[Dave W]

I just got my simple touch with glow light and think it's great. However, I've found a weakness. It is advertised as useable in direct sunlight. My Sony PRS-600 tended to fade out when the display got heated by the Sun which was its Achilles heel. The Simple Touch doesn't have that problem. However, I can't turn pages by tapping or swiping. I have to use the buttons on the sides. Tapping and swiping work fine indoors.

Now the technical stuff. It is my understanding that B&N chose to use infrared to detect taps and swipes rather than the capacitive technology used by Apple and others. My theory as to why the touch screen stops working in sunlight is that there is a lot of infrared in sunlight and it simply saturates the detectors. I suppose that's the nature of the beast, but B&N should have put that caveat in the description of the product.

I prefer using the touch screen when reading, but I can live with the buttons if I must. I'll just have to move into the shade to use the screen to select books or to navigate to specific pages. It seems that all I will be able to do while the Nook is exposed to direct Sun is turn pages. Anything that depends on the touch screen will not work.

Has anyone else experienced this?

Dave W