Kindle Review – Kindle 3 Review, iPad Review

Will add a full-blown Nook review and videos after playing around with the Nook more and reading a book on it.

However, there are a lot of things that strike me as interesting so here’s a post covering initial impressions of the Nook and the differences between it and the Kindle (also following soon - a full-blown Kindle Vs Nook Review and videos).

Before Reading

1. There’s a two-sided instruction sheet for how to get the Nook out of its box. Anytime you have a 2 page, 7 step guide for how to get your device out of the packaging box you’re doing something wrong.  
2. On the plus side the case is solid plastic and can be used to carry the Nook during moves. 
3. The second thing that hit me was that on the welcome screen the Nook uses bolded eInk. Will have to see how the books are – However, this is a good, good move.
4. The weight is a lot. It’s supposed to be 11.2 ounces (317 grams) and the Kindle 2 is supposed to be 10.2 ounces (289 grams). There’s no way the difference is just 1 ounce.
5. It really feels like the Kindle is a paperback and the Nook is a hardcover. If you have arthritis or weak hands please try out the Nook at a B&N store before buying it. The kindle is a lot lighter.
6. The Nook is a bit narrower (it’s narrower by about the width of the Kindle’s Next Page button) and  is not as long - However the Kindle is thinner.

Nook First Impressions 

1. Having to register the Nook doesn’t make sense – Why isn’t it pre-registered? To be fair though, the registration is straightforward – it needs 3G or WiFi to work.
2. There’s a quick start guide, called Start-off Tour. It’s good.  
3. The bolding of the Font makes a difference. The readability is better on the Nook.
4. Changeable fonts are a cool feature. The Light Classic Font doesn’t seem to be bolded. It still seems a tiny bit clearer than the Kindle’s font.
5. The other two fonts (Amasis, Helvetica Neue) are bolded and clearly darker than the Kindle font.
6. Wouldn’t be surprised if eInk has improved their screen technology recently (My Kindle 2 is from February). However, bottomline is that the Nook uses the bolding to get better readability.
7. The Nook has 5 font sizes (compared to the Kindle’s 6). The largest size on the Nook is equal to the Kindle’s 2nd largest. So the Kindle has a larger largest size font.
8. The Nook’s extra small font size is really small.
9. When the touchscreen dims out you can swipe it to turn the page – Remember to do a really quick swipe to get it to work. 
10. Working with two screens is a bit difficult.

Exploring more of the Nook

1. Having to open the back cover to get to the microSD card is a strange design decision. 
2. The on-screen keyboard is as awkward as the Kindle’s awkward keyboard. What you type has to show up on the eInk screen and the keys are tiny and placed right next to each other.
3. Using the Kindle’s keyboard is actually faster as the Kindle seems to process key strokes faster. The Nook takes a tiny bit of time to transfer touch-screen keystrokes to the eInk and does it two keys at a time which is a bit disconcerting.
4. The slowness of processing is a constant theme. It’s not overly sluggish – just slow.
5. The WiFi feature is cool. It finds networks in range and lets you select one. It’s rather unfortunate there’s no browser or Wikipedia feature on the Nook.
6. Haven’t been able to set-up a home WiFi network so will test out some coffee shop WiFi networks and see how buying books from B&N over WiFi works.

Purchasing Books and Reading Them

1. Had to do the ‘download to computer and transfer to Nook’ method. 
2. It’s strange that you have to click on a book and then click on read. The default option should be to read the book (as opposed to seeing the book details).
3. The formatting before opening the book is bad. It’s not as slow as some people say.
4. Having the table of contents on the touch-screen is cool.
5. Perhaps because my Nook isn’t registered yet it asked me for my full name and credit card number to validate the purchase. 
6. That’s scary – does every book have the buyer’s name and credit card information embedded. It must be because it didn’t connect with anything.
7. What if someone hacks the book format?
8. The page turns on the Nook are strange. They are slower and it almost seems as if the first page fades away, then there’s the eInk reset flash, and then the new page fades in.
9. The page turn is bad.

Initial Thoughts on the Nook

Am very tempted to add on a video and write a pros and cons list – However, a few hours isn’t enough to write a fair review so will spend a bunch more time with the Nook and also compare the Nook and the Kindle side by side, and will then start adding posts.

What is pretty clear is that the Kindle and the Nook are the top 2 eReaders on the market.