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What's the best e-dictionary?

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MikeH85

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Hi, and hajimemashite!

i'm thinking about buying an electronic dictionary. on the computer i use jwpce, which works great for me... but i also want a mobile one that i can just carry around with me all the time, especially because i'm planning on doing an exchange year in japan...

canon wordtanks seem to be the most popular ones, but there are many models and also other good companies that make dictionaries like that...

so i was wondering which models you guys are using and which one you think is the best...
 
Well I waited till i was in japan and found that being dependant on a dictionary did not help me, so i went without and when i got home at night i'd look up what i didnt know and write it down. In the end I went to Akihabara and bought a Sharp S7000 that was on sale (last one! hehe). Is useful when im writing up essays for uni and you just cant think of that darn word!
 
i am not sure, i don't use e-dict. I use a eng-jap jap-eng dict. Mike, pls tell me your email btw.
 
nvm Mike I got your email, you just need to add me in msn messenger
 

yeah both of those are pretty good... JWPce, the program i was talking, is based on Jim Breen's i think...

but what i'm looking for is actual, physical electronic dictionaries... you know, ones that you can carry around with you easily... like the CANON Wordtanks or other ones like that from Seiko, Sharp, etc.....
 
There is the Canon Wordtank IDF-3000, but the manual is in Japanese. You can read more about Wordtanks on Wordtank Central.

There is also the Sharp PW-9700, and here are some things that people have said about it:
Personally, I bought the Sharp PW-9700 about 1 month ago when I was in Japan. What I like about this model is it's big screen and lots of usage examples.

Ive got a Sharp PW-S7000, sounds like a lower model to beluga's. Big screen, plenty of examples, easy to use, kanji search. Only problem with the japanese e-dics is that you need to know a fair bit of kanji.

TangoTown offers an electronic dictionary that is downloadable onto your mobile phone.

See also this message by Maciamo, and the one two messages down, also by Maciamo.

These are just some ideas, and you could always do a search on amazon.com or even google. Hope this helps.
 
thanks...
i've looked into it some more myself too, but i still can't decide...

as far as the wordtanks go, i think that the IDF-4100 is the best deal... the only thing that kind of bothers me about it is that it only has 95,000 entries in the english-japanese dictionary, compared to 128,000 entries in the IDF-3000...
and then there's also the Canon G-50 which boasts an incredible 270,000 english-japanese entries! but it's way more expensive... although on the other hand you don't want to be too picky about the price when buying something like this...

the sharp PW-9700 has a huge english japanese dictionary (370,000 entries) but it doesn't have a japanese-english dictionary at all...
 
I have been using this one for a while, very happy with it & now I am learning intermediate Japanese with less hurdles..... Hope the info below will help your comparison in choosing the e-dictionary (it's value for money indeed)
 

Nope, PW-9700 does have JE support. Where did you get this info from? I'm using one now. What I like most about the Sharp e-dict is that they have the biggest screen and has lots of usage examples(not all models though). I think Ewok has a smaller sibling on PW-9700. Given the choice to choose again, I'd probably buy Ewok's model as it's slimmer and ligher.
 
Last edited:
beluga said:
Nope, PW-9700 does have JE support? Where did you get this info from?
Click to expand...

on the Aiko Trading Store website it says :
i was refering to the first entry... the information might be wrong, but that's what the website says...

anyway... i ended up getting the Casio EXword XD-470 and i'm quite happy with it...
the only thing that's a little disappointing about it is that the J-E and E-J dictionaries are so small, but the XD makes up for that with the fact that you can write Kanji/Kana/Romaji characters directly on the display.
you can even write whole words using kanji and it will give you the reading!
 
I thought about buying a Wordtank G50 but what I really want is a device for helping me learn and remember Kanji more than a dictionary. I have just started thinking about buying a Palm PDA and installing a dictionary and some Kanji learning software (like King Kanji). Does anyone have any experience with using the Palm as an alternative to a dedicated electronic jisho?
 
Any Casio XD, specifically the XD-470 is second to none and is pretty much all you'll ever need.
 
Last edited:
crunch said:
Any Casio XD, specifically the XD-470 is second to none and is pretty much all you'll ever need.
Click to expand...
I think my boyfriend has one of these, but without the handwriting stylus/kanji lookup -- just a regular keyboard layout. I wonder if there is a different version sold in Japan ? :?
 
Is there a e-dictionary for students who are learning Japanese? I mean one that has an English interface?

I have done Google searches many times and have also looked while in Japan but have never found anything. This last visit though some friends of my wife said they knew a couple foreigners who had them but didn't know what brand they were or anything else about them. Has anyone heard of them?

It seems like if a company decided to make one, that wasn't too pricey, it would have a fairly good market as there seems there is nothing out there currently.
 
The nintendo DS has a decent one, and there are dictionary apps for the iphone. These days, why spend a ton of money on a whole new gadget?
 
I'll post thread to download a Japanese - English Dictionary .
 
Few important things I should think of for choosing your dictionary:

1)Pen input
Writing a Chinese character in to find how to read it is easier than doing it other ways: PDAs or smart phones normally has a better interface.

2)Your level of Japanese? ( How soon will you upgrade the device?)
At some point, you should switch to Japanese to Japanese dictionary because you will spend more time reading Japanese that way: bilingual dictionary may help you with understanding grammar etc but you will spend less time thinking and reading in Japanese.

3)Price: just in case you lose or break it
Dictionaries can break or be lost. Particularly, if you take it to school every day. it is not all that unlikely that you lose it or break it. Maybe you would like a relatively affordable product.

4)Using in Class room (How to avoid looking like playing with a phone)
Smart phones PDAs are great but I don't know if you want to use them in class room. Maybe something that look like a dictionary is better sometimes?

5)How will you use it?
Not like electronic dictionary would help you a lot in class, because you simply won't have the time to look up things. If you can't understand teachers at all, however, you may end up spending a good amount of time reading text books with your dictionary.


My advice
Get a smart phone or PDA to be used in private
Get a cheap Electronic Dictionary or paper dictionary to be used in class room

Our electronic gadgets will evolve a lot this year, so if you are not coming to Japan this spring, then maybe you should pick a tablet PC (Entourage Edge e-reader shows off its softer-ware side on video | Engadget) or Ereader like sony PRS-600(Currently no Japanese dictionary with pen input available yet)


Japanese Language Tools
http://www.bornplaydie.com/japan/dictionary/reviews.htm
 
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