Customer Reviews

Franklin MWD-5002HS Merriam-Webster Dictionary Springboard Module

5 star:		(1)
4 star:		(0)
3 star:		(2)
2 star:		(1)
1 star:		(0)

 

 

The best I can say about this product is that it's superior to the dictionaries available for download on the Palm platform--but that's not saying all that much. The interface needs improvement; the definitions do not include tips on the pronunciation of words; and some words are either missing from the database or are only half-heartedly defined. For the price, which is at least double that of the download-able dictionaries, I was hoping for more. Having said that, this product does indeed work--I'm a college student, and the dictionary contains the majority of the words I've needed to look up, including some obscure and technical ones. This product is, for now, the only dictionary out there that's worth spending money on. Despite my three-star rating, I'd recommend it to any owner of a Visor that is looking for a dictionary (this product is MUCH better than the Noah program).

I've just got my dictionary module and I've been playing with it for a few hours. It's nice but I was waiting for something much better than the Freeware Noah dictionary. There are no colors and the font options are even too small or too big. The shortcuts are also useless. If you want to go back you have to use < and > for forward. It is very hard to do those symbols in my Visor and I think hardware buttons shortcuts would have been much better. The interface looks boring, like a DOS shell with not colors or anything. The only good thing about it is the search feature that looks for words that are similar to the one you entered if misspelled. I hope they release an update for this module.

For me This is the most useful of all the springboard modules. I usually have to carry a big heavy college-size dictionary around when I want to read something because there's inevitably going to be some obscure word that I don't know and that'll bug me if I don't look it up; but carrying around that size of a dictionary although it's really useful is rather on the cumbersome side. I was skeptical at first as to whether this dictionary had what it takes (as compared to an Encarta dictionary or an American Heritage college-sized dictionary) but the definitions are pretty close to what I'm used to reading the main difference being instead of carrying around a 10 pound dictionary I'm not carrying much more than my Handspring visor! This module mounts flush and even though beyond simply looking words up the navigation is a little lacking; the act of looking up words is much easier and quicker than opening up and looking for the words in a 10 pound dictionary. I don't use the module for anything beyond looking up words so I don't really use any of the navigation (beyond the little left arrow at the top to move from the specific definition to the index of all of the words). Navigation among the words is so easy I even found myself scrolling through the dictionary and looking up words that I knew nothing about; with this module it's sort of fun! So if you like to look up words and you own a handspring visor you should ask yourself this: Would you rather carry around a ten pound dictionary or a flush-mounting pittance of a module? ...And could you use all of the time you waste flipping through pages and running your finger down a column of ink?

The idea of having a dictionary as big as the one advertised in this module is great. How many times have you wanted to look up a word only to stop yourself because you didn't want to open up that huge book? Even for those of us who have internet connections to look up words easily, sometimes we are not around the Internet and would like to be able to look up a word on an airplane, train, or bus, etc. The problem is with this module is the implementation. The navigation is poor, and even if you don't use it at first, you will want navigation in it lately. I would wait until Franklin releases a better user interface.