Kindle - bear with me

Yes it reads like a paper based book. I don't read books in bright sunlight without making a shade over the paper at least. I'd do the same on the kindle.
 
I've found it's actually BETTER than reading from a book. The e-ink is totally solid, and there's no back-lighting to cause eye strain. The fact that you can adjust font-size, words per line and line spacing makes it better in every way. And it's very readable in sunlight - it's just like having ink printed on a page. Anyone who says an ipad or similar device is just as good is either deluded or has never seen one.
 
I find the kindle pages look even better in bright sunlight. Buy it, you won't regret it. It's a relatively small investment for a great device.
 
Seeyou said:
I've found it's actually BETTER than reading from a book. The e-ink is totally solid, and there's no back-lighting to cause eye strain. The fact that you can adjust font-size, words per line and line spacing makes it better in every way. And it's very readable in sunlight - it's just like having ink printed on a page. Anyone who says an ipad or similar device is just as good is either deluded or has never seen one.
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True hey. You need to have one in your hand before claiming some other gimmick is better. About 5 people here in the office have ordered theirs as soon as they laid their hands on mine.
 
R13... said:
True hey. You need to have one in your hand before claiming some other gimmick is better. About 5 people here in the office have ordered theirs as soon as they laid their hands on mine.
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Had similar experiences with every single person I've shown it to, to date :)
 
quick question though.

i've got a collection of 4000 epubs......can i just copy those to a kindle and read them? or does it only work with books bought on amazon?
 
What are the thoughts on the DX? I see it's a lot more expensive, but is readability that much of an improvement over the "regular" one? Or is the size a con in terms of portability?
 
Keeper said:
quick question though.

i've got a collection of 4000 epubs......can i just copy those to a kindle and read them? or does it only work with books bought on amazon?
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If your ePubs are DRM protected then I think you are out of luck. If not, use Calibre to convert to mobi format
 
Ok... you caught my ninja delete. I deleted cause I'm not sure if epub is natively supported, looks like not. So Calibre it is then.
 
R13... said:
Ok... you caught my ninja delete. I deleted cause I'm not sure if epub is natively supported, looks like not. So Calibre it is then.
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ok, no problem - but this Calibre App you speak of, can it do 4000 in batch process mode or do i have to do it 1-by-1?

because if it can do 4000, i'm not worried.
 
Apparently they are not great for PDF's keeper, or so I am told.
 
It can do batches, although 4000 at one time could be a stretch.

Pdf's are not great. For the rest, as all the previous posters stated, this is a brilliant little device. You won't be disappointed.
 
Is the Kindle user friendly?

My gran really is hopeless with technology, will she be able to use it?
 
The DX is bigger and thus better for viewing technical documents, however, the Kindle 3 has a newer version of E-Ink (I think it's e-ink 2) and thus has a better contrast and faster screen refresh. That was a selling feature for me, because the earlier version of e-ink has a noticable screen refresh - the screen 'shimmers' before each change. So the DX, until they bring out a new version, won't have as good a screen as the Kindle 3.

PDF's don't resize automatically, so with a PDF, you have to shift around the screen a bit to view the document.

Images come out in grey-scale, but they are still very viewable.

My 8 year old daughter reads quite happily on my kindle - I think the technology is very accessible.
 
Thanks TheMightyP. I understand is the new Graphite version of the DX also has the improved Pearl screen.

I was seriously considering the DX Graphite for technical datasheets in PDF (as well as the normal stuff) but I am not so sure now. Time to do some more research.
 
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Just to clarify something asked earlier in this thread: the Kindle was not designed to hold 4,000 books -- the official specifications list 3,000 as an approximate capacity. Dumping such a huge number of books on the device at one time will also cause it to spend ages 'indexing' and is really not advised: do it in batches of a few hundred each. In fact some owners prefer to keep the bulk of their ebook collection separately and only load a small number onto their Kindle at a time -- a matter of personal preference.

Converting EPUBs to the MOBI format the Kindle needs is one of the more successful conversions using the freebie Calibre, generally with no quality or formatting losses.

All technical reviews of eInk screens say they are far easier on the eye for long-term reading than a backlit LCD screen, e.g. the iPad or a netbook. Most users will confirm this, and the new Kindle's 'pearl' screen is definitely a nicer read than the previous one, ditto the new Sony 350.

There are freebie apps to improve PDF performance on the Kindle: see one of the leading Kindle forums for details: http://www.mobileread.com/forums/forumdisplay.php?f=140&order=desc&page=1
 
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