MobileRead Forums - View Single Post - Are you one of the most satisfied e-reader owner?

SensualPoet · 10-21-2010, 08:21 PM

I bought a Kindle 2i the first day it was available in Canada. I was blown away by how "natural" the experience of reading on it was. I got to know manybooks.net, mobileread and renewed my long-term acquaintance with gutenburg archive. It was actually several weeks before I bought an e-book fro Amazon; I think the first e-purchase of an e-book was at fictionwise. Satisfaction was high on the experience.

Then I took the e-reader to Mexico (two trips) including using the 3G on a 5 hr bus ride through the mountains to Guadalajara. I read about the towns along the way using wikipedia. I didn't recharge the device during the entire 2 week holiday. I even found the dictionary an unexpected pleasure whilst reading Chesterston. I was really, really satisfied.

Then I actually started to buy stuff from Amazon, as well as sampling free chapters and, indeed, whole books. The 60 second Whispernet always-connected, always archived aspect of Amazon Kindle experience blew me away a second time. It's so user-friendly. And then it got better: two software updates in the first seven months and each brought faster page turns, better battery life, and expanded 3G usage -- like the whole world wide web, not just wikipedia.

But then came Kobo on May 1 and I bought it the first day ti was available in Canada. Wow! Half the price, effectively, of the Kindle 2i and now I had access to a strange new world of ePubs, and better, the Toronto Public Library. It was a bit shaky firmware at first, but I personally had few troubles and purchases at fictionwise worked well; about half of the library books were fine (that nasty too small font issue now buried). The screen quality matched the Kindle 2i; kobobooks offered Canadian content I couldn't find at Amazon; the reader was considerably lighter and battery length good. Yup, I was a very satisfied customer.

Over the summer, I discovered kobo discount coupons which helped my grow my library and buy Georges Simenon novels which were stupidly priced as paperbacks ($17 for 1930s 180 pg novels?), and more expensive or unavailable in Kindle editions, nicely discounted at kobobooks. Not free; not cheap; but under $8 and, hey, classic terrific reads. And then all those Rex Stout at a discount, too, at kobobooks or fictionwise. Again, feeding the ePub side. I was a very satisfied customer.

Then came Kindle 3 and my lovely new Graphite WiFi only K3 arrived the day it was available in Canada. Brilliant clearer screen; way less $$ than the K2i; faster, better, more words per page, and all the great Amazon attributes plus protecting my K2i investment in content. (The Kobo and K3 were abt the same price combined as the K2i purchased just nine months earlier.)

Kindle 3 has made the Whispersync delivery so easy. And the wifi web experience has been flawless in airports and at home. It's not the browser of choice; but it works really well in a pinch. And I love the social networking aspects of highlighting, tweeting and possibilities down the road as I put my toe in that water.

All else being equal, the Kindle 3 is my e-reader of choice, DRM or not. It's lovely; it's so easy to use; and the Whispersync, across multiple devices, is brilliant (something, I might add, the Kobo shares, but a little less seamlessly). I recommend the K3 without reservation to anyone who asks ... but I do put in a word for Kobo (now in a wifi edition) if library book access or ePubs are important to them.

So ... satisfied? You betcha! And with every model I've sampled. The K2i has now been passed to my husband loaded with content I know he'll like and drawn from our shared Amazon and Calibre library. And in spite of my love of the Kindle 3, the last three books I've read have been on the original Kobo because that's where the content happens to be.

Thumbs up everyone (in a nice way)!

10-21-2010, 08:21 PM	#29
SensualPoet Wizard Posts: 2,302 Karma: 2607151 Join Date: Nov 2009 Location: Toronto Device: Kobo Aura HD, Kindle Paperwhite, Asus ZenPad 3, Kobo Glo	I bought a Kindle 2i the first day it was available in Canada. I was blown away by how "natural" the experience of reading on it was. I got to know manybooks.net, mobileread and renewed my long-term acquaintance with gutenburg archive. It was actually several weeks before I bought an e-book fro Amazon; I think the first e-purchase of an e-book was at fictionwise. Satisfaction was high on the experience. Then I took the e-reader to Mexico (two trips) including using the 3G on a 5 hr bus ride through the mountains to Guadalajara. I read about the towns along the way using wikipedia. I didn't recharge the device during the entire 2 week holiday. I even found the dictionary an unexpected pleasure whilst reading Chesterston. I was really, really satisfied. Then I actually started to buy stuff from Amazon, as well as sampling free chapters and, indeed, whole books. The 60 second Whispernet always-connected, always archived aspect of Amazon Kindle experience blew me away a second time. It's so user-friendly. And then it got better: two software updates in the first seven months and each brought faster page turns, better battery life, and expanded 3G usage -- like the whole world wide web, not just wikipedia. But then came Kobo on May 1 and I bought it the first day ti was available in Canada. Wow! Half the price, effectively, of the Kindle 2i and now I had access to a strange new world of ePubs, and better, the Toronto Public Library. It was a bit shaky firmware at first, but I personally had few troubles and purchases at fictionwise worked well; about half of the library books were fine (that nasty too small font issue now buried). The screen quality matched the Kindle 2i; kobobooks offered Canadian content I couldn't find at Amazon; the reader was considerably lighter and battery length good. Yup, I was a very satisfied customer. Over the summer, I discovered kobo discount coupons which helped my grow my library and buy Georges Simenon novels which were stupidly priced as paperbacks ($17 for 1930s 180 pg novels?), and more expensive or unavailable in Kindle editions, nicely discounted at kobobooks. Not free; not cheap; but under $8 and, hey, classic terrific reads. And then all those Rex Stout at a discount, too, at kobobooks or fictionwise. Again, feeding the ePub side. I was a very satisfied customer. Then came Kindle 3 and my lovely new Graphite WiFi only K3 arrived the day it was available in Canada. Brilliant clearer screen; way less $$ than the K2i; faster, better, more words per page, and all the great Amazon attributes plus protecting my K2i investment in content. (The Kobo and K3 were abt the same price combined as the K2i purchased just nine months earlier.) Kindle 3 has made the Whispersync delivery so easy. And the wifi web experience has been flawless in airports and at home. It's not the browser of choice; but it works really well in a pinch. And I love the social networking aspects of highlighting, tweeting and possibilities down the road as I put my toe in that water. All else being equal, the Kindle 3 is my e-reader of choice, DRM or not. It's lovely; it's so easy to use; and the Whispersync, across multiple devices, is brilliant (something, I might add, the Kobo shares, but a little less seamlessly). I recommend the K3 without reservation to anyone who asks ... but I do put in a word for Kobo (now in a wifi edition) if library book access or ePubs are important to them. So ... satisfied? You betcha! And with every model I've sampled. The K2i has now been passed to my husband loaded with content I know he'll like and drawn from our shared Amazon and Calibre library. And in spite of my love of the Kindle 3, the last three books I've read have been on the original Kobo because that's where the content happens to be. Thumbs up everyone (in a nice way)!