Amazon Kindle 2 pictures and pricing | Hacker News Reader

Amazon Kindle 2 pictures and pricing

pcworld.com

22 pointsjacquesm22 comments

I'll share my experience with ebook readers here. As someone who owns over 30 gigs of ebooks and reads academic journals often, I was naturally excited when the whole slew of ebook reading device hit the market.

I've tried 3 different E-book readers: The sony PRS505, the Kindle and the iRex iLiad. In the end, I returned the kindle and gave the 505 to my dad and kept the iRex. The main reason was that the Kindle screen was WAYYY TOO SMALLL to read full sized Pdfs and academic journals.

The sony had the same screen-size problem as the Kindle but its cheaper and it was a good fit for my dad, who mainly reads fiction books. The iRex was the keeper because of its big 8 inch screen.

The new kindle 2 seems to have the same screen size as the previous one, so this is an absolute no-buy for me. However, the upcoming plastic logic reader looks promising with its full A4 sized screen and could be a good fit for me.

At $699, the iRex also costs nearly twice as much as a Kindle and about three times what you can get a PRS505 for. I have no doubt the 8 inch screen is great, but that's a pretty big jump in price-- especially when you consider that the Kindle is already priced too high for many consumers.

Yes, the iRex is prohibitively expensive but if you buy the 1st edition while its on sale, you can get it for around $100 cheaper than that.

In the end, I justified the purchase because of the features I'm getting over the other 2 readers. - The sony and kindle both have a 800x600 screen while the iRex has a 1024x768. - The iRex also has a wacom stylus embedded into the screen which you can take notes with - The iRex is open-sourced, the developer released the SDK a while ago and there is a bunch of 3rd party free software for it.

However, I can definitely see how the iRex can be overpriced for some people and the sony and kindle could be a better fit for them.

A good resource for ebook reader information is http://www.mobileread.com/ (i'm not affiliated with them in any way) . You can read other people's experiences with them and find out which reader is right for you.

I have only used one ebook reader, but have been very pleased with it so far. I purchased the eBookwise 1150 a few years ago for $99 (now $136). I am sure there are bigger, better, faster readers out there, but this may be appropriate for a casual reader like myself.

The eBookwise Librarian software package ($15) converts .DOC, .RTF, .HTML and RB files to the eBookwise Librarian format.

eBookwise Reader: http://www.ebookwise.com/ Librarian Software: http://www.ebookwise.com/servlet/mw?t=book&bi=28181&...

I re-read Dune on my Sony reader and it was what I wanted. I agree, though, the problem is with any kind of books that have diagrams, code listings, two column formats don't render nicely on it.

What I worry about the iRex is that things will be scaled down by a third which I won't like, either.

The Plastic Logic reader isn't coming out until 2010, btw. :( I think someone else will come along in that time.

Why not just buy a netbook if you're going to carry something around that large? I'm not trolling here--it's a sincere question. I do like the idea of "e-ink" though, and I haven't seen a device that uses it, so my opinion might be changed in favor of ebook readers if the e-ink technology is really that much superior.

I think the eInk reader market is in dire need of some simplification (pretty strange considering it's not even remotely mature yet). I know several people, myself included, who are still waiting for what we consider the basic ebook reader features:

- big screen

- adjustable font size

- left and right buttons

- DRM-free

- reasonable pricing.

I wonder how much of the price could be shaved off by getting rid of the other features like search, keyboards, image support, etc. I'd buy a cheap, stripped down eInk reader if only I could.

I agree completely. I've discussed this with several other people and everyone seems to want exactly the same. I'm starting to wonder what it would cost to have it built to order. I believe there are a lot of asian electronics manufacturers with over-capacities right now. I know that's probably very naive :)

But isn't it possible to detach the screen from a laptop, connect it with an extra long cable and flip pages with the remote? The screen might be too heavy though, I don't know.

The Kindle lets you adjust fonts, and it can handle non-DRM'd formats with ease. What do you mean by left-right buttons?

I mean that practically the only buttons required on such a device are the buttons to turn pages (maybe some modifiers to swap between books and to go to the beginning and end of the book). Other buttons are superfluous to a "back to basics" device.

What I'm saying is, the Kindle has too many features and is too expensive.

The Kindle needs that. Its top, ignored feature is its ability to download books from anywhere from the Amazon store. For that it needs a navigator, a keyboard, and wireless Internet access. And from my uses of the device, that's what puts it in a league of its own.

Booken's Cybook [1] has all these features except for the first one, it's screen is just 6". Nevertheless, it's a great sexy-looking reader.

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Cybook

The title is misleading. As the article mentions, this is all speculative, based on information from a forum.

Why not wait until Monday to post official pictures/specs/pricing? Visit Engadget if you want rumors.

It turned out the price was spot on and the article was correct as far as I can see.

I agree that it's 'just from a forum', this one turned out to be surprisingly well informed. My take on that is that it is a secret known by so many people that if there is a place it's going to be leaked is in a forum.

It looks a lot better than the original Kindle. I tried one and disliked it so much I returned it. The sad thing is I really wanted to like it. I prefer reading on the computer anymore. I didn't like how there wasn't a good way to hold it with out accidentally flipping the pages. This new version seems to have fixed that. I was willing to accept the non-color display, but I didn't like the liquid paper. I wish it was backlit. The navigation was terrible. It looks like they've tried to address the navigation with a joystick, I'm sure it's better than the original.

I guess I wish I had an something like an iPhone or iPod touch that was around the same size the Kindle, that had a color screen, the touch features of the iPhone and iPod touch would be great, but button and stylus navigation would be alright. Nice looking anti-aliased fonts are essential. A good way to get content. Kindle has a nice tie in to Amazon, but the on the original it was such a bother to get other content on it. The big problem was no pdf support.

I'm excited that the Kindle 2 is much improved, I hope they have a lot of success with it.

Hmmm... If you don't like the eInk displays, none of those readers are for you, really... The whole point of these devices, their reason for existing, is the high contrast, non backlit, paper-like display that's much easier on the eyes than typical LCDs.

Is the keyboard really necessary? I would probably prefer to have bigger screen on its place.

The screen is probably the size it is because of price, not because the keyboard.

It's necessary for the business model, Amazon wants you to be able to search and buy books easily.

The kindle has a fairly complete note-taking/annotation system, since you can't write in the books.

As someone who doesn't write in books, though, I agree with you.

I'm still leaning towards the upcoming Foxit eSlick, unless the Kindle 2 has much better support for PDF programming books (ones not purchased through Amazon).

The leaks look like the same design broken on BGR (http://www.boygeniusreport.com/2008/10/03/amazon-kindle-2-eb...) 3 months ago.

I love my current Kindle, and if these leaks are accurate, Kindle 2 feels like a step back for a few reasons: * Pouch instead of binder. Current Kindle can be opened and read while waiting in line at the airport, train, etc. What do you do with a pouch after you pull the Kindle out of it? * Larger and heavier. I'm all for sturdy, but the current Kindle is feather light, which is great for extended reading sessions. * Joystick rather than roller w/ spare LCD. Is the new E-Ink screen really responsive enough for a random access pointer? * No SD slot. So, moving the 400MB of programming books I have as PDFs is going to be a PITA.

We'll see on Monday.

Reply on news.ycombinator.com