It is early morning on an overcast day in Nantucket and the Kitty and I are sitting on two ends of the same sofa in our living room typing furiously into our laptop computers. Other times when we are at home and not on walkabout all over the island, we read books. My good friends who have e-readers all have opinions about which one to get. Most prefer the Kindle because they like to read outside in bright sun at poolside or in their favorite lounge chair on the patio. There are a million books you can get from Amazon for about 1/2 what the book would cost in paper form in a bookstore. The iPad from Apple is the first choice among people who want a reader but also want to do other things like manage their photographs. The price differential is significant. The iPad starts at $500 and runs up to $1000 if you want maximum memory and the ability to fully connect the way and anywhere a cell phone does, as well as Wi-Fi. We have Wi-Fi or wireless router internet here in our place in Nantucket as well as in our other home in Florida. The Kindle costs $138 for the middle of the road small screen model.So, I guess I am soliciting feedback here from readers of this blog. Which one of these fine devices is the preferred one for doing mostly reading indoors? Or is that too limiting and I should expect more from an e-reader?
My dad is a tech neophyte but he got a Kindle for Xmas and he's obsessed with it. I love my iPhone but whenever I've played with an iPad, I found the keyboard to be quite annoying. The only advantage of it is having the internet access as you have with your phone from anywhere anytime, but it still seems a little excessive already having a laptop I use regularly.
ReplyDeleteBought Maureen a kindle for Christmas 2009 - she belongs to 2 book groups (1 in FL and the other in CT)
ReplyDeleteShe uses it regularly and after a year and a half, continues to be very impressed with it especially side she can:
- order a book in 15 seconds
- get a free sample of book - 10 pages to see if you like it!
- order a book by mistake and it can be returned for credit immediately
- highlight a word to get it's definition
- case/cover (extra charge) allows you to read while lying down
- easy to read in sunlight
- books stored on Amazon so no Storage issue
Last night while I was watching an out of market NY Yankee game while simultaneously listening to a radio broadcast of the game on my iPad2, she said,
"I love my kindle"
I then switched over to an email I received with a link to a web site discussing apple computer, read the article, checked my portfolio, and the after hours market price, while still listening to the ball game!
Get the kindle with the bigger screen - color is not necessary. I don't have an iPhone as my wife and daughters all use blackberries and we bbm each other during the day and I save the scripts and plan on publishing them as I have kept them since they were in college!
I haven't singed onto a computer in days and use my ipad regularly for email, surfing the web, real estate research, sports, and will soon download movies and tv shows which can be viewed anytime anywhere.