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Comment by innocenat | Hacker News Reader

Kindle Paperwhite (2021) is one of the fastest E-reader available right now (in term of responsive ness). Kindle device have excellent dictionary too, especially for non-latin language. (Japanese dictionary implementation on Kobo is not very good).

Kobo is more open and is price competitively with Kindle. It's also much more customizable if you are into that.

There are also a lot of Android e-ink tablet like BOOX. These are more expensive but a much, much more customizable as it's basically an Android reader.

Contrast shouldn't be a problem with any recent device. But anything release in past 1-2 years are excellent.

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What about battery replacement?

Seems like no matter how good the display and build quality, all eBook readers are bound to stop holding a charge after 3-4 years. I feel like the ongoing availability of newly-produced replacement batteries and the difficulty of replacing them are the primary factors in choosing an ebook reader.

My 2015 Paperwhite barely lasts 20 minutes after I pull the charging cable, even back in 2018 it was down from two weeks to two days per charge.

It's not like you can avoid the problem by loading up on extra batteries. A replacement battery manufactured shortly after the reader is going to be as bad as the one that came installed by the time I need it.

All the other problems I worry about like responsiveness, display quality and defects apply early on when a refund or warranty replacement is a solution.

I also have 2015 paperwhite, and 3 days ago I charged it from 0 (where it was for few months, which isnt healthy for battery at all) to 46%, and today I finished a book with 34% left. I only used backlight for about two hours, the rest was with backlight off. First half of book was with wifi on, before I realized that (I tend to keep it in airplane mode whenever possible for battery savings, dictionaries work offline too)

> What about battery replacement?

I don't think any e-readers are designed to be user-replaceable except the very first Kindle. As for DIY replacement, I don't really know, sorry.

> A replacement battery manufactured shortly after the reader is going to be as bad as the one that came installed by the time I need it.

Is it? I was under impression that battery mostly degrade with cycle count. At least, there are plenty of people still use Kindle from 10 years ago.

> [...] warranty replacement is a solution.

Then I think you are mostly limited to Kindle or Kobo. Most other e-reader or e-ink tablet are mostly shipped from China so warranty and replacement are going to not be as good.

My kindle 4 is from 2012 and still holds a charge for 2 weeks if I use it for 20 minutes a day.

You must have had a heavy use of your kindle. Even if the battery is not new they consume so little that I am not having any problems.

Having said that, every electronic should have user replaceable batteries instead of being a programmed obsolescence nightmare.

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