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[Manics]

Yep the Nook Touch did it right where they had a touch screen but kept the page turn buttons on each side of the screen. Seriously, anyone who wants a touch screen eReader with physical page turn buttons, give the Nook Touch a look. If you're worried about your existing Kindle library, they all can be converted over. The touch screen, easier navigation, physical size and weight all make a touch based eReader a great device. I hope Amazon adds the buttons back in with a revision at some point.

The form factor of the Nook touch kinda sucks though. I hate that slighly square thing they got going on. It's not as comfortable to hold in the hand in my opinion.

 

[PjotrStroganov]

He got a bad one. I have mine and the images are as sharp or slightly better then the Kindle 3

Same screen afaik.

 

[Jintor]

I thought I'd lost (broken) another Kindle, the third in about six months, after it failed to boot while I was on the train home - power button didn't do anything, didn't even light up. I was especially worried because the power key is sticky so I thought it had gotten jammed or something. Thankfully I plugged it into the computer and it booted right back up. Seemed to have deleted everything on it but, you know, the cloud. So everything worked out good.

 

[VistraNorrez]

It looks like in the Kindle 4.0.1 update they are giving the user the ability to decide if they want a flash every page or not. I guess some people miss it.

 

[MarkusRJR]

Why does Amazon insist on not selling Kindles in Canada... Ugh. Guess I'll go buy a Kobo Touch, those look alright.

 

[HiroProtagonist]

It looks like in the Kindle 4.0.1 update they are giving the user the ability to decide if they want a flash every page or not. I guess some people miss it.

I bet it has something to do with ghosting and not being able to manually refresh the screen without a keyboard.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

I thought I'd lost (broken) another Kindle, the third in about six months, after it failed to boot while I was on the train home - power button didn't do anything, didn't even light up. I was especially worried because the power key is sticky so I thought it had gotten jammed or something. Thankfully I plugged it into the computer and it booted right back up. Seemed to have deleted everything on it but, you know, the cloud. So everything worked out good.

How the hell do you break so many?

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

Why does Amazon insist on not selling Kindles in Canada... Ugh. Guess I'll go buy a Kobo Touch, those look alright.

What are you talking about? There's been a couple canadians in here who have ordered kindles and it's on amazon.ca.

 

[LCfiner]

Why does Amazon insist on not selling Kindles in Canada... Ugh. Guess I'll go buy a Kobo Touch, those look alright.

only the 110 dollar plain jane kindle is available up here.

I suspect the lack of a kindle touch is due to prioritizing US customers now - since it’s still in pre-order stage. I’d expect it up here around Xmas (maybe only afterward?)

The kobo touch does look good and the bookstore seems to have some titles that amazon doesn’t have up here.

but… the deal killer for me with the kobo touch is the lack of page turn buttons and no equivalent “easy reach” mode to allow for one handed, left handed page turning. I love my kindle 2 because I can hold it in any hand I want. any regression from that is a no go.

 

[Jintor]

How the hell do you break so many?

First one bricked itself while plugged into my computer, it never came off USB mode. Second one's screen got damaged while it was in my bag.

 

[Manics]

I bet it has something to do with ghosting and not being able to manually refresh the screen without a keyboard.

I've left it with the partial refresh. I don't notice any ghosting, seems very clean to me on each page and it only flashes every 5-6 turns.

 

[Blackhead]

only the 110 dollar plain jane kindle is available up here.

I suspect the lack of a kindle touch is due to prioritizing US customers now - since it’s still in pre-order stage. I’d expect it up here around Xmas (maybe only afterward?)

The kobo touch does look good and the bookstore seems to have some titles that amazon doesn’t have up here.

but… the deal killer for me with the kobo touch is the lack of page turn buttons and no equivalent “easy reach” mode to allow for one handed, left handed page turning. I love my kindle 2 because I can hold it in any hand I want. any regression from that is a no go.

The kobo touch has 'swipes' for page turning so you can swipe left or right and turn the page backwards or forwards, respectively, from anywhere on the screen. I can hold the kobo touch in either hand and comfortably turn pages using my thumb on either edge of the screen. I prefer swiping to tapping because (1) I don't ever have to move my thumb to reach a different zone (2) it feels more natural given the mental model of a book (3) the rhythm of my swipes usually corresponds to the pace at which the pages turn—it can tap much faster and end up waiting for pages to load.

p.s. I also find the 'eink blink' "horrible" but to everybody else with same concerns I'd say that the new rate of one blink every 6 pages now available on the Nook, Kobo and Kindle makes a huge difference.

 

[Manics]

Why does Amazon insist on not selling Kindles in Canada... Ugh. Guess I'll go buy a Kobo Touch, those look alright.

You can buy a Kindle at Staples or order online through Amazon. Amazon will get you that thing in 2 days (provided they have stock). From the time I ordered to the time it was in my hands was under 48 hours.

I would go and test the Kobo touch before buying it. I played around with one at Chapters and I found it dog-slow to load up books. It was really annoying. Maybe it was just that display model but I thought it was garbage compared to the Kindle.

 

[Manics]

One good thing about the Kobo touch is that it's the same dimensions as the new Kindle. That means you can buy the cases for the Kobo touch and they fit the Kindle perfectly. I walked into Chapters yesterday and bought a zipped up travel case.

 

[JoshuaJSlone]

It looks like in the Kindle 4.0.1 update they are giving the user the ability to decide if they want a flash every page or not. I guess some people miss it.

I read someone saying that it was more distracting when it came occasionally, rather than expecting it each time.

 

[Blackhead]

I read someone saying that it was more distracting when it came occasionally, rather than expecting it each time.

Stockholm Syndrome

Ok, to be fair, you might want the flash everytime if you're seeing ghosting every other page but on the Kobo Touch I'd just adjust the flash from 6 pages to 3 or 4 pages.

 

[LCfiner]

The kobo touch has 'swipes' for page turning so you can swipe left or right and turn the page backwards or forwards, respectively, from anywhere on the screen. I can hold the kobo touch in either hand and comfortably turn pages using my thumb on either edge of the screen. I prefer swiping to tapping because (1) I don't ever have to move my thumb to reach a different zone (2) it feels more natural given the mental model of a book (3) the rhythm of my swipes usually corresponds to the pace at which the pages turn—it can tap much faster and end up waiting for pages to load.

p.s. I also find the 'eink blink' "horrible" but to everybody else with same concerns I'd say that the new rate of one blink every 6 pages now available on the Nook, Kobo and Kindle makes a huge difference.

thank you for mentioning this. I was looking around for info about page turning details in online reviews but they didn’t mention anything like this (which I consider important)

Depending on how long the kindle touch takes to expand beyond the US, I may now more seriously consider the kobo touch. I would just need to do the one time DRM strip of my kindle azw files to keep everything simple.

 

[GuessWho]

yeah i think i'm going with a kobo touch in the end.

 

[HiroProtagonist]

I've left it with the partial refresh. I don't notice any ghosting, seems very clean to me on each page and it only flashes every 5-6 turns.

I just remember some of the 'simple reader' readers complaining about ghosting, but for all I know they were using a huge Helvetica Neue 93 black extended font and that was the problem. Either way, more settings are never a bad thing (within reason).

 

[Captain N]

I can't wait for the Fire! Mainly for the comics and apps, but I think I might finally get back into reading books again. Starting with World War Z.

 

[antispin]

I guess I am in the minority that prefers touch zones to page turn buttons.

 

[Manics]

I just remember some of the 'simple reader' readers complaining about ghosting, but for all I know they were using a huge Helvetica Neue 93 black extended font and that was the problem. Either way, more settings are never a bad thing (within reason).

Yeah no issue with ghosting that I can see. I've even been looking for it.

 

[VistraNorrez]

MobileTechReview has a 17 minute review up of the Kindle. I think this should answer most questions.

 

[mosaic]

I was playing with a friend's Kindle today and, for the life of me, I couldn't find a spot where someone would actually be able to access their account to input a gift card code. Can the "experimental" brower access Amazon.com decently?

My plot to hook up my technophobic mother (that's in another state) with an eReader absolutely hinges on "no PC necessary, ever."

 

[Marty Chinn]

I guess, but I imagine most people will adjust to the lack of page turn buttons, or never have used them in the first place. Of the few time I've ever read on my Kindle iPad App the touch was something I never thought about. They should have been on the Kindle Touch but it's not something that would ever make me purchase a Nook Touch.

Seems like a lot of people do care about it though with the number of responses though. I'm just saying there's an option out there for those people.

I know it's easy to covert files but I'll take convenience and my whispersynch over it.

You realize the Nook has the same functionality as whispersync right? And what convenience? It's just as convenient on the Nook.

And I really like that new X-ray feature. And anyway I don't find navigation an sort of issue on my Kindle 2. So the upgrade to a Kindle Keyboard might make more sense.

X-Ray sounds cool so I'd like to try it. Not sure how much I'd use it in the long run but definitely a neat feature. Kindle Keyboard won't work for you on that though since that's a Kindle Touch only feature. The navigation on the Nook and Kindle before touch screen had a lot of directional navigation to get to where you want to go. Touch screen eliminates all that extra navigation which is really nice once you've used it. I can't go back to either the original Nook or the Kindle that we have because of it.

 

[PastorOfMuppets]

I think I'm going to pass on this generation of Kindle. My Kindle 3 serves me fine and and I don't see enough improvements to upgrade.

What I would like to see on the next batch of Kindles:

- A reasonably priced DX sized Kindle. $379 is kind of ridiculous.
- I can go either way with the elimination of the keyboard but page turn buttons on the side are a must. What do I need a touch screen for? I'm reading books, not playing tower defense games.

How far are we off from colour e-ink at this point in time? I would pay extra for a DX sized ebook reader with colour e-ink. It would make reading magazines, PDFs, newspapers and comic books so sweet.

 

[dr3upmushroom]

Some people are talking about getting a Kobo or Nook over a Kindle; have any of you checked out the Google ereader? Looks quite a bit like a Kindle 3, full keyboard and all. It's big selling point is that it has a higher resolution screen, which many people don't imagine would be a big deal with an ereader but once you examine the screen on any other reader closely and see that the letters are ever so slightly pixelated, it's one of those "can never unsee" sort of things.

Most people aren't even going to notice the pixelly look of the Kindle, and even knowing about it I still can't tell a majority of the time holding the Kindle a normal distance away from my eyes, but I still really like that ultra-smooth look text has on a high PPI screen like an iDevice with a "retina display."

Pretty sure the thing doesn't have a touch screen, but in my opinion it's definitely another option worth checking out if you're in the market for an ereader. Target has them on sale for $100 at the moment too (or at least mine does, not sure if it's nation-wide).

I've been really happy with my Kindle 3, but so long as you don't really care about a touch screen and can stand the style of the Google ereader (some people don't like the white body and bronze buttons. I love the style of it myself) it's the one to get at the moment in my opinion. I was tempted to try to sell my Kindle and pick one up when the Target sale started but it seemed like a bad time with new products coming out in the next few months, and I didn't really want to deal with converting my Amazon collection, especially now that I know I'll be picking up a Fire.

 

[Ratrat]

Sorry if this has already been addressed, but is the touch likely to have inferior battery life? Its be far my favorite feature with the kindle that I can read hours a day and only have to charge it about once every 2 weeks.

edit: thanks!

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

I'm confused when she says soft touch in the review. Does that mean it's not grippy on the back like the kindle 3 was?

Edit: Nvm, I thought mine was gripper than it apparently is.

Sorry if this has already been addressed, but is the touch likely to have inferior battery life? Its be far my favorite feature with the kindle that I can read hours a day and only have to charge it about once every 2 weeks.

Well if you look at their site they list the same battery life.

 

[JoshuaJSlone]

I was playing with a friend's Kindle today and, for the life of me, I couldn't find a spot where someone would actually be able to access their account to input a gift card code. Can the "experimental" brower access Amazon.com decently?

Amazon.com is at the top of the bookmarks list, but I found it a bit clunky since it involved so much zooming and scrolling. They have a mobile site which works pretty decently, though. Checking now, I see one can go into the "Your Account" area and there's an option for using gift certificates/cards.

Unrelated to your question, but I wanted to say that the mobile site has improved a lot in the last year. I was pretty amazed when I found it that it wouldn't allow purchases of Kindle books. Now, no problem.

 

[VistraNorrez]

Seems like a lot of people do care about it though with the number of responses though. I'm just saying there's an option out there for those people.

You're seriously just stating the obvious. If it wasn't people wouldn't be buying Nooks. And I agreed with you, anyway. That's why I said "I guess".

You realize the Nook has the same functionality as whispersync right? And what convenience? It's just as convenient on the Nook.

Does the Nook whispersync non-Nook books? Like if I convert my Kindle books? And anyway it's convenient to download my books directly to my Kindle and start reading immediately. Converting a book and transferring over via computer isn't convenient, not matter how easy it is.

And as for the iRiver Google ereader, it hasn't gotten particularly good reviews. The page turn button is on the bottom of the screen for one and the keyboard is not good. And, unless it's changed, you cannot do annotations on it. It does have the higher definition screen on it, which may just negate all those minuses.

 

[Blackhead]

Some people are talking about getting a Kobo or Nook over a Kindle; have any of you checked out the Google ereader? Looks quite a bit like a Kindle 3, full keyboard and all. It's big selling point is that it has a higher resolution screen, which many people don't imagine would be a big deal with an ereader but once you examine the screen on any other reader closely and see that the letters are ever so slightly pixelated, it's one of those "can never unsee" sort of things.

Most people aren't even going to notice the pixelly look of the Kindle, and even knowing about it I still can't tell a majority of the time holding the Kindle a normal distance away from my eyes, but I still really like that ultra-smooth look text has on a high PPI screen like an iDevice with a "retina display."

Pretty sure the thing doesn't have a touch screen, but in my opinion it's definitely another option worth checking out if you're in the market for an ereader. Target has them on sale for $100 at the moment too (or at least mine does, not sure if it's nation-wide).

I've been really happy with my Kindle 3, but so long as you don't really care about a touch screen and can stand the style of the Google ereader (some people don't like the white body and bronze buttons. I love the style of it myself) it's the one to get at the moment in my opinion. I was tempted to try to sell my Kindle and pick one up when the Target sale started but it seemed like a bad time with new products coming out in the next few months, and I didn't really want to deal with converting my Amazon collection, especially now that I know I'll be picking up a Fire.

I hadn't heard about the sale, thanks for the info. I seriously considered this ereader back in the summer when it first came out. I just took a look at the firmware updates since then and it's not much (iRiver certainly aren't pumping out new features like Kobo). The crispier text doesn't matter for amz/ePub files imo but is a huge deal for content with few reflow options—this is the ereader to get if you'll be reading a lot of PDFs. That said, I don't believe the high resolution screen makes up for a poor user experience in every other aspect: that eink flash on every page turn, no dictionary/word look up feature, slower UI navigation compared to the touchscreen ereaders, problems with the database/folder organization, none adjustable margins (no margins period!), no user selectable fonts and an ugly device (not because of the color scheme but due to keyboard which, as with the kindle keyboards, makes the device look like a calculator).

$99 is a magical pricepoint though (and no 'Special Offers' is a plus for me), it'd be worth it for PDFs and manga alone, but I really should save my dollars for the mirasol display device(s) Qualcomm has promised is coming before the holidays.

 

[345triangle]

as someone who uses a UK amazon account, i'd be interested in the new non-touch kindle were it not for the lack of page-turning buttons on the bezel. i have a sony PRS-600 right now, and while the screen isn't really responsive enough to make touchscreen page-turning feel natural, it's a pain to have to move your thumb down to the lower button every ten seconds or so.

i think i'm going to wait for the kindle touch to be available to me, or just get the new sony reader wi-fi.

 

[broadwayrock]

as someone who uses a UK amazon account, i'd be interested in the new non-touch kindle were it not for the lack of page-turning buttons on the bezel. i have a sony PRS-600 right now, and while the screen isn't really responsive enough to make touchscreen page-turning feel natural, it's a pain to have to move your thumb down to the lower button every ten seconds or so.

The non touch screen Kindle has page turn buttons on the side:

 

[PjotrStroganov]

The non touch screen Kindle has page turn buttons on the side:

But what if people want both?

 

[Snaku]

But what if people want both?

Nook Touch.

 

[PjotrStroganov]

Nook Touch.

US only.

 

[345triangle]

The non touch screen Kindle has page turn buttons on the side

wow, i never noticed that in any of the photos so far - all the ones i've seen have been head-on! thanks for the heads-up.

okay, maybe i should consider this model. still kind of ridiculous that it's $79 in the states and £89, though i guess that is still by far the best value of any e-reader in the UK to date.

 

[Zaraki_Kenpachi]

wow, i never noticed that in any of the photos so far - all the ones i've seen have been head-on! thanks for the heads-up.

okay, maybe i should consider this model. still kind of ridiculous that it's $79 in the states and £89, though i guess that is still by far the best value of any e-reader in the UK to date.

YOU GUYS DON'T HAVE SPECIAL OFFERS THEY ARE THE SAME PRICE. It's $109 in the US.

 

[345triangle]

yeah, and i'm saying i would like the option to pay less for something that will likely eventually save me money! amazon unfortunately does not have its shit sorted out internationally.

 

[Bboy AJ]

yeah, and i'm saying i would like the option to pay less for something that will likely eventually save me money! amazon unfortunately does not have its shit sorted out internationally.

Probably because of the sponsors, not Amazon.

 

[renitou]

yeah, and i'm saying i would like the option to pay less for something that will likely eventually save me money! amazon unfortunately does not have its shit sorted out internationally.

Move to a more important country. It's that simple.

 

[jayb]

in the special offers kindles, does the $10 for a $20 Amazon gift card show up very often?

 

[Verdre]

in the special offers kindles, does the $10 for a $20 Amazon gift card show up very often?

I believe that has only shown up once.

I have, however, gotten a code for $5 off any order of $10 or more twice.

 

[hermit7]

I got my regular Kindle yesterday. It is overall pretty nice I have to say. The size is great and I really like the overall form factor. The keyboard is monotonous to type on, but personally for me that is not that big of an issue as I don't take any notes usually when I read.

It is a great little device overall.

 

[DrForester]

I almost never use the keyboard, but I like the extra size it gives the unit.

 

[AstroLad]

Man, I really wish the folders you made on the Kindle were synced across all devices.

I like my folders. :/

 

[AndyD]

You mean collections? I want a better tool to manage those. So I can easily sort my books, I have a few dozen on the kindle and its getting tough to manage.

Also, as to books from overdrive/library. Mine expired Tuesday. Got an Amazon email and all. But I am still reading it. I have advanced significantly and no sign of it dissapearing. I have not gone to the menus or home page, just read, shut off, turn on, read, repeat. I want to see if I can get all the way to the end.

Also, I cannot find a renew option on Overdrive. With paper books our library lets us renew twice, once if its on hold, with Overdrive it has to expire, then re-checkout. And you have to wait your turn if its on hold.

 

[AstroLad]

You mean collections? I want a better tool to manage those. So I can easily sort my books, I have a few dozen on the kindle and its getting tough to manage.

Yeah "Collections." The book management on the apps is pretty weak so why not at least have collections there? Not to mention it would be easier to actually create and manage collections from touch devices rather than the Kindle, where it's (relatively) a mild chore.

 

[Verdre]

I wish kindle did support folders. Would make things easier and seems an odd thing not to support.