Kindle Paperwhite
daringfireball.net
daringfireball.net
Where Topolsky reviewed the Kindle Paperwhite as an electronic device, comparing it to other tablet and e-reader devices, Gruber weighed the Kindle as a book, comparing its characteristics to the print medium.
Considered together, I find the two reviews complementary. The Kindle Paperwhite beats other electronic reading media, but is still lacks some of the characteristics of print. It's certainly a step in that direction, though.
[1] http://www.theverge.com/2012/9/30/3433110/amazon-kindle-pape...
I thought that was really insightful. It'd be really interesting to make the kindle the best reading experience period - not just the best e-reading experience.
Great books design is a factor of not just picking a good font, but the right font. The right margins and font size, the right paper weight and finish, the right line height, cover, putting blank pages and linebreaks in the right spot even when it's not consistent. These are the tools of the book designer.
But e-books take all of those tools away. Sure e-books could handle all of that, you could make a reader capable of displaying LaTeX files pixel-perfectly, but it would be a terrible experience. I bought my mom a kindle because she can make the font size gigantic, it would be unbearable for me to read like that. I have my kindle set to use a different font, size, line spacing, and margin than my girlfriend, and the fact that we can make it just right for ourselves is one of the reasons I've read exactly 1 hardcopy book out of 50 in the past ~2 years and she's read maybe 2.
I'm not saying the kindle can't be improved, but you need someone who wants to make a better kindle, not a more book-like kindle. In my experience, great leaps in design need to come from a distance. The best early website/Director designs were not made by the best print designers, or the best programmers. They were made by people with backgrounds in music and dance and animation, those that grasped the actual beauty of interaction, in that it is dynamic and ephemeral, not "just so". You can't get much more uncompromising than a book designer. Look at Edward Tufte, he was unable to find a publisher who would make exactly the book he wanted, so he started his own publishing company.
I pre-ordered it and got it ASAP, and like it except for the extreme sparsity of settings. The wifi is on either for browsing or page syncing; it should be smart enough to turn off if you're not interested in either. The light can't be turned completely off [although, I admit I can't think of a use case for this]. I was excited at how quickly it transfers files -- the specs say USB 2.0, but it's pretty much instantaneous, even for 100 MB bootlegs. The uneven lighting makes me feel resentful, but of course they're just saving that for v2.0
The Kindle Store is useless at selling me new content -- I have a wishlist of books I'd like to read/buy someday. You'd think offering me a Kindle Version of one of them would be a first choice.
And of course, the paperwhite is rooted, so if Gruber wants he can just add new fonts soon [2].
[1] http://gizmodo.com/5947435/kindle-paperwhite-review-forget-e...
[2] http://www.mobileread.com/forums/showthread.php?t=192858
If the Paperwhite had some of that tablet-like functionality, that'd be great.
I initially dismissed the Paperwhite, but those three features made me pause. They could give the Paperwhite the edge over the Nook's hardware pageturn buttons and cheaper adlessness.
Top of mind because I just spent an eternity (3 seconds ;] ) searching for a new book just loaded onto my Keyboard.
When the combo LCD/eInk comes in earnest[1], tablets and ereaders will converge. It'll be interesting to see how device use shifts then. Will we spend most of the time on our phones and tablets looking at eInk, Only turning on the LCD when we need it?
Battery life would be so amazing. And reading emails and other stuff might improve. I heard of a study that showed retention after reading on an LCD was worse than for deadtree.
Maybe I should design my latest browser-based project with "How would this look in greyscale?" in back of mind... at the very least it would solve any colorblind issues.
[1] http://www.engadget.com/2012/08/31/lcd-and-e-ink-dual-screen...
It's also on for auto-delivery of new books and periodicals. I like the fact that my Kindle is always ready to go with the latest things that I've bought without me needing to think about remembering to sync.
That's a very serious accusation. Do you have any proof to back it up? If anything, The Verge has been quite critical of technology products, and I have no reason to doubt that there's anything untoward influencing their reviews (other than from blatant Apple fanboyism, particularly on the part of Nilay Patel. Take a look at his recent iPod Nano review[0], for example).
0: http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/10/3481926/apple-ipod-nano-r...
> That's a very serious accusation
(Which I don't agree with, the way it was written) And then you go on to accuse the same website of something else:
> blatant Apple fanboyism
Seriously? - And how is this related to the OP? And from the review you've linked to:
> The new nano might have Apple’s connector of the future, but everything else about it clings tightly to the past — to a world in which iTunes is still the center of the digital media universe, not a bloated relic badly in need of a fresh start and new ideas.
This is so fanboyish that it's worth the side snark?
The OP's saying that a technology website is allowing itself to be swayed for the sake of scoops. This is one of the most serious accusations you can make of a journalist, because it's basically saying you can't trust anything they write.
> This is so fanboyish that it's worth the side snark?
Nilay gave the device a 7.7 when Apple clearly fucked up with the Nano. There was a TON of potential for smart watch innovation with the previous Nano. Apple even acknowledged it when they added clock faces to the Nano last year. There were very successful Kickstarter projects based on using the Nano as a smart watch. Instead of making that official, Apple fucked it all up by (yet again) completely changing the form factor.
My accusation is very different from the OP's because it's not based on any factual misconduct - it's simply the result of Nilay (like many other people) getting sucked into the RDF and drinking Apple's Kool-Aid far too much. If you watch the Vergecast, you'll understand very quickly that he has a barely concealed raging hardon for all things Apple.
> I was convinced that he just wanted to keep getting scoops.
http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/9/3408030/mark-pauline-spine...
http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/1/3424828/philip-k-dick-fest...
http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/5/3451206/thinkpad-turns-20-...
http://www.theverge.com/2012/10/4/3437364/mark-zuckerberg-fa...
0: http://www.engadget.com/2011/03/12/hello-i-must-be-going/
I think this comment is just about right. The Kindle team really needs to focus on making the Kindle as good as traditional books, when applicable, but better than books whenever possible. Currently the Kindle fails to be as good as books where it counts most (e.g., clarity/sharpness of text, page layout decisions [e.g., hyphens], font choices, display contrast, index functionality, TOC functionality), and it only does a decent job of employing some of the technological advantages it has over books (e.g., the Kindle has a great weight-to-content-offered ratio, it backs up your collection remotely). It kind of surprises me that the Kindle hasn't already surpassed traditional books in every way. Maybe my expectations are too high, or maybe Amazon is more concerned with the bottom line than responding to readers like me. I don't know.
o ability to loan to others
o physically robust (I've cracked three (3) screens)
o extended reading time (on at least two 10 day vacations
I ran my hyperjuice extended battery down
recharging my K3 every couple days)
o random-access speeds/location
o support for color.o Robust - You don't mind breaking kindles?
o Ability to loan to others - You never lend books? To anyone?
o Extended Read Time - How on earth couldn't you want extended battery life. It drives me crazy to go on vacation and have a fully charged kindle run out of battery. I would kill for a solid 100 hour battery life.
o Random Access - You never want to flick through a book? (Admittedly, the K3 has the +/- chapter view, which is good, but not as good as being able to flick back and forth in a real book - particularly textbooks or a complex Game of Thrones reading)
o Support for color - Really? You don't want any color in your books? Not even Text books?
With the possible exception of "Loan to others" - I can't understand why every single one of those isn't a "Must have" in order for the kindle to be as good as a paper book for everyone. Also, and not coincidentally, they also make for a better eBook experience as well.
I would love to switch to "eBook Only" (I've purchased about 200 books so far for my kindles over the last several years) - but, for some things, I continue to purchase paper books.
> Robust - You don't mind breaking kindles?
I won't break a Kindle. The Kindle is sufficiently robust, and then some.
> Ability to loan to others - You never lend books? To anyone?
No. The only exception was my textbooks in college.
> Extended Read Time - How on earth couldn't you want extended battery life.
How long does it take to read a book? My Kindle lasts easily 4 weeks, reading about 5-8 hours a week, and in that time I can usually get through a 1,000 page novel. I've never taken a trip where I would be without electricity for more than 4 weeks, and even if I were, I doubt I would want to lug around more than one 1,000 page novel.
> Random Access - You never want to flick through a book?
No. Again, textbooks are the only exception, but that's not really a common use case for e-readers.
> Support for color - Really? You don't want any color in your books? Not even Text books?
Maybe for textbooks, although all the textbooks I've actually enjoyed enough to keep after class have been monochrome.
> With the possible exception of "Loan to others" - I can't understand why every single one of those isn't a "Must have" in order for the kindle
And, conversely, I can't understand why many people would care at all about these issues.
However, if they really wanted to advance ebook readers instead of just enjoying their dominant position and branching into androids tablets and phones, they ought to try to push the envelope.
Frankly, if I could legally get textbooks and have random access, color and better pen support... I would be so, so keen. I think there are education opportunities as well with good pen options and text books.
Why can't you buy your third grader a Kindle and have their math book, math workbook/worksheets, answers, tutorials, everything in their hand? The technology more or less exists for this.
I whip out the Kindle when I want to blow a Saturday breezing through the latest John Sandford cotton candy or awesome-seeming fan fiction, and I read most technical books and my Instapaper backlog on my iPad. So maybe my desired set of Kindle features is smaller than the average Kindle user, or maybe this discussion is proof that I have no idea what the average Kindle user wants.
- I've owned my (4th-gen, non-touch) Kindle for ~9 months, and it has held up just fine. Maybe if/when I break it, I'll wish for more robustness.
- I've never lent books; maybe I should!
- I haven't been without power for long enough to substantially discharge my Kindle's battery yet. I went to Belize for 9 days with it and had power the whole time, although I did more diving than reading ;-)
- Nope, I've never longed for random access. I've flipped through paperbacks before, but that's a feature I can easily live without.
- Nope, I definitely don't miss color. When I want to lay back and feel like I'm reading a little paperback from my neighborhood bookstore, I reach for the Kindle. When I read a textbook and inspect diagrams or want to look at pretty pictures in Flipboard, I grab the iPad.
I'm just weird with tablets though, so this data point may be worthless. I've considered buying a Nexus 7 (or its rumored successor) just to lay in bed and read code, and the official GitHub app for Android is the best tablet code-reading experience I've found.
I think the point that Gruber, the OP, and I were trying to make (though I could be wrong) - is that we believe the ultimate goal, the end-game for a kindle, is to be in every way as good as a book. Books don't run out of battery, don't shatter when you sit on them, textbooks have color, and can be flipped through.
I think you'll agree - that unless the Kindle has (at least) all of those features, you won't be able to replace 100% of your book usage with one - and you'll need to turn to other sources (either your tablet, or paper, etc...)
Power, for me, is probably the killer feature. I can be careful with the kindle, I rarely read/use textbooks when I'm not taking a course, and I can work around (painfully) the ability to flip through a book - but particularly when we are heading off grid for a while, trying to keep the kindle charged is always a hassle, and I'm always dragging along at least one, if not two hyperjuice batteries in my packout (though, admittedly, one of them also serves to keep my iPhone charged for GPS/Map usage)
Of course, on the flip side, I'm bringing my entire 200+ book library with me....
Obviously longer battery life would be fine, but I wouldn't trade any size or weight for it. A color screen would be fine but I wouldn't trade any contrast or battery life or additional expense for it. A stronger case would be fine but I wouldn't trade cost or weight for it, and so on. It's a great device for reading novels, papers, long blog posts that I send to it. My ipad is a great device for movies and magazines. My computer is a great device for doing research and copy/pasting code snippets and playing games. My radio is a great device for listening to music or news in the car. My TV is a great device for watching movies and shows.
That's a mere 6 devices that pretty well cover my information and media needs. Not too bad considering I use at least twice as many different tools to make dinner.
Robust: I've had it for almost 2 years, and most of that time didn't even have a cover.
Ability to loan to others: Since I have to strip the DRM anyway to read kindle books, no problem there.
Extended Read Time: Nice to have, but it will charge off of my phone charger (micro USB) so not a big deal.
Random Access: This is the one that hurts. Humans have great spacial access "It's about half way down the page maybe 3/8 of the way through the book" Not a big deal for most novels. I still use dead-tree reference books
Support for Color: Can't remember the last time I read a book with color, other than graphic novels.
You can loan books, but it depends on the publisher. http://www.amazon.com/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=2...
Even if the Kindle was more flawed, I'd continue to use it. There is no way I'm going back to worrying about which physical books to take with me, or on holiday, and having to carry them everywhere. I haven't purchased a paper book since buying the Kindle.
> o ability to loan to others
I totally boycott DRM'ed books. Period, absolutely non negotiable. Problem solved.
> o physically robust (I've cracked three (3) screens)
I have a metal-cased Sony reader since 2008. It's really, really robust. It's not as good as the latest readers, but good enough nonetheless (and it has two sets of metal-cast page turning buttons).
> o extended reading time
Strange, my Nook Color easily lasts a couple of days and my Sony PRS 3 weeks of avid reading.
> o random-access speeds/location
Yes, this one is unsolved so far, though the Nook color quick page slider is quite good.
> o support for color.
That's why I have both an e-ink and an LCD reader so far. When will readers with Qi screens come?
> o physically robust (I've cracked three (3) screens)
Yeah, but as long as Amazon's willing to replace it free each time I don't really mind, and they have been so far.
> extended reading time
Were you using it for just reading? With internet turned off? I know javascript-heavy pages absolutely kill my kindle's battery, but if you're just reading it should be able to handle 10 days fine.
> o random-access speeds/location
Not something I ever want or need.
> o support for color.
No, no, a thousand time no. Keep it black and white so that the focus is where it should be, on the content.
My kindle (international v2) has a small crack in the screen after I dropped it on a hard floor when it wasn't in its case, also I have a few hairline cracks starting to appear in the case plastics. I'd guess it's not much worse than a laptop screen though.
Battery life - Still happy with mine spend around 2 hours a day reading while I commute and need to charge it around once a month. It's rarely been a problem and when on holiday I usually have either a PC or a micro USB charger. However I don't leave the 3G on.
Random access speeds - Don't jump around enough for this to be an issue.
Color - Not all that bothered to be honest.
However keeping buttons for page turning is an important feature for me. I was wondering how to get the paper white over here in europe but the reviews I've been seeing don't make me want to upgrade.
Without my Kindle, my fortune of being born in the digital age may have prevented me from recognizing the value in buying a printed book. Furthermore, I was able to ebay it for cost (plus shipping!) thereby transforming the invaluable lesson into a gift.
1) Give me back my physical pageturn buttons that I can tap without moving my fingers! Why, Amazon, why?
2) Make the LED whiter, maybe even yellower, instead of bluish. I'm not a color expert, I just know that this color looks wrong.
3) I'm not sure what's up with the font, but pick a font that doesn't look fragile, like some parts of thinner connectors are half-not-there.
My wife loves her Kindle but when we're reading in bed together the sound of her clicking the button drives me up the wall. She likes that she can use a larger font so she doesn't need glasses, but that just means way more clicks-per-minute. I think she's pressed the button so many times it's worn out a bit because it makes a very distinct 'click'. After a while each one is like a gun shot in my ear.
But if it wasn't blue, it wouldn't suppress your melatonin secretion and make you stay up all night reading and buy more books!
2) If I zoom into text I don't want to have to horizontally scroll, that's even more annoying that small text.
I read a book in the computer, and I read it scrolling down. It didn't feel fulfilling. It was like reading a web-page.
But having read a couple of books in my phone (with the kindle app) it felt natural again, I enjoyed much more the books that way.
And no, the quality of the book was not the question. It was a free download (by the publisher) and a year or so later I've bought it on paper and read it again. It was much more fulfilling this way.
Perhaps in half a generation or so people will feel more natural going down than sideways, right now I prefer the later.
One of my main use cases is reading a book before bed. Without f.lux-like functionality that use case is significantly worse.
On the other hand, I can turn a bedlamp on and turn the backlight off, which is OK.
I love it, but I have three gripes. Two of them the author mentioned: uneven lighting at the bottom and the lack of physical pageturning buttons. The latter of which is not nitpicky as luigi has stated, it does fundamentally change your most common interaction with the device.
The third problem is that I have to go in to settings to turn off wireless. Their 8-week claim only works if there is no wireless on; otherwise it lasts a paltry couple of days. The old Keyboard model allowed you to turn on/off networking while reading a book. This version forces you to go to the home screen, then to settings, turn off networking, back to home, and finally back to your book. That's obnoxious.
The Paperwhite is clearly superior to all of them. Gruber's points are all extremely nitpicky.
(1) It's not a big deal to move your thumb an inch to tap the screen. The device is so light that I suspect it would be hard to make a button with just the right resistance so that it could be easily pressed while holding it in one hand. But seriously, moving your thumb isn't hard. Gruber also harps on not being able to operate large screen Android phones with one hand. Just use both hands for crying out loud.
(2) The default Caecilia font is great. I think it's beautiful. Gruber loved picking on Droid Sans, but I think that's a great font too.
It's a worthy upgrade to any of the previous e-ink Kindles.
After reading on the Gen1, and Gen2, I've stuck with a Gen 3 Kindle, and I'm hoping Amazon comes out with an eReader with a combination of backlighting (I have the Leather case with Light) and great buttons. (The Gen3 are a little stiff - much, much better than the "You touch it, you turn the pages Gen1" - but still not what I'm really looking for - I guess button are really hard to do properly.)
I'm also hoping for better battery life - I usually blow through my battery in a couple days of heavy reading, so I always end up having to carry a hyperjuice when camping to get through a full week of reading - it would be great to have a kindle that gives you a full week of nonstop reading.
This is the exact reason that I have 2 Kindle's on my nightstand now. I much prefer the Kindle Keyboard because of it's page turning buttons. However, the Paperwhite has replaced my iPad as my reading device of choice for after my wife goes to sleep.
Typography-tuned-people often claim there's a right way and wrong way, which is probably true. However it's fascinating to think that a vast majority of people aren't tuned into the existence of the subtleties, affected (true?), or care about most of the subtleties -- possibly because the actual impact it has is very very minimal. (Again, is it?)
That's what we pay him for, isn't it?
No, but it IS annoying.
"It's not big deal" is defensive. It conveys the opposite message, that it _is_ kind of a deal.
Leave a little room for the possibility that others are annoyed by things that you are willing to tolerate.
> I don't want a keyboard, or a web browser, or even a store.
It's not the most important point, but I absolutely love that I can finish a book and just go online and buy the next part of a series / a new book.
I read a lot so a convenient method to quickly get new stuff is awesome.
Also, the dictionary. My English is quite okay but many fantasy novels use archaic words I've never heard of before. Without a built-in dictionary I'd have to get the meaning purely from context.
On my Kindle, at least, words seem to be separated at most 1 em, and any more and they go 'ragged right' instead of hyphenating — which I actually found far more pleasant than even Liang's LaTeX hyphenation algorithm in terms of readability.
On Intelligence http://imgur.com/QIdam
(You can see it isn't just ragged-right where most of the lines happen to end in the same place; compare the spacing on, e.g., the first two lines.)
I don't think I've ever seen anything typeset that way before.
It's such a shame that Amazon just doesn't seem to care about good typesetting practice. It's maybe just not something Amazon views as a "barrier to sale", but as Gruber says, the Kindle only has to do one thing well, so why shouldn't it do it fantastically well?
One of the nicest things about my first generation Kindle, and it's nice big page turning buttons on the sides, is that I can read in bed on a cold night, snug under my blanket, grasping the Kindle through the blanket.
To turn the page, I simply have to bump the side with the hand that is not holding it. This can be done without taking either hand out from under the blanket. In fact, I can usually just bump it on my stomach or chest.
If I have to actually extrude some fleshy appendage out from under my blanket to turn pages, I will consider that a step backwards.
THe previous model, Kindle Touch used an infrared touch sensor that could be triggered by anything touching the screen, but in my experience it was too easy to trigger by accident.
I just rest my thumb on the bottom right corner and move it about as much as I did with the actual button on prior models.
I was excited about the new fonts when I saw them announced, but will agree with Gruber that none of them are great. I still prefer Caecilia Condensed.
My Paperwhite also suffers from some unevenness in the lighting on the bottom, but I quickly forgot about it. Amazon's product description promises an evenly illuminated display, so it would be better if they actually delivered, of course.
- buy a simple ereader.
- Turn Off everything you can: the store, wifi, 3g, recommendations, awards, share, ads.etc ANything with an off button.
- Once a month or three load it up with some books that you would like to read. Just books. Not too many. Choose, then load.
Basically, de-gadgetize it. Make it into a book. A nice, light book.
Our computer world is a hell of distractions. To me, any reminder that I'm reading on a "device" that can do other things is unwelcome. Even recharging the device breaks the illusions for me.
I was initially frustrated that I didn't have a convenient way o get short PDFs, blog posts and such onto the device. Now I'm glad. Short-form articles would just put me into browsing mode.
The upshot of all this is that unless the manufacturers can get better at things they are already very good at (eg weight, battery life), I want the old cheap one. I don't want any new features.
My default position is suspicion of every "feature." I hear "paperwhite screen" My immediate reaction is I don't want it to feel more like a screen & I don't want it to feel more like a screen and I don't want a brightness button.
Does someone know what is going on? As such, the light is light whether from LEDs/LCD or from Kindle Paperwhite.
Kindle may be using less default brightness levels but that could be adjusted for LCDs too. Is lower contrast ratio of Kindle helping since black is not too black [1][2]
[1] Kindle has contrast ratio of ~10:1. See here http://www.best-ereaders.com/2010/09/02/eink-pearl-vs-eink-v...
I would like a good touchscreen, however I like my page-turning buttons and do not want to give up those. I'm also concerned that battery life will be worse on these newer version, and that is something I care about.
Gruber has a point in that the Kindle should be extremely optimized for reading. I already own an iPad, I don't want an eBook Reader that tries to be a cheap tablet.
I rant into a bug at the gym.
The usual tap, swipe to turn page was instead activating the font size select. I'm not sure if my sweaty finger (sorry for the image) was the cause, or some other bug in the Kindle.
Amazon really needs to make these devices solid. I like the e-ink for the relaxing time experience AND the fact that I don't have to worry about battery (mostly), I just shove it in my gym bag, something I can't do with my nexus 7, b/c the battery might be almost dead.
PDFs have a fixed-size baked in, typically 8.5 x 11 or larger, and the Kindle screen is much smaller than that. There's no intelligible way to reflow a PDF, especially not one full of tables and figures like journals and textbooks are. It comes out either unreadably small or with unreadably broken formatting.
So basically it's worthless for that use-case. You want a Kindle DX or a 10 inch or larger tablet to fit PDF content comfortably.
The only drawback is the slow page turn. I usually end up placing a bookmark on any page I think I might want to flip back to as I'm reading. It's annoying.
Not that such a button would necessarily be a bad idea (not sure). I suppose it would have to be quite sturdy, as it would be used a lot. Perhaps on the touch screen the clicks are distributed more and so it will last longer.
Competition is great and the Nook is fairly competitive with the Kindle. I went with the nook at the time simply because it was superior to the kindle (it had the touch screen first).
For some reason this guy compares it to an iPad but doesn't even mention the Nook.
Thought I shall share the revelation :-/