Newbi needs help

[JadePriest]

Hello everyone I am thinking about getting a reader for my wife she loves to read books and magazines and first off was wondering if any of these readers have color screen or are they for the most part grey scale. Um that is the first question I am sure more will pop into my head but I will do some searching on my own. Thanks

[desertgrandma]

Welcome to MobileRead, JadePriest

The nook is coming out with a color screen, but its not a true e-ink reader.

You might try going into a best buy,,or target, and looking at some in real life, they carry various brands.

[neilmarr]

Good to have your company, Jade. If your wife likes colour magazines, you'd probably be as well not to go for an eink reader. Though they're ideal for straight novels, they so far present in black and white (there's a rumour on the grapevine that we may see colour eink next year, but at the expense of black text definition). Have you considered Apple's iPad? It's backlit LED and has several bells-and-whistles functions, so is not strictly ebook-dedicated, but it handles novels well and provides good high definition colour for magazines. Good luck and best wishes. Neil

[Nexutix]

E-ink devices are mostly greyscale only(atleast for this year). From next year, mirasol-like color e-ink displays will soon be seen in markets. But if you can't wait, get any of good android based tablets. They are good for reading color and highly formatted PDFs and many other formats. (But note: No LCD screens are good for eyes for reading more than 2 hours.)

[fjtorres]

Originally Posted by JadePriest

Hello everyone I am thinking about getting a reader for my wife she loves to read books and magazines and first off was wondering if any of these readers have color screen or are they for the most part grey scale.

To clarify: the vast majority of ebook readers being sold today are based on the B&W eink electrophoretic displays. This is because they use very little power and can last weeks on a single charge using cheap cellphone-grade batteries.

However...
There *are* color ebook readers out there, all based on LCD screens, so the trade-off is color vs battery life; the LCD models generally offer anywhere from 4 to 10 hours on a charge, with most doing about 6, maximum. The NookColor and Pocketbook IQ, among others, are being marketted as color ebook readers and both come from companies with established reputations as reader vendors. There are also other color "readers" that are thinly disguised low-end Android-based webpads tablets from companies *without* a reader track record and performance has been an issue with most.

Alternately, there are a few Android-based webpad tablets with higher-grade hardware (Archos has a line ranging from 3in to 11in screens) that have enough hardware power to deal with the demands of Android software. There is also, as mentioned, the Apple iPad, and a wide variety of Windows-based Tabet PCs. All can be used for color ebook reading.

Which way to go is really up to your needs and budget.

If magazines are *really* going to be a big part of your wife's reading, then your best bets are either the NookColor (a 7in model running around US$250) or the Apple iPad (a 10in model starting at US$499). Bear in mind that the iPad does *not* offer magazine subscriptions but rather requires you to buy individual issues at full newstand price.

If color magazine-reading is a "desired" but not indispensable feature then you might want to consider the Kindle and Nook, both of which offer magazine subscriptions (they are even automatically delivered to the reader) but while the files themselves are in color, the readers aren't. Which is where Android Webpads and Tablet PCs come in as both Kindle and Nook offer free reader applications for Android and Windows that are compatible with their B&W reader hardware so some (a lot of?) people are buying Android webpads to install those apps and end up with the equivalent of a color Kindle or Nook. This is not particularly hard but it is *not* a clean out-of-box experience for most devices so a bit of computer savvy is required for initial setup.

So, your magazine-reading options today are:
Apple iPad at US$499 and up
Windows Tablet PC at $499 and up
High-grade Android Tablet at $299 and up
Nook Color around $250
Pocketbook IQ at $139
Kindle Wifi or Nook WiFi at $139-149 for B&W grayscale displays.
Plus, assorted third-tier Android-based tablets and "readers" from $99-200 if you're adventurous and computer savvy enough to cook up your own reader.

There will be more and more varied options next year, especially if color eink products actually materialize but for now your choices all involve a trade-off of battery life and convenience in return for the color screen.

Prioritize your needs and look around; there might be an acceptable answer.
Good luck!

[JadePriest]

Thanks for all the help everyone I will look around and let you know what I pick up.

[boswd]

Yeah it sounds like either a Nookcolor or an ipad is going to be the best best for combo magazine and book reading.

Nookcolor is due out Nov. 19 and should be able to demo one at Barnes and noble, BestBuy and I think walmart

www.nookcolor.com

[JadePriest]

I found one in futureshop called the pandigital noval and it is color so I picked up then started reading other reviews and it does not sound to be very good. Has anyone tested this unit out yet? Think i will return and pick up the sony 650 series that is out. From what I can tell it is a good quality reader.