coverup Wrote:I really recommend a separate Denshi Jisho in combination with software/internet ones. I would recommend the Casio EX-WORD XD-SF4800. I got mine at an electronics store in Japan for about 28,000円. I think I just got lucky when I bought it, because I have not regretted it since.

The model is intended for high school students in Japan. Usually when you use a Japanese-made electronic dictionary, you feel the pain of all these great features designed for Japanese people learning English, with very little thought put into usability for JSL learners. That is not the case with this dictionary.

Aside from the TWO J-J dictionaries (Meikyo,　Koujien), a kanji dictionary that has pronunciation guides for names, there are a couple of killer features that make this dictionary really JSL friendly.

One is the NHK pronunciation dictionary, which I have yet to find online. This combined with the fact that the Meikyo also speaks the pronunciation for many of the entries. Usually you only see this for English.

However, the single most useful thing for me has been the way you can use the Progressive J-E dictionary. Every entry has tons of example sentences (check Yahoo's J-E dict for a taste, it's the same), whereas if you use the more common Genius J-E , you often get single words with little or no clues on what kind of situations the word is used in. I mine sentences from it all the time, as they are virtually all accurate, natural Japanese - no twisting grammar or obscure words.

However, the KILLER feature that I have only seen on this dictionary (correct me if there are others) is that they have cross-referenced it so you can use the J-E dictionary BACKWARDS as an E-J dictionary. You can search the example sentences for the English word you're looking for, find a sentence that has the intended usage/meaning in English, and then see how the meaning is expressed in natural Japanese. I really can't stress to you how useful/killer this is compared to other dictionaries - I don't even use the Genius E-J dictionary (even though it's there too) at all because of this.

Another great feature is that it has dual touchscreens, so when you want to jump between dictionaries to look up words in a definition, you just tap the word on the upper screen with the stylus and then tap the dictionary you want to see it in. Man that is so much better than rewriting/retyping/scrolling around with an arrow key. Then just press the back key and you're back in the original definition.

Everyone will tell you that what you buy depends on your needs. If you are serious about using an electronic dictionary, I think you need one with a full physical keyboard and touch screens. "Touch screen only" (a la DS) created problems for me, and I found myself avoiding the dictionary because of how slow it was to look things up. Anything less than a full keyboard, no matter how accurate, is going to be slower, and this was eventually my frustration with the DS dictionary, and is likely to be similar on the iPod. The EX-WORD handwriting recognition for kanji is excellent, and you decide when you're done writing the character instead of an arbitrary time limit - perfect for when you need to double-check what you're writing. This is one of the best dictionaries out there right now for JSL learners, and I will very arrogantly suggest that it would be almost impossible for you to go wrong with it.

I feel really out of character (and slightly inappropriate?) recommending a specific product like this - it's not like I get paid to write this, but I have been 110% thrilled with it. Very well thought-out and designed for non-Japanese users, something rare in my experience when it comes to electronic dictionaries.

squarezebra Wrote:Check out any of the new series of Casio Ex-words. The current Casio range is the D series (Dxxxxx / d9800/d10000 etc) I know for SURE that all the 9800 or 10000 units over the past few years (A, B and D series) in the casio range have all these features (but they are the most expensive models).

fishhead Wrote:

squarezebra Wrote:Check out any of the new series of Casio Ex-words. The current Casio range is the D series (Dxxxxx / d9800/d10000 etc) I know for SURE that all the 9800 or 10000 units over the past few years (A, B and D series) in the casio range have all these features (but they are the most expensive models).

Thank you very much for your helpful reply.

I've been looking 'round amazon.co.jp and I'm looking to spend around 250,000 yen - I've been looking at the following models - would you know if they contain the features mentioned earlier? I'm not sure if it is better to buy a model designed for Japanese learning English, or just a 生活 version...

squarezebra Wrote:The features you want are standard across the whole range of Ex-words. The difference between each model is the quality of the dictionaries, and how useful they are for specific purposes.

the D9800WE in your first link is a SUPERB dictionary, second only to the D10000. I have the old XD-A9800 (and a D10000), and the D9800 is an updated version of that. The main plus of the 9800 model is that it is only 1 of 2 models to get the superb Green Goddess which is great for English learners of Japanese. I know for sure it has the NHK pronunication guide I think you wanted, and the Kangorin kanji dictionary, koujien, meikyou, progressive... basically, this dictionary has everything!

The D4850 is definitely an inferior model. The only J-Es installed are the Progressive and OLEX dics. It does have the koujien and Meikyou J-Js mentioned in the above thread, and *probably has the NHK pronunciation dic too.

Again though, neither dictionary is built for English people, and there are no English manuals etc....

fishhead Wrote:The D9800WE sounds very tempting! However, at almost 300,000 yen I am worried that I will be paying for a lot of features that I don't actually need.

fishhead Wrote:Thank you so much for your helpful reply. The D9800WE sounds very tempting! However, at almost 300,000 yen I am worried that I will be paying for a lot of features that I don't actually need.

partner55083777 Wrote:A smartphone/tablet/mp3player with an epwing reader is usually enough. You'll have a much, much larger selection of high-quality dictionaries than any electronic dictionary.

You can also throw in some apps for looking up kanji and you should be set.

fishhead Wrote:Can anyone recommend a good place online to buy one? I need shipping to Europe.

partner55083777 Wrote:I generally recommend people just use an epwing reader over buying an electronic dictionary, so I was pretty surprised when so many people were in support of electronic dictionaries over epwing readers.

What are your reasons for preferring an electronic dictionary? I can understand things like specialized 書道 dictionaries or classical japanese dictionaries, but for casual use I feel like epwing wins hands down, especially in regards to price and amount of content.