RandomGuest asked some excellent questions as a comment on one of my posts about the Casio XD-GW9600. I thought it would be good to post the questions with some of my comments as a new post. That way, other people can chime in to clarify or disagree

---

1. Is there additional memory that’s not being used by the dictionary on the SD card?

Yes, I can’t remember how many megs, but there is plenty of on board memory for lots of text files and dictionaries to install.  (will look this up later!)

2. I noticed that the touchpad that you can actually write on, looks very small. Is it so small that writing kanji with many strokes gets hard? How big is the size difference from the - I think it was G90 or V70 - demonstration video (I’m talking about the actual area where you can write, not the product’s size)?

The Canon models use the screen to write on. So the Casio’s is much smaller. I have had no problems writing any kanji, though.

 3. When you use the kanji handwriting recognition function, does the small screen you draw it on display what you’ve already drawn (while you are drawing), or is it like trying to draw it with your eyes closed?

Yes, it displays every stroke.

4. Isn’t the fact that the main display isn’t touch-sensitive very frustrating? Wouldn’t it be much easier and time-saving to navigate around with the pen, like you can with many other models, or do you navigate other models with the keyboard as well?

It isn’t for me. I prefer it this way since it makes the main screen look so much nicer. I think the Canon models have poorer screens because of the touch sensitive film.

The only negative for some is you can’t use the stylus to ‘jump’ simply by tapping words. Not a biggie for me since I always used the keyboard to jump even with the Canons.

5: Is it possible to buy Chinese dictionaries for it, and if so, do you have some more information for me?

Yes. I haven’t tried it, but there are SD and CD expansion Chinese dictionaries available:
http://casio.jp/exword/soft/