If you enjoy reading as much as I do, you might find beneficial to obtain an electronic reader device. Nowadays most book stores provide a big collection of books in electronic format. So an avid reader like me would find themselves with a huge amount of choices starting from what book format to read, what book store to buy it from, all the way to what device to purchase. Such choices could make you want to go back to paperback.
I recently decided to purchase an electronic device recently because the amount of books in my book case is getting out of hand. I find that if I could replace all my book titles to electronic format, I could fit it all in a single computer. Thus eliminating a whole wall in my house dedicated to books. But upon making this decision I found myself with all the questions that anyone of you have reached.
So I decided to do a little research and selected a couple of devices which I feel fit my needs the most. Within those devices selected I have chosen Amazon’s Kindle $259, Barnes & Noble’s nook $259 and Sony’s Reader Touch Edition PRS600 $299.
One of the first differences I found is that the only device that was not available now was the nook. Barnes & Nobles’ website says that if you pre-purchase it now, it will be ship on January 4th 2010. The Amazon’s Kindle is available to purchase from the Amazon’s website. And the Sony Reader Touch is available from most US stores.
These three devices all have 6 inch monitors even though their dimensions are slightly different. Sony Reader Touch is 6.9” x 4.5” x 0.4”. Barnes & Nobles’ nook is 7.7” x 4.9” x 0.5”. And Amazon’s Kindle is 8” x 5.3” x 0.36” making this the biggest device out of the three listed.
As far as weight, Sony Reader Touch and Amazon’s Kindle are very close. Amazon’s Kindle weights 10.2 ounces while Sony Reader Touch weights 10.1 ounces. Barnes & Nobles’ nook at 11.2 ounces was the heaviest device out of these three.
Looking at storage, Sony Reader Touch has only 512MB of internal storage making this device the one with the smallest capacity. But the fact that it takes Sony Memory Stick PRO Duo™ and SD Card™ up to 16GB could help make this device as big if not bigger in memory storage than the other devices (except Barnes & Nobles’ nook). Barnes & Nobles’ nook haves an internal capacity of 2 Gigs and since it takes a microSD card up to 16 Gigs, this could be the biggest capacity in all the devices here mention. Amazon’s Kindle has a non-expandable 2 Gigs of internal memory.
The battery life in the three devices is 2 weeks without the wireless option turn on. The only difference you will find is in the changing time with Amazon’s Kindle been 4 hours and Barnes & Nobles’ nook been 3.5 hours. I was not able to find information the Sony Reader Touch.
As far as network capability I found that even though Amazon’s Kindle and Barnes & Nobles’ nook both have 3G capabilities only Barnes & Nobles’ nook is Wi-Fi enable.
Another difference I found was in the book formats that the three devices support. Sony Reader Touch is one of the most open devices I found taking EPUB, BBeB, PDF, Text, RTF, Word documents, MP3 and AAC. Amazon’s Kindle Supports AZW, PDF, TXT, Audible, MP3, MOBI and PRC without conversion. HTML DOC, RFT, JPEG, GIF, PNG and BMP would be supported in the Amazon’s Kindle but with conversion. Amazon provides and application you could use to convert this formats to a format that the Amazon’s Kindle can use. Finally, Barnes & Nobles’ nook takes EPUB, PDF, MP3 and PDB. PDB (ereader.com format) is the only format that is not supported by either Amazon’s Kindle or the Sony Reader Touch.
Upon opening the box the Sony Reader Touch contains only the USB cables. Barnes & Nobles’ nook contains MicroUSB 2.0 cable, AC adapter and a rechargeable battery. While Amazon’s Kindle contains a power adapter, USB cable 2.0 and a rechargeable battery.
All devices have a 1 year manufacturer’s warranty with an option to purchase a 2 year at the time of purchase.
I hope this has helped you in the subject. Please comment on this article and let me know.
This is very informative post. I love this and I will check your blog again.
I really love this device. I am an avid bibliophile and collector running out of space. The Kindle will not replace my dear books, but it gives me portable reading pleasure of a huge library in a convenient package.
PLUSES:
* You can return it within 30 days if you don’t like it.
*It is fairly easy to learn how to use.
* I was amazed by the free and really cheap books available
*Electronic Ink gives the printed paper reading experience.
*Perfect size and weight, better than a book cause ya never lose your place and don’t have to hold the pages open.
*the free wireless and web-browser not only allow me to buy books via the unit, but I can also check my email!
*I love the text-to-speech function with choice of male or female voice and of speeds. When I am driving I can plug the unit into my car stereo and listen to the book until I get to my destination and begin reading again.
*Love the built in dictionary, I highlight the word and it gives me a definition! No need to leave the page.
*Adjusting text size comes in handy when I am tired and my eyes need a little extra help.
DOWNSIDES
*Turning it on is a little slow. When it’s off, there’s a picture of a famous writer on the display. It says to slide the button to turn it on. Well, there is a delay of several seconds and sometimes I get impatient and hit the button several times and it goes on and off and on and off again. I have to tell myself, just wait.
*The free web-browser is slow and I only use it for Wikipedia or checking my email. Not good for Ebay and all that. Not really a complaint, I wasn’t expecting this thing to do all that it does, but as I mentioned it, I will say I am thrilled with what it does, but don’t expect a big free-internet experience.
*Synthesized text-to-speech is pretty good once you get used to it, but proper nouns are really hard to make out.
* I don’t like the placement of the micro-mini USB charger/connector. I sometimes read in bed in an upright position with a hands-free book holder desk. The plug is on what would be the tail of a real book so I cannot use the Kindle on this desk hands-free while charging.
* Not every book I want to read is on Kindle
* The savings on some of the books isn’t that much.
* The Kindle versions often don’t have the illustrations that the print books would have
That’s about it!
My son bought one about a year ago and bugged me to get one. I finally gave in for the 200.00. Great purchase. I have read 13 books in the last month. I highly recomend this for the avid reader. Take it anywhere and never worry about where you left off. Great for taking notes and the dictionary feature is wonderful.
I bought the Barnes & Noble’s nook and it should arrive to my house on January 11th.
Hi, maybe i’m being a slightly off topic here, but I was browsing your site and it looks fine. I’m writing a blog and trying to make it look clean, but everytime I touch it I mess something up. Did you design the blog yourself? Could someone with little experience do it, and add updates without messing it up? Anyways, good information on here, very informative.
Dan, you might want to consider using WordPress. Once you set it up all you do is copy and paste you text and WordPress will apply the formatting.