Comment by Kuiper | Hacker News Reader

Comment by Kuiper | Hacker News Reader

I am a big fan of the Kindle 4. (2012) It's wonderful. I use mine practically every day. It has these huge things on the side called "buttons" that you can use to turn the pages. They have a tactile feel when pressed, and accidental button presses are never a problem. It's symmetrical, so you can hold it in either your right or left hand.

It's the last Kindle made before someone got the bright idea that people would rather have a touch screen instead of buttons. Because apparently, when I'm reading a book, the thing I want to do is use my thumb to cover up the screen (you know, the thing that is displaying the text that I'm reading), and hold the device in a very specific way such that I can press the page when I need to while avoiding accidental touches before I've reached the end of the page.

Recently, they decided to re-introduce the majestic "button" feature into some of the newer Kindle models. You can get it if you opt for the premium deluxe "Kindle Oasis" which for some reason has an asymmetrical bezel and costs $250. (The Kindle 4 originally retailed for $80, which is where pricing for current Kindle models also starts.)

I love my Kindle 4. I use it every day and take it with me everywhere, and whenever I misplace it and need to buy a replacement, I find myself going to ebay to look for a used version of the old model so I can have a device with buttons.

Oh yes, that was my biggest worry when i bought the paperwhite - If i would miss those buttons too much. Even now after a year, if I could get the paperwhite with buttons, I would. It just works, you don't have to move your finger to change the page.

It's not much I have to move my fingers to change page on the paperwhite, but it's still so much more than should be necessary, the old model just fit like a glove.

(I would still get the paperwhite even with no buttons, and it has not been as annoying regarding accidental page changes as I had initially feared. And i really love the background lighting)

After reading the article, I wanted to comment about how Kindle might be actually one smart device better than the dumb alternative (paper). It's about the same size as a paperback, but much slimmer. About the same font size too. Paper has better contrast, but it's not too bad. For reading a lot of fiction, it's pretty much the ultimate option. And Kindle 4/5 are pretty much the ideal, I couldn't imagine doing anything better. Yet Amazon decided to make the new Kindle heavier, remove the great buttons and force to me to use touch screen. I use Kindle in freezing cold with my heavy gloves on, I use it in my bathroom with partially wet hands, the physical buttons just work. I'm still hoping to get a few more years out of my Kindle 5 (I bought two used ones on eBay, just to have a backup).

My Kindle 3 broke about a couple months ago. I've had it for nearly 4-5 years, worked like a champ, I had a protective case on it with an external LED light you could extend off of it to read at night. I got used to using purely tactile buttons when reading.

So I had to buy a new kindle. I looked into the Oasis, and the kindle paper white, and the voyager. I ended up going with the kindle paper white for $80, despite the fact it doesn't have tactile buttons

I actually prefer the kindle paper white. I actually find that pressing a tactile button on every page is kind of tiring with my old Amazon Kindle 3. Swiping back and forth is much easier if you do it constantly, and doesn't really take long to get used too

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