, can speak and read no problem (she studies Japanese 5th year). BUT she can't afford it, and if I asked her for help with buying she would get mad that I want to spend so much $ on her (yes she's unique in that). I found a website
********** dot com

and it has the best prices for new ones that I could find, but best of all it also has model names, so that I can look them up on ebay without actually having to search Japanese web pages.

I was thinking about Sharp PW-AT790. It's $349.00 new and $180.00 used on ebay. Will it be any good? I want her to be happy with it, but I can't afford more expensive than ~$400. Does she need that handwriting recognition? She knows how to look up words in a normal dictionary, so it can be a gadget of no use (I'm just thinking loudly now). Maybe there is some better model but looking less fancy (as for now it's the only criteria I use ) I know there are few types of J/J and J/E dictionaries and I'm completely lost here.
Please help, any insight is welcome!

 

[ariso07]

Honestly, I hardly ever used my dictionary until I got one with handwritting recognition. It is incredibly useful for looking up kanji. The ones on nippon imports are a little old. That's why they are so cheap. A really good one is likely going to be over $500. This one isn't bad: Nippon Imports - Electronic Dictioanry: Japanese, Italian, German, Chinese, Spanish

I use a Casio ExWord XD-GP9700. I bought it 4 years ago and it is still working beautifully. It was $1,500 though. The thing you want to look for is number of dictionaries and number of words. It should ideally have more than one J>E dictionary (that is probably what she will use the most, depending on what she does.)

Some cheaper options are iPhone and Nintendo DS. Both offer hand writting options. The former has apps that work just as well as any dictionary and the later has a program called Kanji Sonomama that lets you hand write in and look up stuff.

 

[Mikawa Ossan]

The one I have is a Sharp PW-M800. In my humble opinion Sharp makes the best ones around. I've been using Sharps since 1999. Handwriting recognition is not a factor for me, though. Not having it teaches you to learn the radical system better when looking up kanji.