Swede thinking about buying a Kindle

[Nokturnal]

To my knowledge, it is correct that there are only three hardware variants of the Kindle 3, and that the only difference is the builtin SIM card (None, Vodafone or AT&T).

However, there is one more subtle difference between the UK, the US and the International version: The power adapter. The US and UK versions comes with power adapters for their intended countries, and the International version comes without an adapter (which really doesn't matter as it is chargeable by USB or any standard USB charger).

When I purchased my Kindle from Denmark, I was directed to the international site due to the physical delivery address.
I ended up being assigned an International, Vodafone version.

Which SIM you end up with is based on which provider has the better roaming arrangement in the country of delivery.


There is more though...
As my delivery address was in Denmark, Amazon soon cut me off from using 3G to browse the web (except the Kindle store and Wikipedia). Also, I had to pay £.99 to have free books delivered over WhisperNet.

Changing my primary delivery address on Amazon.co.uk to a UK address fixed this for a bit, but then I received an email from UK customer support asking for evidence of my UK address.
I ignored this and was cut off again.

I proceeded to purchase a few books via a UK proxy and generally only connected via this proxy for a few weeks while still ignoring the request for evidence.

Then I switched back to using regular and apparently Amazon now believes in my address. I should probably mention that most of my purchases from Amazon are still made via a UK proxy, simply because that is where our Corporate proxy server is located


In summary (TL/DR);
- A Wifi-only Kindle will be the same everywhere - only the power adapter differs.
- You may experience different prices and availability of contents based on your residency and/or the store in which you shop.
- A 3G Kindle will have different SIM cards depending on shipping address, but this only matters to Amazon (roaming charges) - not to you as a consumer.

[ProfCrash]

All Kindles come with WiFi. There is not a wireless free Kindle. There are three Kindles available in the US, Kindle WiFi with Special Offers, Kindle with WiFi, Kindle with WiFi and 3G. The Special Offer Kindle is not available outside of the US.

[jbcohen]

Not attempting to disuade anyone and I have nothing against kindles and Kindlers but from what I am told the Bookeen does a better job at non english langeuge books and since you are from sweeden and will msot likely read sweedish languege books the bookeen is the right choice.

[ProfCrash]

Hi!
Newbie here I am planning on getting a Kindle, hopefully through a friend who lives in the UK who'll bring it here on her next visit. I have decided on a Kindle even though, yes I might not be able to read any Swedish books but I rarely do that anyway so not a big problem. Buying it in the UK is cheper than from the US.

The OP first post on this topic which says that he does not read Swedish books regularly.

[jbcohen]

But if he does read them at all the bookeen is better at handling the non-english books. Again nothing against kindles or Kindlers, I'm a part time Kindler myself and a Nooker on ocasion.

[stickybuns]

Originally Posted by jbcohen

But if he does read them at all the bookeen is better at handling the non-english books. Again nothing against kindles or Kindlers, I'm a part time Kindler myself and a Nooker on ocasion.

That's really more of a concern with languages that have non-Roman alphabets (e.g. Chinese, Arabic, Hebrew, etc. etc. etc.)

Swedish uses a Roman alphabet (same as English), so the Kindle doesn't have any trouble with it. I've read Danish literature on my Kindle without any trouble (well, other than my Danish being pretty lousy).