Amazon Kindle (ebook thingy)

Maybe it's regional. Are you in France right now?

Being reminded of this classic thread

My fear with the Nook is B&N's inevitable bankruptcy.

― Kiarostami bag (milo z), Sunday, April 27, 2014 4:37 PM

do not buy one. period.

if you already have, sell it and get a kindle or, even better, an ipad with the kindle app.

no, I'm in the USA still

are epubs hard to buy in the US? Over here if/when b&n go under I feel like there are a lot of other sites (waterstones, foyles, etc) where you could buy books for the nook.

even better, an ipad with the kindle app
do you read whole books on your ipad markers? I think my eyes would get really tired if I did this. Plus blue light in bed etc..

(but maybe it's different with retina? idk)

Thought about getting the $32.20 model, but I believe it's most too light.

Calibre converts epubs>mobis or whatever to whatever in seconds.

hey markers. let's say i can get a second hand nook real cheap and all the free pdfs/epubs i want. is there still a real reason not to get the nook?

yeah that waterstones nonsense was a mealymouthed way of saying pretty much this ^

I've not had good luck with the coughfree pdfs/epubs in terms of formatting, tbh and the usual freebie sources haven't had a lot of things I wanted to read.
Kinda makes me want to get a cheaper Nook Glowlight for the buttons, though, if the lighting were up to par with my Paperwhite.

With a retina iPad, reading is okay as long as you turn the brightness way down - using the sepia toning in the Kindle app helps too. I still prefer the Paperwhite even w/o buttons and the occasional wonkiness of double touching and stuff.

hey markers. let's say i can get a second hand nook real cheap and all the free pdfs/epubs i want. is there still a real reason not to get the nook?

― you poll a lot, but you're not saying anything (Noodle Vague), Sunday, April 27, 2014 7:03 PM

if you're going to be storing those files somewhere (dropbox, your pc, etc.) that's not just on the device and you don't intend on using the nook store, then you should probably be fine, unless there's something i'm not seeing, as long as nooks either come with or can be loaded up with an app or apps capable of dealing with those file formats. but i wouldn't buy any actual ebook *from* b&n, because as others have noted their business seems to be in a really bad place right now.

blue light in bed

i read white on black

i got used to it

ymmv

xp

ok cool, the nooks seem to be the cheapest option around at the moment and i just want something to read pdfs from so i reckon for my purposes it's probly ok - don't need any of the interconnective stuff

i just wrote this so i'm going to post it even though it looks like you might be all set:

the best tablet, though, is an ipad, ideally the newest one you can get. (mine is like a year and half old at this point, and i wouldn't recommend that anyone buy it now, even though it works fine.) you get access to whatever bookstores you want to have access to (ibooks, kindle, nook, kobo, etc.), you can use some really nice software to look at epub, pdf, doc, txt, and other files, you know that apple's gonna be around for a bit, and you're going to be able to get software updates for both your apps and the os for a while. it'll be super solid for at least two years probably and will still be good for three, maybe even four years beyond that, before you'd really really want to upgrade.

if you want more opinions, the apple lust objects thread isn't a bad place to ask, but as the title implies we're all a bit biased there.

there are also relatively cheap tablets, like the nexus 7, which might be a little small for pdf reading, but still get good reviews. it's difficult to give a recommendation because the field is complicated. just know that there's a chance b&n gives up the digital books market in some way at some point.

and that your device and the ecosystem around it might not be supported. it's a risk! but if it's cheap, that might not matter. you can always just get a new device later on and copy the files back onto it as long as you keep a backup of them.

i've got no ideological opposition to an ipad, just nowhere near being able to afford even a used one, whereas i can pick up a used Nook v. cheap and i have a whole stack of lovely books on the computer that i want to be able to read at will. take your point that it's a long way short of the best solution - i have read that elsewhere too

can someone else back me up on this or refute me? i want to make sure i don't screw nv over here by giving bad advice, especially because i've never owned a nook and don't know much about it

xpost totally understand. i got mine as a gift and have a flip phone. i just don't want to send you off in a bad direction. hopefully someone else will chime in.

please make sure that whatever model your buying will handle those two file formats, too. i just did two seconds of googling, and i don't what model the dude was talking about, but someone mentioned formatting issues wrt pdfs. (could've been talking about one of the non-tablet models for all i know.) i assume bn.com has some basic information and other specifics can be answered by google or someone here who actually owns one of these things. good luck!

i assume of the 3 (nook, ipad + kindle) the ipad is the only one that does an okay job displaying pdfs (maybe the kindle fire too?)?

i have a no-brand knockoff chinese android tablet that's two years old, pdf, kindle and all etc formats are no problem on it.

I think for pdfs nooks aren't great, but for other stuff they're totally fine and if you get it for peanuts I'd say totally go for it. I got a simple touch for £30 about a year ago and am glad I did.

i read white on black

ah yeah, I meant blue light as in this: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/05/health/05light.html

prob has a lot to do with whether the pdf is a scan (ie unresizable images) or actual text, too.

yeah i can get a glowlight touch for about £30, have heard varying things about pdfs and if they don't work well that wd probably break the deal, i want to road test one before i buy i think

i left mine in edinburgh last time i was up or i'd have a look for you :(

Calibre converts PDFs, makes text ones super-manageable on kindle at least

if you already have, sell it and get a kindle or, even better, an ipad with the kindle app.

this is not "even better" if what you want to do is read

oh i'll get round to doing this for myself, was interested in markers's disparagement because i have heard similar things in the past but if it's just cos the backup will be shitty to non-existent i can live with that, as i say i've got pdfs already to keep me going for months, but nothing to read them from other than the computer, and y'know, that's for video games and porn and picking fights with strangers

google nexus works for pdfs and ebooks. yes battery life and price, but otherwise it's v good.

It doesn't matter if/when bn goes under, I populate my nook almost entirely with side loaded stuff downloaded off the internet anyway. Reading on e-ink is better than reading on retina screen if you are ever ever going to read outside at the bus stop etc.

if it hasn't been said already, there is a huge difference between reading on a tablet (iPad, etc.) and a Nook/Kindle/Kobo which use eInk screens... the latter is vastly easier on the eyes, and much more like reading actual ink on paper.

A Nook Simple Touch with Glowlight (2012-2013 models, black body) has buttons, the new Nook Glowlight (white body) does not... you have to swipe the screen to turn the page. The new version is also lacking a memory card slot. I hope they rectify both of these total design fuckups in their next iteration, because those two things were the only thing setting the Nook apart from the Kindle, which has a better eBook store (Amazon) with better prices.

oops, it was said in the comment right before mine!

ah yeah, I meant blue light as in this: http://www.nytimes.com/2011/07/05/health/05light.html

yeah, i think white text on a black background should be cool? seems like the total brightness matters a lot, and 90% of the screen is dark.

can't imagine you wouldn't get a killing headache reading like that at the beach

ipads are great but i much prefer to read e-ink and also, ipads cost like 5 times as much.

i like that kindles are fairly cheap, i mean comparatively, it means i can like bring them to the beach and stuff and not be too uptight about it

"because those two things were the only thing setting the Nook apart from the Kindle, which has a better eBook store (Amazon) with better prices."

There is nothing to stop you buying from Amazon and reading them on your nook, alls you need is a free download called Calibre. Totally agree with your comments about the Nook glow, the lack of buttons + card slot is what influenced me to go for the older model.

can someone else back me up on this or refute me? i want to make sure i don't screw nv over here by giving bad advice, especially because i've never owned a nook and don't know much about it

You sure have some strong opinions about something you don't know much about. Barnes & Noble is at least a couple of years away from bankruptcy, the Nook division is jointly owned by B&N, Microsoft, and Pearson. When Sony recently shut down their e-book store, they shifted their customers to Kobo. Calibre will convert any format, and even break DRM if you know what you are doing.

A nook e-ink, or a nook tablet are around the best value for specs and the company will outlast the device.

Glowlight doesn't have the buttons or microSD slot, but you can get earlier versions if you look. 59 to 100 bucks Tablets are rootable, and work fine just now. 129 to 179 bucks.

disclaimer - I know what I'm talking about.

I'm about to go to bed, but nooks work good. I'll check back in tomorrow and answer any questions anyone may have them. They're just a machine. Use for what you want. Use it up. Throw it in the trash. Put heavy metals in the water table .

i'd go for the cheapest Kobo (the Mini, £29 in whsmith, widely available here in the uk) over the cheapest Nook (Simple Touch, £29 but usually out of stock everywhere, although some places have the backlit version for £49). it's just a nicer device, imo. it's a 5" screen rather than a 6" screen but also has narrower bevels so it's virtually pocketsize and much easier to hold.

also, epubs are avaliable in many more places than just B&N or Kobo. they use standardised DRM, Adobe Direct Editions, and so places like supermarkets etc can sell epubs that'll work. http://www.sainsburysebooks.co.uk/ for instance. in fact they don't do kindle versions of books because, i think, kindle drm is proprietary. - http://www.sainsburysebooks.co.uk/help/how-to-read/select-account?device=kindle

(not that i've ever bought a drm-protected ebook... i use my kobo exclusively for stuff from gutenberg etc)

that said, a quick look on the internet suggests that kobo is the ereader underdog in the US, only available in independent bookshops, not chains or highstreet stores. and that the mini isn't widely available at all.

ah yeah Kobo, keep mixing them up with Nook in my head. just want e-ink and pdfs really, so thanks everybody for your thoughts

when will Amazon provide kindle ebook links with every paper copy they sell (like they do for vinyl) or is this just a pipedream?

hahahaha

no

xpost they already do this for some of them. google "matchbook"

Matchbook isn't really the same thing... let's you buy kindle versions of your previous purchases at a discount, not free. Also seems to be only USA.

they're not free in some cases? ah, sorry

And pretty slim pickings last time I checked.