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Some initial reflections on using an ebook reader

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JavaJones:
He probably means the less feature-full and older (?) version that's half the price:
http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Wireless-Reading-Display-Globally/dp/B0015T963C

- Oshyan

nudone:
thanks for the review, mouser.

you've made a good case for the kindle - i'd never really seen the point of an ebook reader until now.

(i'll wait until they are about $50 though.)

mouser:
indeed when i said "cheap" i meant the smaller models of the kindle or other ebook manufacturers that are now under $200.

obviously that's still a lot of money -- i didn't mean to imply it wasn't, just that the costs are starting to get to where it's a gift to consider.

phitsc:
I completely agree with your findings mouser. I've been owning a Kindle 2 (i.e. the small one) for a few months now and I really love reading on it. I agree that it sucks for reference books. I think it's suboptimal for programming books (the DX might be better in this respect). It absolutely rocks for novels.

Apart from the display and its consequences (eye comfort, viewing angle, battery life, etc.) what I love most about it are its size/form factor, the dictionary lookup feature (non-native English speaker here) and the fact that I can carry several books with me in such a small (and light) package. This was maybe the main reason for me to get one in the first place. Where this comes in handy is when going on holiday. I usually take a few novels, a few programming books and a few magazines with me on holiday. Programming books are usually quite heavy and bulky too. An ebook reader solves this problem nicely.

And I second mouser's old classics tip. I've already read a few of those. The last one I read has become one of my favourite novels: The Count of Monte Cristo. Man how I wish I was able to read that in French :)

allen:
Admittedly, I use it exclusively for novels, a few philosophy books and a handful of personal documents.

As for annotations failing miserably. . . I guess I don't understand that at all. I have no experience using it as a with reference books, but for my purposes it's far superior to margin scribbles.  I don't have to maintain the books/volumes themselves, the references are all there on my kindle. I can search them. I can view them in a list without having to find where they are in the book.  If I am recalling a part of a book I really liked, I can simply go pull it up on my kindle or on the computer.  Far more convenient than finding the book on a shelf (or in a box or realizing I no longer have it), then fanning through the pages hoping to find what I'm thinking of.

And I guess I haven't had the same experience as you, Mouser--with the kindle books being more ethereal and vanishing from memory. . . Since moving to the kindle, I'm reading far more than I had been. In truth, my reading had really tapered off in recent years.

The kindle has been a, dare I say, magical experience for me. It's like something out of science fiction. A book with a cursor and a dictionary and a database of my notes and it looks and reads like ink on paper.

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