Tablets for A4 PDF reading - Why You've been lied to

[Megamox]

Warning: The contents of this post may shock you. Probably.

I read about 10 books a year (250 pages or so each) and print them out, so I can read them anywhere, on the go. My colleagues look at me like a dinosaur because I don't use a tablet, so I decided that I would quantify why tablets just don't surpass traditional paper yet.

Ebay allows me to buy 7,500 sheets of A4 80gsm paper for £45 which works out to be = 0.6p per sheet.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/A4-White-...pplies_Stationery_ET&var=&hash=item4d0ccc6a15

My Dell HL-2250DN Duplex Mono Laser Printer costs £75 on Amazon and comes with a starter cartridge which should give you about 500 prints @ 5% coverage
http://www.amazon.co.uk/Brother-HL-.../ref=lh_ni_t?ie=UTF8&psc=1&smid=A9613VXMX2KDP

Replacement toner on Ebay, refill kit 400g refills the standard TN2220 high yield cartridge about 4.4 times, each cartridge offering a rated yield of 2,600 prints @ 5% coverage. £20 delivered.
http://www.ebay.co.uk/itm/400g-Tone...?pt=US_Toner_Refills_Kits&hash=item33834c36b7

Using the tool below and analysing a typical layout of the type of pages I read, my ink coverage on a page is typically 13% (Free trial) http://avpsoft.com/products/apfill/

Since Ink catridges are usually calculated at yield by 5% coverage, my average reading page will be requiring 2.66 times more ink (to be at 13% coverage). Factoring this into the the cartidge refill above:
Replacement toner provides 4.4 toner refils, each rated at 2,600 (5%) = 4.4 x 2600 = 11,440 pages (5%). At my typical 13% coverage, this reduces number of pages to 11,440/2.66 = 4,300 pages.
Assuming the catridges will not really get anywhere near their rated quote, I will assume they only get to within 85% of their ratings which reduces number of prints to 85% of 4,300 = 3,655
This boils down to £20 for 3,655 sides of print, of the average type of book I read where coverage is 13% of ink per page. This results in an ink cost of 0.55p per page.

The printer is duplex (prints on both sides) so each page will have two sides and cost 0.6p per sheet (above), plus two print sides at 0.55p each = 1.7p per page of paper.
My typical book is 250 pages. This would therefore cost me £4.25 to print the whole thing. As I read about 10 of these a year, the cost per year is £42.50.

As I believe e-ink technology will not be ready for proper A4 use and functionality for at least another 3 years, the cost over three years using this method will be £42.50 x 3 = £127.50
Add to this the cost of the printer = £75 on Amazon and the total layout for the next 3 years is £197.55.

This is comparable to the price of a typical quad core android tablet, at around 9.7" which my colleagues suggest I try instead. Needless to say my colleagues were shocked that it evens out but there are of course advantages and disadvantages.

Why is paper better?
I read about 30 pages per day maximum, and so I only ever need to carry around this many = this only weighs 100g. Try holding a typical 9.7" tablet at around 500g+ and you'll notice how much of an ache it gets to be. You end up focusing on holding the tablet more than enjoying the reading experience.

If I lose the pieces of paper, drop them, crumple them I'm not worried I can always reprint. I could forget them on the train and not give a hoot. With a tablet, I'm worried I'm going to drop it, smash it, crack it, sit on it or possibly have it knocked over by the drunk sitting next to me at the bus terminal.

Paper is gorgeous, A4 and lovely clarity. When you read on an A4 page it's a beautiful experience, especially if you've forgotten about it and tried to live with tiny 7" -> 9.7" unmatured tablet technology. Save yourself the eyesight and brain tumour. It's a more enjoyable experience, your eyes are naturally more suited to it. There was no need to re-invent the wheel.

Obviously the down sides to using paper, is that i will end up with books that I will either need to give away or recycle. I can write all over them and make notes to my hearts content. Get this, I don't even need a fancy app. A magic gadget called a pen works amazingly.

Incidentally, The printer has a toner saver button which will increase it's productivity by a further 20% and with paper being even cheaper when bought in bulk, it's actually cheaper to print than use a tablet this way. Shock horror.

My advice if you're looking for something to read A4 documents on - get yourself a printer until the Mobius' great grand son's 3rd version is released probably sometime in 2017. Stop squinting at dimly lit, low resolution, over weight hunks of technology you'll pay through the nose for today and see at discount stores tomorrow. Incidentally, the reason why you keep wondering why companies don't make a brilliant A4 PDF reading e-ink display, when you know they can and why they purposely cripple each new e-reader with stupid and obscenely useless design choices is to a) get you to pay for the upgraded model 2 years later and b) to stop you from reading all those pirated PDF books you leeched off the net that none of the publishers want you to enjoy for free. I know you've downloaded a few Terrabytes of them, we all have. If you haven't, collect your copy of halo.pdf at reception.

As I say I don't believe the technology will be ready for affordable, lightweight manageable e-ink displays for PDF's for at least another 3 years. After 3 years I'll either end up with an obsolete tablet which will probably be best used as a doorstop and no physical copies of anything I've ever read, or alternatively choose my method and have a workhorse of a printer that will probably keep on going for many years + copies of everything you've read. Anything else can be recycled.

As usual YMMV:thumbsup:

 

[cronos]

Holy first posts batman!

Basically different strokes for different folks. Those who do choose tablets don't just read on them, they do other things as well.

Oh and the wait is probably longer for full size, e-ink, color tablets that I can annotate on. So yeah, it's tablet for me for now.

 

[Fardringle]

Interesting argument, and for some things (reading large technical documents and drafting/construction layouts, for example), paper is simply better. And sometimes it's nice to have the feel of a good book in your hands, particularly if you're sitting outside in bright sunlight while doing it.

However, for almost everything else, there are some very simple benefits to using a tablet:

I can carry one book (if it's a small paperback) in my pocket. I can carry millions of books on my tablet in my pocket, plus movies, and games, and music, and whatever else I want.

My tablet weighs LESS than even a single pocket sized paperback book.

I can get a new book from my library, a book store, an online site, or wherever else at any time or any place no matter where I happen to be with my tablet as long as I have a data signal available.


p.s. If you are just going to print the books anyway, why not get the paper versions in the first place instead of wasting time and effort printing, folding, and binding your own?

 

[theeedude]

Also waiting for a reasonably priced full size e-ink reader.
Sony has one, but the price is stupid.
http://pro.sony.com/bbsc/ssr/product-DPTS1/
Give it a couple years and competition, and it will be in the $200 range.

 

[BrightCandle]

Tablets can search inside of books, which if you read technical books is an enormously useful feature. But the experience of reading on a tablet is inferior to that of paper, I find it harder to retain the material. The primary reason is the screens are just too small, despite the resolution you end up zooming and moving about the page or potentially reading text at a struggle neither of which is really very good. Since I moved to mostly digital reading I have read a lot less books, I tend to prefer a real paper book having tried the digital thing extensively.

 

[MagnusTheBrewer]

The biggest problem with your reasoning is only reading 10 books a year. I read in the neighborhood of 10 books a month.

 

[bearxor]

Nice try, paper lobbyist.

 

[DrPizza]

OP, you can save money by walking everywhere. Don't use a car, don't use a bus, taxi, train. Walk. It's so much cheaper. And, there are advantages - you *might* just get in good enough shape that carrying a 500 gram tablet might just no longer be so heavy to you as to detract from your reading experience.

 

[Belegost]

The biggest problem with your reasoning is only reading 10 books a year. I read in the neighborhood of 10 books a month.

Seriously, I read about the same and I can't imagine having that much loose leaf paper around, I would be buried in a printed avalanche within 2 months.

Overall I'm happy about how much paper I no longer use on books, not to mention the shelf space.

 

[Mopetar]

Nice try, paper lobbyist.

I was reading this and seriously wondering if it was some kind of covert advertisement for paper or something like that.

 

[Rdmkr]

didn't need convincing. never even thought about reading a book on a tablet. its hard to put my finger on exactly what's wrong with it but it's just not comfortable.

 

[cbrunny]

As I believe e-ink technology will not be ready for proper A4 use and functionality for at least another 3 years, the cost over three years using this method will be £42.50 x 3 = £127.50
Add to this the cost of the printer = £75 on Amazon and the total layout for the next 3 years is £197.55.

This is comparable to the price of a typical quad core android tablet, at around 9.7" which my colleagues suggest I try instead. Needless to say my colleagues were shocked that it evens out but there are of course advantages and disadvantages.

I don't understand this logic at all. What do you mean e-ink isn't ready for A4 use? That's a confusing sentence, since e-readers (e-ink) repositions/resizes text to fit the available screen real estate. So, when you use an e-reader "A4" is literally meaningless. I am aware that A4 is a standard paper size, but even a typical paperback doesn't get printed in A4. The notion of reading in A4 is a bit obscure in and of itself. That you must read in A4 is essentially unheard of.

Amazon had Kindle's on for $19 recently. Right now, in Canada they're $59 CDN. That's £32.

Your logic doesn't hold up.

Edit: Weak thread on Amazon re: $19 Kindles http://www.amazon.com/gp/forum/cd/d...orum=Fx20DX5GEB7TUX8&cdThread=Tx2VJ7II5R4XH9A

 

[Ancalagon44]

With my Kindle, I can store as many books as I want. With traditional paper, you have to start giving books away, or throwing paper away, pretty quickly. My kindle has something like 20-30 books on it, and I'm probably what you would call a light user of a kindle. I simply would not have the shelf space for 20-30 more books in my one bedroom apartment.

 

[gorcorps]

what do you have against trees?

 

[bearxor]

Amazon had Kindle's on for $19 recently. Right now, in Canada they're $59 CDN. That's £32.

Your logic doesn't hold up.

Edit: Weak thread on Amazon re: $19 Kindles http://www.amazon.com/gp/forum/cd/di...x2VJ7II5R4XH9A

Man, I'd love to wake up one morning and find one of those offers for a Paperwhite for $44. I would buy that so fast...

 

[AstroManLuca]

I read eBooks on my smartphone, which I would own regardless of whether I read anything or not. I may be in the minority but I actually prefer it. I always have it with me, and I actually prefer a narrow page width. I lose my place less often and the frequent page turns keeps me more engaged (I used to always fall asleep while reading). It's also light enough and can be easily used one-handed.

Technically it's still heavier than your stack of 30 sheets of paper (145 g; it's a Lumia 810 which is notoriously brick-like), but it also fits in my pocket.

And since I would own it regardless of whether I read or not, and my reader app is free, so the cost is zero. Therefore a smartphone is superior to printing out books.

 

[pm]

Right. I mostly read on my smartphone too - and an iPad when I can pry it away from my wife and children. But mostly nowadays, I read on my smartphone.

I read about 6-8 books per month - some of which I read while travelling on extended trips which rules out the paper printing method because I'd have to carry a large pile of paper.

 

[BrightCandle]

I have owned a Sony eReader and the Kindle Graphite and been using them for years. But much of what I read is technical books rather than the usual paperbacks. So while the text can often reform the images are often too small or hard to read without zoom. Since the screen is kind of small you also don't get a lot of text on there compared to an actual technical book (which is typically between A4 and A5 in size) and so overall its not a great experience. It works a lot better for a standard fiction book however that is just text throughout, it just does not work well for non fiction with images, diagrams and highlighted areas and all that jazz.

The N7 tablet works a bit better for a technical book just because you can zoom in and out much easier along with seeing all the colours. But then its also dramatically slower to keep doing that and messing around with the page than it is to read it on paper.

Small, convenient and space saving but my own experience of going digital with books has been quite mixed. I like not needing new bookshelves, i like being able to have my entire collection with me and searching through them all. I dislike actually reading from them however, I find retention is lower and reading is slower. For fiction my Kindle is great, for technical books it isn't but its liveable with just about. Really what I need is a bigger (A4) sized eInk with colour, that would help a lot.

 

[Megamox]

I did want to clarify one or two other points. I'm not against tablets and e-ink readers, I'm just acutely aware of confusing compromise with an ideal - especially with technology. The e-reader/tablet you buy today will look like a first generation Ipod in a few years. Clunky and ugly so you might as well get some use out of it. Just because every money making tablet producer in the world thinks a 6, 8 or even a 9.7 inch screen is perfect for my needs, doesnt make it so. They can spend now until doomsday working on pinch, zoom and scroll functionality but honestly speaking, I don't want to spend my time looking at the literary world through a letterbox. I'm hoping that applies to you too. Take that million you've invested in software to pinch, zoom and scroll and dump it into manufacturing the same useless 6 inch screen and bump it up to 10 at least. Take my advice, if the device you're buying or considering buying doesnt do what you want, and I mean exactly what you want right now, out of the box with no compromises - Dont buy it. Simple.

I would not choose to undo a screw with several spoons, I'd use the the right tool for the job. There are many people, each with a list of tablets and readers they own. Oh, I use my tablet for THIS, but I keep my e-reader for THAT. I'm sorry but all I see are a collection of SPOONS. Stop, take a breath and realise the absolute nonsense you're being SPOONfed by the manufacturers of these vastly underpowered devices whose intent is to make you a media consuming machine. Fair enough - if that's your thing, but I value my time more highly than beating the top score at candy crush. If you haven't guessed it, I'm a reader - not a media consumer.

Like I said, I'm not against tablets, but for an A4 PDF experience - nothing beats paper. You say it's my subjective opinion - I disagree. How can I be that bold? Because every device that claims to offer a substitute experience tries to mimmick.... what? That's right.. PAPER. Why settle for devices which immitate paper - why not have the full lightweight experience of.. PAPER. All the R&D went into producing it a thousand years before you were born, enjoy it. You owe it to the Egyptians. Is it a coincidence that the latest offering by amazon is called the PAPER white. Why do tablets try to mimmick the page flip experience? Think about it. Now when tablets and ereaders seriously compete with PAPER - I'm happy to switch. I'm not a paper fetishist. I'm a realist.

When tablet/ereader technology is where it should be then I will follow suit and adopt it. For now, I'll leave you with a list of criteria which will outline the perfect A4 experience just so you'll know it when you see it.

1) Be at 100g weight or less
2) Full A4 size. AND I MEAN no lying about screen size where half of it taken up with nonsense unmoveable menus top and bottom. I want FULL A4 edge to edge. EDGE TO EDGE.
3) Decent memory, because for most people this will be the device to hold ALL their books. So 64GB, or MicroSD up to 64GB.
4) Access to some sort of MP3 player - because lets face it, music and reading do get together.
5) Be thin enough to hold comfortably and offer an easy navigation experience. I don't want to have to hold a stylus all the time. God gave me 8 fingers, let me use one of them to turn a page.

Seriously - can anyone tell me this device exists? That whatever device you use for a proper A4 experience comes anywhere near this? If you do really need one these current devices, respect to you. But you can't tell me your amateurish tablet is anywhere near the experience I've outlined above because plainly, you're dreaming. If you don't buy garbage, they wont sell garbage. You can bet your bottom dollar that the device above has already been designed and prototyped, probably at Sony, but they will not release it to you until they've marketed another 3-4 useless versions in between, each one being slightly less useless than the next. The time will come when you're so tuned into their marketing nonsense you'll consider the addition to an e-ink display of a back light, yes a simple back light, to be a true innovation. Oh wait, that just happened.

Sure you tell me, "oh but I can't carry around my vast collection of 20,000 books on paper". Yes because you read 20,000 books whenever you leave the house. Sure, in your jet set lifestyle where you're always on the road, in a plane, or on the beach sipping martinis. God, I want your life. For the rest of us non James Bond types, we do make it home once a day and having paid an extortionate amount of rent to my landlord, I'm sure going to store my books there. Stop trying to prepare for some fanciful event in your life when you'll need your entire collection to hand at once. Your life isn't that complicated. People who talk like this are usually the same ones worried about the zombie apocalypse. If this is you, stop buying up all the water. Just stop it.

Finally, read a book, something on printed paper - I guarantee you'll absorb it more. Oh you might learn just fine on a tablet/ereader - but you wont retain as much. In case you're reading this on a tablet, I said you might not retain as much. Trust me. The laws of physics, the theories of relativity and complete symphonies have done just fine on paper. Perhaps there might be a few budding genius types who have managed to solve the schroedinger equation while using a tablet. Sadly however, it probably crashed before they could publish. My advice, stick with Paper for the next 2-3 years until you see a device with at least 4/5 of the criteria above being satisfied as well as your own individual needs and let me know - I'm right there in the queue to buy it with you.

One last thing. Read 20 books on a tablet, at the end you've got nothing to show for it. Read 20 books on paper, you can recycle them all and still have nothing to show for it. However you've got the option to keep the ones you've really enjoyed - consider it an optional extra. I've already proved that for a fairly average reader the price difference between paper and any current tablet offering a somewhat decent full page experience is negligible. You think you're being greener with a tablet, sure you are. It's a hell of a lot easier to recycle paper than some amalgamation of plastic and circuitry.

 

[cbrunny]

When tablet/ereader technology is where it should be then I will follow suit and adopt it. For now, I'll leave you with a list of criteria which will outline the perfect A4 experience just so you'll know it when you see it.

1) Be at 100g weight or less
2) Full A4 size. AND I MEAN no lying about screen size where half of it taken up with nonsense unmoveable menus top and bottom. I want FULL A4 edge to edge. EDGE TO EDGE.
3) Decent memory, because for most people this will be the device to hold ALL their books. So 64GB, or MicroSD up to 64GB.
4) Access to some sort of MP3 player - because lets face it, music and reading do get together.
5) Be thin enough to hold comfortably and offer an easy navigation experience. I don't want to have to hold a stylus all the time. God gave me 8 fingers, let me use one of them to turn a page.

Seriously - can anyone tell me this device exists?

You're right, it probably doesn't exist, but the only limitation that I can think of from these requirements you've set out is that you want full A4 edge to edge. All else easily existed years ago. First generation iPad, I would assume. But, as I mentioned earlier, a requirement to read in full A4 is not common in any way. An iPad weighs more than 100g, but so do all books ever. A Kindle weighs 170g. Kindle Paperwhite weighs 215g. iPad mini weighs 331g. The weight requirement just seems silly.

Sure you tell me, "oh but I can't carry around my vast collection of 20,000 books on paper". Yes because you read 20,000 books whenever you leave the house. Sure, in your jet set lifestyle where you're always on the road, in a plane, or on the beach sipping martinis. God, I want your life. For the rest of us non James Bond types, we do make it home once a day and having paid an extortionate amount of rent to my landlord, I'm sure going to store my books there. Stop trying to prepare for some fanciful event in your life when you'll need your entire collection to hand at once. Your life isn't that complicated. People who talk like this are usually the same ones worried about the zombie apocalypse. If this is you, stop buying up all the water. Just stop it.

Wants expandable storage to 64 GB but doesn't want to carry all books at once. Logic doesn't hold here. Further, assumes that holding lots of books is somehow a bad thing, which just doesn't make sense at all since it's not finite. Hoarding paper and forcing it to be recycled is substantially greedier than leaving trees alone and downloading an e-book for consumption on a device.

Finally, read a book, something on printed paper - I guarantee you'll absorb it more. Oh you might learn just fine on a tablet/ereader - but you wont retain as much. In case you're reading this on a tablet, I said you might not retain as much. Trust me. The laws of physics, the theories of relativity and complete symphonies have done just fine on paper. Perhaps there might be a few budding genius types who have managed to solve the schroedinger equation while using a tablet. Sadly however, it probably crashed before they could publish. My advice, stick with Paper for the next 2-3 years until you see a device with at least 4/5 of the criteria above being satisfied as well as your own individual needs and let me know - I'm right there in the queue to buy it with you.

Ironically, OP didn't absorb that 4/5 criteria already exist and have existed for years. Must be because he wrote this on a screen.

One last thing. Read 20 books on a tablet, at the end you've got nothing to show for it. Read 20 books on paper, you can recycle them all and still have nothing to show for it. However you've got the option to keep the ones you've really enjoyed - consider it an optional extra. I've already proved that for a fairly average reader the price difference between paper and any current tablet offering a somewhat decent full page experience is negligible. You think you're being greener with a tablet, sure you are. It's a hell of a lot easier to recycle paper than some amalgamation of plastic and circuitry.

Disagree for two reasons. 1) Kindles are $59 CDN right now. A basic tablet with expandable storage that is easily navigable and can play mp3s is cheap, as in under $100 cheap - no need for a $500 tablet if those are your criteria. The cost argument simply doesn't hold up. 2) When you finish an e-book, it doesn't go away. You can literally read it again whenever you want. I would argue its even more accessible in e-book format since you can read it essentially on any device anywhere in the world, and don't need to make sure you aren't missing a book - or in OPs case, missing one of the 30 pages of the day.

Sorry, OP. I just don't see your argument as valid.

EDIT: I should add - if you like paper because you just like paper, that's fine. Go nuts. Read paper as much as you want. No sweat off my back & all the power to you for reading at all. For me, these arguments are just not convincing.

 

[gorcorps]

I did want to clarify one or two other points. I'm not against tablets and e-ink readers, I'm just acutely aware of confusing compromise with an ideal - especially with technology. The e-reader/tablet you buy today will look like a first generation Ipod in a few years. Clunky and ugly so you might as well get some use out of it. Just because every money making tablet producer in the world thinks a 6, 8 or even a 9.7 inch screen is perfect for my needs, doesnt make it so. They can spend now until doomsday working on pinch, zoom and scroll functionality but honestly speaking, I don't want to spend my time looking at the literary world through a letterbox. I'm hoping that applies to you too. Take that million you've invested in software to pinch, zoom and scroll and dump it into manufacturing the same useless 6 inch screen and bump it up to 10 at least. Take my advice, if the device you're buying or considering buying doesnt do what you want, and I mean exactly what you want right now, out of the box with no compromises - Dont buy it. Simple.

I would not choose to undo a screw with several spoons, I'd use the the right tool for the job. There are many people, each with a list of tablets and readers they own. Oh, I use my tablet for THIS, but I keep my e-reader for THAT. I'm sorry but all I see are a collection of SPOONS. Stop, take a breath and realise the absolute nonsense you're being SPOONfed by the manufacturers of these vastly underpowered devices whose intent is to make you a media consuming machine. Fair enough - if that's your thing, but I value my time more highly than beating the top score at candy crush. If you haven't guessed it, I'm a reader - not a media consumer.

Like I said, I'm not against tablets, but for an A4 PDF experience - nothing beats paper. You say it's my subjective opinion - I disagree. How can I be that bold? Because every device that claims to offer a substitute experience tries to mimmick.... what? That's right.. PAPER. Why settle for devices which immitate paper - why not have the full lightweight experience of.. PAPER. All the R&D went into producing it a thousand years before you were born, enjoy it. You owe it to the Egyptians. Is it a coincidence that the latest offering by amazon is called the PAPER white. Why do tablets try to mimmick the page flip experience? Think about it. Now when tablets and ereaders seriously compete with PAPER - I'm happy to switch. I'm not a paper fetishist. I'm a realist.

When tablet/ereader technology is where it should be then I will follow suit and adopt it. For now, I'll leave you with a list of criteria which will outline the perfect A4 experience just so you'll know it when you see it.

1) Be at 100g weight or less
2) Full A4 size. AND I MEAN no lying about screen size where half of it taken up with nonsense unmoveable menus top and bottom. I want FULL A4 edge to edge. EDGE TO EDGE.
3) Decent memory, because for most people this will be the device to hold ALL their books. So 64GB, or MicroSD up to 64GB.
4) Access to some sort of MP3 player - because lets face it, music and reading do get together.
5) Be thin enough to hold comfortably and offer an easy navigation experience. I don't want to have to hold a stylus all the time. God gave me 8 fingers, let me use one of them to turn a page.

Seriously - can anyone tell me this device exists? That whatever device you use for a proper A4 experience comes anywhere near this? If you do really need one these current devices, respect to you. But you can't tell me your amateurish tablet is anywhere near the experience I've outlined above because plainly, you're dreaming. If you don't buy garbage, they wont sell garbage. You can bet your bottom dollar that the device above has already been designed and prototyped, probably at Sony, but they will not release it to you until they've marketed another 3-4 useless versions in between, each one being slightly less useless than the next. The time will come when you're so tuned into their marketing nonsense you'll consider the addition to an e-ink display of a back light, yes a simple back light, to be a true innovation. Oh wait, that just happened.

Sure you tell me, "oh but I can't carry around my vast collection of 20,000 books on paper". Yes because you read 20,000 books whenever you leave the house. Sure, in your jet set lifestyle where you're always on the road, in a plane, or on the beach sipping martinis. God, I want your life. For the rest of us non James Bond types, we do make it home once a day and having paid an extortionate amount of rent to my landlord, I'm sure going to store my books there. Stop trying to prepare for some fanciful event in your life when you'll need your entire collection to hand at once. Your life isn't that complicated. People who talk like this are usually the same ones worried about the zombie apocalypse. If this is you, stop buying up all the water. Just stop it.

Finally, read a book, something on printed paper - I guarantee you'll absorb it more. Oh you might learn just fine on a tablet/ereader - but you wont retain as much. In case you're reading this on a tablet, I said you might not retain as much. Trust me. The laws of physics, the theories of relativity and complete symphonies have done just fine on paper. Perhaps there might be a few budding genius types who have managed to solve the schroedinger equation while using a tablet. Sadly however, it probably crashed before they could publish. My advice, stick with Paper for the next 2-3 years until you see a device with at least 4/5 of the criteria above being satisfied as well as your own individual needs and let me know - I'm right there in the queue to buy it with you.

One last thing. Read 20 books on a tablet, at the end you've got nothing to show for it. Read 20 books on paper, you can recycle them all and still have nothing to show for it. However you've got the option to keep the ones you've really enjoyed - consider it an optional extra. I've already proved that for a fairly average reader the price difference between paper and any current tablet offering a somewhat decent full page experience is negligible. You think you're being greener with a tablet, sure you are. It's a hell of a lot easier to recycle paper than some amalgamation of plastic and circuitry.

I'm not reading all of that, but I'll focus on your criteria:

1) Be at 100g weight or less
You want an e-reader the size of printer paper that weights less than half of what the current paperback sized readers do? We'd need a completely new battery technology to get there

2) Full A4 size. AND I MEAN no lying about screen size where half of it taken up with nonsense unmoveable menus top and bottom. I want FULL A4 edge to edge. EDGE TO EDGE.
I can't think of another person that wants to read books on regular printer size paper the way you do. I know people that like paper better, but they want them in the size of novels... not A4. You can't fold a tablet, so what you're asking for is something that would require a backpack to carry around with you. That's bananas, and VERY specific to your odd desires.

Also, what lying about screen size? What unmoveable menus? When you're reading a book on an e-reader it's full screen, and you can choose yourself how much margins are on the sides. The only thing stopping you from reading edge to edge on current devices is your own personal preference.

3) Decent memory, because for most people this will be the device to hold ALL their books. So 64GB, or MicroSD up to 64GB.
Some current readers have SD card slots so that shouldn't be an issue

4) Access to some sort of MP3 player - because lets face it, music and reading do get together.
I disagree, but like the rest of your argument it's just preference. If you like listening to music while reading that's fine... I need silence.

5) Be thin enough to hold comfortably and offer an easy navigation experience. I don't want to have to hold a stylus all the time. God gave me 8 fingers, let me use one of them to turn a page.
I don't know what this means... the readers today are far thinnner than an actual book and are already touchscreen. Why do you think you have to use a stylus to turn the page on current readers? That's incredibly ignorant.

So based on just your 5 questions I've concluded a few things.

One, your desire to read things on A4 size paper is something I've never seen before, and is currently unmatched by anybody I know. That doesn't mean you're the only one, it just means it's not the majority. So having such an odd request will probably go unanswered until they have color e-ink, where having technical drawings/textbooks without pinch-to-zoom would be preferred (it'd be ~14" screen size though to match regular paper).

Two, based on your assumptions that you have to use a stylus to turn pages (huh?) or that you don't think you can make use of the full screen of current readers (huh?) means you don't seem to understand the products you're arguing against. If you've never owned one that's fine, but don't spread misinformation to others because of your own ignorance.

Third, your desire for halving the weight of e-readers while having over 4X the screen surface is so outlandish that it looks like you're just making demands impossible to reach so you can say paper always wins.

Basically it's obvious you don't want it. That's fine, but don't try to convince us that printing on paper is better because for the vast majority of us it's just stupid.

 

[AstroManLuca]

I'm not a paper fetishist

Yes you are, and a luddite to boot. You are taking your exceptionally odd reading ritual (one that no one else does) and holding it up as the pinnacle of reading experiences. Then you make the claim that e-readers can't match your experience because they don't precisely mirror the physical attributes of your stack of printed paper.

Do you also hate printed books? By your reckoning, a printed book is even worse than an e-reader - just look at your own criteria. You can get e-readers that fit all your criteria except the first one. But bound books? They weigh more than 100 g as well, and they also aren't printed in full A4 size (because no one except you actually enjoys reading huge pages like that), they can't play music, they can't hold more than one book's worth of information, and they are thick.

I value my time

Obviously not too much, considering you go to the trouble of printing off 30 pages of whatever book you are reading every single day. An e-reader (or even just a printed book with a bookmark) would allow you to pick up immediately where you left off and would require no morning routine, and neither one would run out of material if you happened to read a little more than you expected in a day.

I can understand that some people like the look and feel of printed paper. That's fine, I can respect that. I can also understand why some people would want to have physical copies of their books, not unlike people who buy movies and video games and like the look of a stocked shelf. But what you're doing is just really, really weird. If it works for you, fine, but good luck convincing anyone else that you're not way outside the norm. There's a reason no one else prints out small sections of a book every day to read.

 

[bearxor]

I'm still going with either paper or printer lobbyist.

 

[radhak]

<snip>

2) Full A4 size. ... I want FULL A4 edge to edge. EDGE TO EDGE.

<snip>

What I got from this thread is, that this is a strange new fetish I'd not come across before.

Somebody reading a book of fiction, on A4 size. Wow.

 

[AstroManLuca]

What I got from this thread is, that this is a strange new fetish I'd not come across before.

Somebody reading a book of fiction, on A4 size. Wow.

Yeah, it's really weird to me. I am a technical editor and do layout for scientific journals, and while our journals are printed on letter-size paper, they all use a 2-column layout. I can't imagine trying to read anything on A4 or letter paper in a single column. I like the narrow column width so much that I actually prefer reading fiction books on my smartphone.