Electronic dictionaries

[Megumin]

I was wondering if anyone has experience with them and if you have any particular recommendation if you do.

In an ideal world, my trip to Japan this winter wouldn’t have been cancelled and I could have played with them on a Yodobashi or something… but so is life.

I’m potentially looking for something that it’s not to expensive, and that works for both elementary and high school students, I only really care about dictionary, vocabulary, writting and reading functions. Not so interested in other stuff like Maths and such…

[evandcs]

electronic jisho? really? Any particular reason for this?

When I was in japan in 2010 it was all the fad, everyone (students and teachers) had one. I didnt, I kept a physical dictionary

then in 2014 when I was back in japan, I didnt see a single electronic dictionary, everyone had a dictionary in their iphones and androids.

[Ochamame]

I guess the plus of a simple electronic dictionary over a phone is that you can use it in class or even exams without being able to cheat. Seeing “for elementary and hight school students” is mentioned.

[Daru]

I got one I bought for cheap on Mercari when I was in Japan. It’s an older, chunky model.

To me, the most useful thing about it is the superior kanji recognition, the included dictionaries and nested navigation of the content.

I’ve used tons of apps, and while some of them are way better than a 電子辞書 in terms of ease of use, none of them have good character recognition. Also, if you ever find yourself in a language school in Japan, teachers will allow you to use it in class so that’s always useful.

I don’t think it’s essential to get one. You could make the tryhard argument of “the time and money you’ve spent getting one is time you could’ve just studied”, but they’re fun to own.

[Daru]

The boi.

[Antlershy]

Maybe this is of interest to you, since you already own a DS?

Amazon | 漢字そのまま DS楽引辞典 | ニンテンドーDS

I just know of it because it’s one of the things that comes with a 3DS I just bought, I don’t actually have it yet; seems to have favorable reviews though.

[Megumin]

@Antlershy

Maybe this is of interest to you, since you already own a DS?

Thanks, I’ll give it a shot if I can find a “trial” before I jump into buying, but it’s already 1/3 of what a cheap electronic dictionary goes, and I doubt it’s as good.

@Daru

The boi.

Mind sharing the model? I’m between the CASIOs and the SHARPs, but I’m still at a loss of what to go with really.

@evandcs

electronic jisho? really? Any particular reason for this?

I’m looking for a J-J dictionary, that has kanji recognition input. If it has both elementary and high school levels it would be ideal. Also being it’s own device I can take it with me along a book and read without having to pull my phone and try to fight with it on my phone.

[Devenu]

Before I moved here I bought a Casio EX-Word Dataplus 6 thinking I would be using it constantly. However, I found that compared to my smartphone it lacked functionality and, occasionally, didn’t have Japanese to English translations for some words. I imagine it would be more useful for Japanese to Japanese because there are several dictionaries I never used.

When I was working at the computer I already had my computer open so why not use jisho.org? I mean, I already had a web browser open anyway? Writing kanji on it was also incredibly strict as well (stroke order) whereas Google Translate’s kanji recognition was more visual and simple to do.

Basically, whenever I needed to use a dictionary it’s because I needed something done quickly and the electronic dictionary wasn’t able to compete. I imagine it will be useful way later in my studies but, as it stands, it’s just kind of my emergency thing in case I’m travelling and need it. I know I’m not getting the most out of it, but at the same time I don’t think I ever really needed the most out of it.

[Megumin]

@Devenu

When I was working at the computer I already had my computer open so why not use jisho.org? I mean, I already had a web browser open anyway? Writing kanji on it was also incredibly strict as well (stroke order) whereas Google Translate’s kanji recognition was more visual and simple to do.

I have a wacom one hooked to my computer, but the experience is not great. Jisho as you said is very strict with the order, and it’s not a J-J dictionary. You could “bypass” the Jisho recognition by writing on Google Translate, as that has better tolerance, but then you have to copy it on a dictionary, making it annoying and slow.

Also there’s the fact that it makes me have to be sit in front of the computer, when the idea is to be away from it while focusing on reading.

@Devenu

Casio EX-Word Dataplus 6

This seems to be the one being used by @Daru or at least very similar.
I’d love to be able to play with them before making a decission really, it was on the bucket list for the trip, but I don’t think that situation where I’m able to travel there is going to improve anytime soon.

[Megumin]

I ended up buying a Casio XD-K4800YW used, for ~40€ (~5000JPY).

I don’t really need a cutting edge model and it’s cheap enough if it doesn’t work out for me to not pull my hair out.

[Asher]

I’ve got this one, I find it incredibly useful for study/work. The primary useful feauture is that it compares several different dictionaries/encyclopedias at the same time, letting you scroll through the results of each one to find the most comprehensive answer. May not sound super useful, but it saves a huge amount of time searching on the net if you know what you’re looking for.

[Megumin]

Yeah, if I’m not wrong, that’s the newer model of what I bought.

Well, if I find it helpful I might actually invest in something better. We will see.

Excited to try it, hopefully it arrives sometime next week.

[rururun]

I have a Casio Ex-Word. Mine is a student model that I bought used for around $30. It has multiple monolingual dictionaries as well as the Genius J-E dictionary and the NHK pitch accent dictionary. There’s some other stuff on it that high school students use but obviously I don’t touch those.

I like it a lot. Being able to jump between definitions is an especially useful feature. There are so many wonderful features that make it better than what is available on smartphones.

[Megumin]

@rururun

I have a Casio Ex-Word. Mine is a student model that I bought used for around $30. It has multiple monolingual dictionaries as well as the Genius J-E dictionary and the NHK pitch accent dictionary. There’s some other stuff on it that high school students use but obviously I don’t touch those.

The used market in Japan is amazing. I look forward to play with it. If it makes the lookup of words less tedious I might be able to have longer reading sessions.

And yeah, I currently have little interest in learning Maths and Science in Japanese

[ThousandJP]

Both of those look good. How responsive is it? Does it ever feel “laggy”?

I saw on the amazon page for the one Asher has that it has “発音トレーニング” for English. Does that also mean that it has capability for voice input for searching in Japanese?

[Megumin]

@ThousandJP

Both of those look good. How responsive is it? Does it ever feel “laggy”?

I haven’t gotten mine yet so I can’t tell you if it’s laggy or not. Maybe the others can tell their experience with their units?

@ThousandJP

I saw on the amazon page for the one Asher has that it has “発音トレーニング” for English. Does that mean that it has voice input for search?

発音トレーニング means pronunciation training.

[ThousandJP]

I was half asleep and left out way too many words
I know what 発音トレーニング meant, was just wondering if that meant that it can handle voice input for other things. Edited it now to make that clearer

Did you get your used one off Amazon?

[Megumin]

@ThousandJP

I know what 発音トレーニング meant, was just wondering if that meant it means that it can handle voice input for other things. Edited it now to make that clearer

I can see Japanese Hatsuon practice being interesting in a future purchase if it works properly. Maybe @Asher can tell us his experience if he used the function?

@ThousandJP

Did you get your used one off Amazon?

Yes, it’s not the first time I go with used for AmazonJP. There also a few on ebay but I prefer to let Amazon do the customs handling.

[Megumin]

I received today the 40€ electronic dictionary I bought.

While it’s extremely good, I might have to reconsider my options as this high-school model is out of my league. Will have to ponder for the next days if I should go for a elementary school one instead.

[Chuck_Spears]

I’ve used tons of apps, and while some of them are way better than a 電子辞書 in terms of ease of use, none of them have good character recognition.

In my opinion, you really should not rely on your Dictionary app to provide character recognition. Instead, install a “keyboard”, such as mazec3 (jp) -Handwriting, which is FANTASTIC at recognizing Japanese writing and converting it to typed Kanji, Hiragana, or Katakana, and can be used with ANY app that takes keyboard input. It’s available for sure on Android, and I think on Apple too, and does not rely heavily on stroke order. Samsung also includes decent Japanese handwriting recognition (and fantastic English recognition) in some of their keyboards for devices that have a stylus.

As for Japanese dictionaries on Android, if you don’t mind paying a monthly subscription fee, I think Aedict3 and its companion Aedict Reader Popup provide unbeatable features. You can choose from among multiple dictionaries (including name and sentence dictionaries); create study lists; select and lookup words from within other apps; see tons of example sentences; drill up or down on words, kanji and kanji parts; add notes to word and kanji entries; use an online version of the same dictionary (including lists and notes); and on and on. It’s truly fantastic. There are decent free dictionaries that have some of these features, but I always come back to Aedict when I want to be productive.

Cheers!