MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Kindle or PRS-650 for a kid?

sun4384 · 10-11-2010, 11:34 AM

Hello all. First post to seek for advice. I'm about to get a Kindle 6", and want to make sure if I'm getting the right one. Here is my situation.

The reader will be a present for my son's 7th birthday. He reads a lot of books, mostly chapter books and some thicker ones like Harry Potter series. I want to keep it going that way. Since he is more than fine without color or pictures in books, I think it's OK to get an e-book reader.

The single most important thing is the screen quality. I absolutely don't want get a reader that might negatively affect his eyesight. So far I checked Kindle and Nook in person, and found Kindle's screen quality and readability is surprisingly acceptable. Nook was too slow, and black is not dark enough. I heard PRS-650 uses the same screen as Kindle's.

It looks we will not buy many books for quite some time. I hope to get as many free books as possible from Internet, esp. classic ones from Gutenberg. It looks Gutenberg already has Kindle formats for download. I plan to use Calibre for e-book management and conversion.

Kindle's wi-fi feature, if I can access websites like wikipedia, gmail, google calendar, google voice, weather.com, and the like, will be very handy I guess. If not, I'll just block its wireless access in my router. I like the dictionary feature, and If it can be looked up by typing words while reading books, it would be excellent. I don't want my son to use D-pad to navigate and lookup words. Mp3 feature, I don't care. It doesn't even support shuffle, and without expansion slot, there is no point, I guess.

I'm hesitant if I should get PRS-650 instead. It has the same Pearl screen. Though I think the touch feather is not necessary to me and my son, I greatly want to have an expansion slot. From time to time I'll be using the reader, and I hope to have my collection of documents separated from his (I want him to read his). I don't know the details yet, but I think if I put my docs in an SD card and plug it only when I need, it seems doable. Problem is I'm not sure it justifies extra $100 for PRS-650.

Any experience or advice, I'll appreciate.

10-11-2010, 11:34 AM	#1
sun4384 Member Posts: 11 Karma: 1052 Join Date: Oct 2010 Device: none	Kindle or PRS-650 for a kid? Hello all. First post to seek for advice. I'm about to get a Kindle 6", and want to make sure if I'm getting the right one. Here is my situation. The reader will be a present for my son's 7th birthday. He reads a lot of books, mostly chapter books and some thicker ones like Harry Potter series. I want to keep it going that way. Since he is more than fine without color or pictures in books, I think it's OK to get an e-book reader. The single most important thing is the screen quality. I absolutely don't want get a reader that might negatively affect his eyesight. So far I checked Kindle and Nook in person, and found Kindle's screen quality and readability is surprisingly acceptable. Nook was too slow, and black is not dark enough. I heard PRS-650 uses the same screen as Kindle's. It looks we will not buy many books for quite some time. I hope to get as many free books as possible from Internet, esp. classic ones from Gutenberg. It looks Gutenberg already has Kindle formats for download. I plan to use Calibre for e-book management and conversion. Kindle's wi-fi feature, if I can access websites like wikipedia, gmail, google calendar, google voice, weather.com, and the like, will be very handy I guess. If not, I'll just block its wireless access in my router. I like the dictionary feature, and If it can be looked up by typing words while reading books, it would be excellent. I don't want my son to use D-pad to navigate and lookup words. Mp3 feature, I don't care. It doesn't even support shuffle, and without expansion slot, there is no point, I guess. I'm hesitant if I should get PRS-650 instead. It has the same Pearl screen. Though I think the touch feather is not necessary to me and my son, I greatly want to have an expansion slot. From time to time I'll be using the reader, and I hope to have my collection of documents separated from his (I want him to read his). I don't know the details yet, but I think if I put my docs in an SD card and plug it only when I need, it seems doable. Problem is I'm not sure it justifies extra $100 for PRS-650. Any experience or advice, I'll appreciate.