Vacation

Hi all,
I'll be taking some vacation this month. I may try and get a couple posts in while I'm on vacation if I can. But, if not, I'll be back blogging later this month. Thanks for your support, and be sure to stop by beNippon for your otaku fix.

XD-A9800: Nice body!

Today we're going to take a closer look at the overall design of the EX-word XD-A9800. As I've written previously, it is a marvelous device and if you're studying Japanese you'll definitely want to check this one out to see if it meets your requirements. Although I have not throughly checked out the competition, I can see why the EX-word has had such a long run at the top.

Overall Design:

The XD-A9800 has the usual hinged notebook design with screen and keyboard. For some reason like its predecessor, the XD-A9800 only comes in white. While the body itself is plastic, the back of the screen cover is metal, probably aluminum or magnesium. It feels very sturdy in hand, but you wouldn't want to try dropping it for fun. I would imagine that it would blend quite nicely ;-)

Casio has made the XD-A9800 slightly smaller than its predecessor, the 2009 XD-GF9800, managing to shave a few millimeters off the length and width, and 20 grams off the weight. However, due to the new AA batteries and new screen, the height has increased by over 1mm. In the real world, there shouldn't be too much difference in storage space, but you may have to get a new case if you're upgrading.

Model	Width (mm)	Length (mm)	Height (mm)	Weight (g)
XD-GF9800	154.0	110.0	15.5	320.0
XD-A9800	148.5	106.5	16.3	300.0

Let's take a look at some size comparisons. Unfortunately, we don't have an XD-GF9800 around, but I did have my iPhone handy and since most people are familiar with the size of the iPhone, I thought it would be a good reference. Here we have the top view. As you can see there is only a few centimeters difference in the width and length.

There aren't too many ports on the XD-A9800, but let's take a quick look. The right side contains the slot for the stylus and a microSD card:

The left side houses a standar 3.5mm headphone jack, switch to control speaker/headphone output, and a mini-USB connector:

Here's a shot of the battery bay. As you can see, it indeed takes two AA batteries allowing for an estimated 80 - 150 hours of usage time, estimations that have increased by 20 hours over the XD-GF9800.

Looking at the keyboard, the layout has not changed. You get a standard QWERTY keyboard with chicklet style keys. The keys are nice and big, and while people don't usually touch-type on a dictionary, you can certainly do so if you have small hands like me. Otherwise, thumb typing is easy.

On the right side is the circular navigation with the select (決定) button in the center, voice, and back. The touch input panel at the bottom changes depending on your dictionary selection. The left side holds the speaker and more controls: page up, down, history, jump, font-size, and history.

Located at the top of the keyboard are the dictionary shortcut keys. These allow you to quickly select different dictionaries on the fly. Particulary handy is the second button on the left (next to the circular power button). Press once, and you can search all dictionaries in English, press it again, and you can search all dictionaries in Japanese.

Design Hot:

While a lot of people find the white color too plain, I prefer it over say, black. Glossy black on electronic devices is just a fingerprint magnet, and I prefer not to see greasy fingerprints on my gadgets. The body is very sturdy and the hinge is nice and tight, without being too tight. Keyboards on denshijisho are pretty much the same across the board, which shows that they're pretty user friendly. I can imagine if you're a lefty you might not like the right side navigation.

Design Not:

Overall, I only have a couple complaints about the XD-A9800. First of all, the "feel" of the navigations arrows is a bit lacking. It feels kind of like squishing taffy, and I'd rather have a "sharper" tacktile press, like you get with the other buttons. Secondly, the battery bay cover feels very cheap. When you press on it, it makes a squeeking sound, some re-enforcement there would have been nice, and more in line with the solid feel of the body.

Conclusion:

Casio has managed to pack more into a smaller package. I'm especially happy that they chose to use AA batteries over the smaller AAA type. Giving up 1.2mm for 20+ hours of battery life is a worthwhile tradeoff in my opinion. The Casio EX-Word XD-A9800 and the whole 2010 EX-word line-up gets a huge thumbs up from me.

My only question to you readers, do you remove the stickers on your denshijisho? I'll be taking a look at the Blanview screen in a future post. Stay tuned.

Loco Moco x McDonalds

When you think of a Hawaiian burger, you'd probably imagine pineapple, maybe maybe some kind of mango chutney sauce if you're lucky. But that's not where McDonald's took their take on the Hawaiian burger. McDonald's chose to embrace a true local dish, the Loco Moco. So unlike the previous New York burger, the Hawaiian burger has true "Hawaiian" roots.

If you're not familiar with the Loco Moco, it's basically a breakfast food consisting of a bowl of rice, hamburger steak, brown gravy, and topped off with a fried egg. It's one of the best breakfast dishes on the planet (IMO), and I'd take it over Eggs Benedict in a heart beat.

This afternoon for lunch I found a sen-note in my wallet, so I headed down to the local McD's joint for to try this month's burger.

I was without coupon today, so I ended up paying the full price of ¥720 for the set meal. Today, instead of 爽健美茶 (tea) I opted to go for some Coke Zero. For some reason, I think they messed up my fries, 'cause the bottom was full of small pieces, somewhat disappointing. Anyway, on with the show:

 

As usual, the Hawaiian burger does not even come close to the glorious marketing photo. It's a 1/4 pound patty with bacon, lettuce, cheese, egg (a la the Egg McMuffin), brown gravy, and housed on a Parmesan cheese topped bun. The kicker here is that I found this burger quite tasty, and with the other Big America burgers, I felt that I'd tried them in some way, shape, or form. However, this Hawaiian burger was something I'd never tried before... Loco Moco on a bun, and it works, damn well. If I had one complaint, it would be the mess. They put the egg directly in contact with the bun, and with the gravy acting as lube, everything just slides all over the place. McD's food scientists should have placed melted cheese or something in-between to hold everything together.

If you get to try one burger in the Big America series, this is the one. They will probably get my ¥¥ again on this one.

XD-A9800: first boot.

It's been a few days since I first got my new denshijisho, and I'm pretty much in Japanese language heaven. Looking up words is a breeze, and really fast too. In fact, it's such a cinch to look up words on the Casio EX-Word, studying is almost fun! Most evenings I've been leaving it on while watching TV, and punch in words I hear. For example, I've been trying to get the word yurai (由来) into my head, I heard it on TV this evening, looked up the meaning ('cause I forgot) in the Kenkyusha Japanese-English dictionary and remembered it meant "derived" from, as in a name, in the show's context. Being able to look up words on the fly while watching TV adds more context to the words making them easier to remember.

Here's a look at some of pics I took on the first day. When you first turn it on, by just opening up the lid, you'll be greeted by this screen:

It's telling you to adjust the keyboard touch panel contrast. You do this by hitting the left and right arrow keys on the circular right hand side navigation. As you can probably guess, left is light (usuku/awaku): 淡く) and right is dark (koku: 濃く). After you get a comfortable contrast (the default setting will probably be fine), just hit the center button of the circular navigation marked, 決定 (kettei) to register the setting.

Next, you'll be shown the screen to set your battery type. The EX-Word now takes two AA batteries called tan-san (単３), instead of the previous two AAA batteries:

The top radio button is for alkaline, middle and bottom are for the eneloop® and EVOLTA branded rechargeables from Sanyo and Panasonic, respectively. Again, just hit the 決定 button after selecting. Since I'm using the stock batteries that came with the EX-Word, I just chose alkaline (default). Has anyone used those other rechargeables? I'll have to purchase a set someday.

しばらくお待ちください, after setting the battery, you'll get this screen. It says "shibaraku omachi kudasai," or "please wait." It's probably changing some settings for the battery.

The next screen is for User Registration. You can click yes (はい) or no (いいえ), I just chose no for the time being, 'cause I was excited to play study. Press the 決定 button. I've always wondered why there kanji isn't used for "hai" or "iie."

 

After all that tedium, you're greeted with the homescreen. Glorious, isn't it? Over 100 volumes of dictionaries and texts in the palm of your hand. I've only begun to search the various dictionaries, there's just too much information to go through in such a short time.

Get the absolutely amazing, Casio EX-Word XD-A9800 at beNippon. We're here to service all your Japanese language and otaku desires.

Unboxing the Casio Ex-Word XD-A9800.

I walked into the office to find a nice black box sitting on my desk. My brand new Casio EX-word XD-A9800 had arrived earlier than I expected, but who's complaining. Somehow I was able to restrain myself from playing with it until I got home, so I could snap some photos. My kitties found it almost as interesting as I did, but they preferred the cardboard and plastic wrap.

If you haven't seen the box, here it is. Not too exciting.

 

Opening the box, you can see the nice tight packaging. Momo-chan takes dibs on the USB cable bag.

Here we have Nana-chan proudly displaying the product layout. There's just the essentials inside the box, everything to get you up and running: Casio EX-word, USB cable, ear phones, two alkaline AA batteries, and instruction manuals (Japanese). There is a convenient Quick Guide printed in English that explains the basics... but, who needs instructions anyway.

Nana-chan thought it would be a good idea to take a shot with the screen open, but she wouldn't get out of the frame. Hiding behind the box didn't work.

So my EX-word is in-house, and works fine. The white case is nice, fingerprints aren't as noticeable as the shiny black case. It's a lot smaller than I thought, which is a plus. Casio's Blanview® screen is great, very easy to read. I'll be excited to see how it looks outside. Now if you'll excuse me, I have some playing studying to do.

Order your EX-word XD-A9800 from beNippon, and have it at your home before the JLPT. Stay tuned for more.

Casio EX-Word on order!

In 1994, while on exchange in Tokyo everyone was buying Canon wordtanks, however I ended up with the Sharp Zaurus PI-3000. The Zaurus was more of a PDA than dedicated dictionary, but it did include Japanese, Japanese-English, and English-Japanese dictionaries. I was particularly drawn to the touchscreen interface, which included Sharp's excellent handwriting recognition software that worked incredibly well. Instead of having to look up radicals or search by stroke order like my wordtank owning friends, I could just write an unknown kanji in the input box, and it would usually pull up the correct one. After 14 years of ownership, I passed it on to a friend during the move.

Having restarted my Japanese studies after moving to Japan last year, my main dictionaries have been Eijiro on my iPhone and DS Sono Mama Rakubiki Jiten on my DS lite. They work fine for my needs, but are slow. Eijiro for the iPhone loads up in a few seconds, but word entry is a pain, and with Rakubiki I might not have the game card with me when I need it. Even so, I haven't really felt the need to shell out for a dedicated denshijisho. However, after playing around with the new Ex-Words I'm hooked.

If you read my Casio Ex-Word report last week, you know that I was pretty excited with the new models. After a little consideration, I made the decision to pull the trigger. My XD-A9800 should be arriving in a few days, I can't wait! Stay tuned here and join me as I figure out how to work one of these things again.

Find the denshijisho that's right for you, at beNippon.

Barista's Choice Black

While canned coffee is a relatively new thing back home, in Japan all of the major drink manufacturers have their own line(s) of canned coffee. Coca Cola's Georgia brand seems to be most famous here, and I drink it every once in a while, but I can't say it's all that great.

At the train station the other day, I walked by an Ito En vending machine that happened to have it's collaboration with Tully's Coffee of Seattle: Barista's Choice Black. Since I hadn't had my morning coffee yet, I thought I'd try it.

Ito En advertises Barista's Choice Black as containing 100% Brazilian Arabica beans harvested at over 1200m, and roasted in Japan. I was pleasantly surprised to find the coffee to be quite good, compared to other canned coffee varieties I've tasted. I usually find canned coffee (black) is usually quite acidic, whereas Barista's Choice was not as acidic and there's a subtle sweetness that is found in fresh brewed coffee. Thumbs up on this one, I'll skip Starbucks or McDonald's at the station, and pick up a can of Barista's Black.

A 285mL can is 130 yen at the vending machines. It's 10 yen more than other varieties, but it's a larger can.