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Got a Kindle Touch today

Pliablemoose

Pliablemoose

Lifer
Thought I'd give e-ink a shot, very readable, the refreshes are a PITA though.

Am definitely liking the free borrowing of books if you have Amazon prime.
 
The refresh rate and lack of color are definitely downsides to e-ink displays, but the upsides (imho) outweigh them when for an e-reader.

They barely use any power (it really stinks when your book runs out of batteries), and perhaps more importantly, no eye strain!


Honestly, I find Amazon's Kindle lineup to be a little weird. Unless I'm mistaken, the Touch (which isn't the most expensive model) has the most advanced software, which means it has access to features the other Kindles do not (include the Fire). The one that immediately comes to mind is the x-ray feature. Really bummed out they didn't backport this to older Kindles, or at least include it with the newer models like the Kindle Fire...
 
podspi said:
Honestly, I find Amazon's Kindle lineup to be a little weird. Unless I'm mistaken, the Touch (which isn't the most expensive model) has the most advanced software, which means it has access to features the other Kindles do not (include the Fire). The one that immediately comes to mind is the x-ray feature. Really bummed out they didn't backport this to older Kindles, or at least include it with the newer models like the Kindle Fire...
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What's this x-ray feature?
 
I have an ipad and I still do the majority of my reading on my kindle. I never saw the refresh rate as a drawback. It refreshes at least as fast as you could turn a page in a book and the visibility is comparable to that of a book, yet it's lighter than most books. Very easy to use for long reading sessions.
 
I went with the Nook Touch and haven't had any problem with the refresh. It's pretty much instantaneous except every six pages I think it is you get a black screen wipe with the refresh. Even that is pretty tolerable though.

Couldn't be happier with it as a strictly e-book reader.
 
I keep wanting to buy one til I remember it's only really useful at the beach or the pool. I usually read in the evening and my Tab or Touchpads are far better suited for the task.
 
ponyo said:
I keep wanting to buy one til I remember it's only really useful at the beach or the pool. I usually read in the evening and my Tab or Touchpads are far better suited for the task.
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Only if you're reading magazines and such. For B&W books, the only thing better than e-ink is the real thing.
 
ponyo said:
You can't read e-ink in the dark and or low light. LCD back light doesn't bother me.
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Reading in low light is hard on the eyes. Reading a backlit device in the dark is eye gougingly painful.

On a slightly related side note, when Aldiko/Nook/Kindle/etc crank the screen brightness on my phone to max when I enter the book, it pisses me off. Just keep the same brightness I have set. Its set that way for a reason, its comfortable.
 
I love E-Ink displays. I have to stare at LCD monitors all day at work, so the idea of using my spare time to stare at yet another LCD screen is laughable.
 
nook simple touch is great. the refresh is only every 5 pages.

i haven't rooted it yet, but you can root it and load your own android apps on it. wouldn't mind using it to read RSS feeds and do some light browsing on wifi.
 
Bateluer said:
Reading in low light is hard on the eyes. Reading a backlit device in the dark is eye gougingly painful.

On a slightly related side note, when Aldiko/Nook/Kindle/etc crank the screen brightness on my phone to max when I enter the book, it pisses me off. Just keep the same brightness I have set. Its set that way for a reason, its comfortable.
Click to expand...

Reading a backlit screen in low light is only painful if you improperly adjust the screen. For low light settings screen brightness should be rather low, and a high contrast light foreground/ dark background used. Optimally the background should be only slightly brighter than ambient, and the text subjectively twice as bright. Fortunately Amazon seems aware of this and provides that color option in the kindle apps for my windows phone and touchpad. Both of which always remember my brightness settings.
 
Bateluer said:
Reading in low light is hard on the eyes. Reading a backlit device in the dark is eye gougingly painful.

On a slightly related side note, when Aldiko/Nook/Kindle/etc crank the screen brightness on my phone to max when I enter the book, it pisses me off. Just keep the same brightness I have set. Its set that way for a reason, its comfortable.
Click to expand...
I find reading in the dark on a Nook Tablet with the screen set for white text on black to be ideal. Just running a finger down the left side of the page in most reader apps lets you adjust the brightness to an optimal level for a dark room, and there's no such thing as eye-strain. At least it works for me.

I don't get why Aldiko in particular would reset the screen brightness on your phone. That's exactly my program of choice for reading because when I return to a book I was reading previously, it keeps the screen setting exactly as I last had it.
 
I have a ad-supported Kindle 4 (no keyboard or touch) which I got for like $60 after using a coupon and it is absolutely fantastic. Feels like 1/2 the size of the original Nook that I had, super long battery life.

The only thing I wish it could do (and maybe it can) is sync pages w/ the Kindle app on my iPhone so I can keep reading the same book without having to remember exactly where I was. I sideloaded the book, so maybe thats why it wont work? Thats just 1 plus for using iBooks since it keeps it all synced pretty seamlessly for sideloaded books.
 
Belegost said:
Reading a backlit screen in low light is only painful if you improperly adjust the screen. For low light settings screen brightness should be rather low, and a high contrast light foreground/ dark background used. Optimally the background should be only slightly brighter than ambient, and the text subjectively twice as bright. Fortunately Amazon seems aware of this and provides that color option in the kindle apps for my windows phone and touchpad. Both of which always remember my brightness settings.
Click to expand...

I agree, I have both a Nook color & Samsung Galaxy Tab, I do a lot of reading on my tab via the kindle app & have no problem with eye strain.
 
Bateluer said:
Its an e-ink reader, the screen refresh is almost irrelevant so long as you're reading text.
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I don't think you are understanding the problem. You are coming at this from a gamer/movie watcher perspective. This is not about how fast your characters move on screen or if it can keep up with the car chase. It's about watching the page change ... ever ... so ... slowly.
 
Red Storm said:
What's this x-ray feature?
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Essentially, it is a tool that lets you see where a character/subject/theme is mentioned throughout a book. For example, if you are reading a particularly long book, and there is a character who you can't remember being introduced, you can use the xray feature to jump back to their introduction.
 
Suffice it to say, you are never going to convince someone who gets eye fatigue from a backlit screen than e-ink isn't better and vice versa. There's no point in contributing anecdotes about how one is better than the other.
 
podspi said:
Essentially, it is a tool that lets you see where a character/subject/theme is mentioned throughout a book. For example, if you are reading a particularly long book, and there is a character who you can't remember being introduced, you can use the xray feature to jump back to their introduction.
Click to expand...

And it kicks massive amounts of ass if it's a series that has 100s or 1000s of characters. Yes, I'm looking at you Brandon Sanderson and George R. Martin.
 
sygyzy said:
Suffice it to say, you are never going to convince someone who gets eye fatigue from a backlit screen than e-ink isn't better and vice versa. There's no point in contributing anecdotes about how one is better than the other.
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Who said one was better than the other?
 
I got a Kindle Touch for Christmas and like it pretty well. I don't either notice or mind the refresh. Sometimes the touch response is horrible though (but this has been my experience with ALL touch screen devices). I'll have to touch it multiple times to turn a page or get a menu option to work but then other times it seems too responsive, like i'll accidently bump the screen and it will change the page, etc.


Who the eff reads in the dark anyway? you couldn't read a physical book in the dark either.
 
sygyzy said:
Suffice it to say, you are never going to convince someone who gets eye fatigue from a backlit screen than e-ink isn't better and vice versa. There's no point in contributing anecdotes about how one is better than the other.
Click to expand...

That's neat, but when you think about it, isn't that essentially just Edit>Find in a document? I'm glad it's there, but makes you wonder why this wasn't there from the very beginning.
 
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