Quote:
Originally Posted by sparklemotion
You like it better than the kindle keyboard, yeah? That's interesting.
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I didn't say that, although I can see how my post can be interpreted that way
So the story goes like this: I've been a Kindle user for 1.5 years now, starting with a Kindle Keyboard. Over the course of the next ~14 months, three died on me. The first one just froze up one day and then kept freezing up immediately after it rebooted. The other two got broken screens, to this that I'm not entirelly sure how those happened, because I had them in a protective case and I really tired to take proper care of them, not throw them around etc.
So when my 4th KK (the replacement of the dead 3rd) arrived I've decided that this generation is just not durable enough for me and I sold it to a good friend of mine who's a happy user ever since.
I love(d) the KK: I think that durability issues aside it's a great device, a great Kindle, but I knew I'd somehow break the screen of the next one in a few months anyway. I didn't really like the K4S (those small page-turn buttons were a big turn-off for me), and I didn't want to get a Touch because I knew that a refresh with hi-res and backlight was imminent. So I went back to reading on my Nexus S / iPad 2 for a few weeks and waited for Amazon to announce the PW.
Now, I consider the K1 the most beautiful Kindle ever (sidenote: I'm also the person who thinks the X- and T- series of Thinkpads are one of the most beautiful laptops ever created, so... yeah.) and I wanted to get one for years beacuse of that. I didn't want it seriously enough to actually hunt one down on ebay, but when it popped up on Hungary's ebay clone about 2 months ago (at that time I was without an e-ink reader for a few weeks then) in great condition and for a good price, I just had to buy it.
Then last month Amazon announced the Paperwhite and of course I pre-ordered it a few days later, and it arrived last week (via Borderlinx). I spent about a week with it and then I sold it because of the now-infamous blotchy screen issue, although mine was actually one of the better ones: my screen looked almost exactly like the one that
Ars Technica had (
direct link to image). So a bright spot on the bottom left plus shadows plus slight pink discolorations on the bottom 25% of the screen. Yeah, I'm a bit OCD about this.
So now I only have the K1. But ever since buying it and using it for a few weeks I really fell in love with it. The keyboard, although I seldom use it is by far the best hardware keyboard they ever created; the big page-turn buttons are incredibly comfortable; and it feels great in my hands with that rubber back cover. It's just so ergonomic. Also, did I mention that it's beautiful?
It also has the Apple kind of emotional attachment effect on me. (my main computer is a MacBook Pro, and I also owned other Macs before)
Of course, I can only load books through USB (and have to take that extra 30 seconds to remove the DRM if I buy a book, since I can't register it w/Amazon because of no US wireless here), and it's slower than the later Kindles and the navigation can be a bit clunky (although it has its charm) and I can't highlight sentences only lines and so on.
The contrast is obviously not as good as on the later Kindles, but nevertheless it is perfectly good enough for reading so I don't really give a damn about that one either.
Overall I couldn't care less about all of its shortcomings becase in the end of the day despite the fact that it's almost a 5-year-old device, it's still a perfectly good e-ink reader and I can read my books just as well as on any other Kindle.
I will keep an eye on the whole PW screen quality issue and if the situation improves I may consider buying one again because screen issues aside the PW was great.
tl;dr version: KK is a great Kindle however I had 3 of them die on me; got a PW but sold it a few days after because of the slight blotchiness; despite it's shortcomings the K1 is a beautiful and ergonomic device that's still a perfectly good e-reader even after 5 years.