Differences between Nook HD and Kindle Fire?

[Dougmeister]

I hope it's not comparing apples to oranges, but the budget is $50 or so and I noticed that we can get manufacturer refurbished Nook HD's for about the same price as a new Kindle Fire (with "Special Offers", or ads).

It's for our 12-year old son. He is a voracious reader. The main reason is for electronic books. Secondary reasons (in no particular order) are: web browsing, email, and games.

Edit: backlighting would be important, too

Can anyone comment on the similarities and/or differences? How easy is it to buy books for them? How is the selection? What about renting 'free' books from libraries?

Also, how "hackable" are they to unlock more functionality? How are the games?

Thanks.

 

[lupi]

Not sure how hackable the fire is, but think the main thing to look at will be how restrictive they are towards the main 2 app stores (Google play and amazon). Not sure the nook can use amazon and fire may have a limited applicability on the play store.

 

[gorcorps]

I would lean towards the Kindle. Mainly because the Kindle store IMO is better for books and such. You also seem to get better e-book check out support at libraries with the kindle (at least in my area). Each library has a different system, so you'll have to check how to sign up for your local one. Amazon also has a service called "Kindle Unlimited" which would be worth it for somebody who burns through books a lot. It's a subscription service that lets you read unlimited books for a monthly fee, instead of buying individual books (basically a Netflix for your kindle). It might be worth checking out.

Nook HD is pretty old so support would be questionable. The community was pretty active at one point when the Nook HD dropped in price, so it's quite "rom friendly" if you're into that sort of thing. However given what the core uses are I'd stick with the Kindle line. The Nook HD is more for someone who wants a cheap tablet to tinker with, not really worth it for just books.

 

[clamum]

Not sure how hackable the fire is, but think the main thing to look at will be how restrictive they are towards the main 2 app stores (Google play and amazon). Not sure the nook can use amazon and fire may have a limited applicability on the play store.

I think the Kindle (I have a Kindle Fire HD 7") is rather locked down, by default. I put Cyanogenmod on mine shortly after I got it, and I can use Google Play without restriction now. For someone more just interested in reading books, though, I'm not sure that would be necessary. Anyway, I really like my Kindle and would recommend them, though I'm not an expert in tablets at all (Kindle is my first tablet).