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Although the original poster made the decision to go with the Nexus 7 (and I have no issue with his decision or the recommendations made by other posters) for the benefit of others who may read this thread and are considering an android tablet, I'd like to add to the discussion with my recommendation.
I've owned and used more than a dozen e-ink readers and tablets, going all the way back to the Rocketbook/Gemstar e-reader in 2000. I owned several other early e-readers before settling on Kindles in 2008. I currently do most of my reading on a Kindle Paperwhite and am generally very pleased with it. The only real complaints I have is it's lack of epub support and that the 6" screen makes it a poor choice for reading most pdf's.
As for tablets, I owned an original Kindle Fire and still own an original Nexus 7, although my wife is now the primary user of the Nexus 7. In my opinion, the Nexus 7 is far superior to the original Fire in every respect, unless you care about access to Amazon videos.
Since I use an e-ink Kindle for most of my reading, my primary uses for a tablet are for email and internet browsing, watching videos and playing music, and for reading PDFs and magazines. Even though I enjoyed my Nexus 7, I found the 7" screen too small to really enjoy watching videos and for PDFs and magazines.
So, a few months ago I decided to upgrade to a larger screen tablet and began considering my alternatives. I ruled out many because of price, including iPad, Nexus 10 and Samsung Galaxy Note 10.1. Most budget tablets didn't come in larger screen sizes or had very low-end specs and poor reviews.
This left me with two choices, the Kindle Fire HD 8.9 priced at $269 or the Nook HD+ which B&N had recently reduced to $149. To me, the biggest advantage to the KF is Amazon's outstanding customer service and support but I couldn't justify paying almost twice as much on this basis alone.
Reading side by side comparisons of the specs, most reviewers gave the edge to the HD+ but the differences weren't great except in two respects. First, the HD+ has access to Google Play. Secondly, the HD+ has an sd card expansion slot. Not only does this allow for expanded storage but more importantly to me, it meant that I could buy a preconfigured dual boot sd card which would allow me to run the latest version of the stock android operating system without rooting it and running the risk of bricking or voiding my warranty.
These two differences, coupled with the lower price, made it an easy decision for me. I bought the HD+ and have been using it now for about three months. I absolutely love it. The large screen HD display is great. I've had no problems with it and haven't needed customer service or support so can't comment on the quality of Nook support although I'm aware of how dissatisfied some B&N customers have been.
So far, I've been running the stock Nook OS and haven't bothered getting a dual boot card for it, although I probably will do so at some point. Based on my experiences, I highly recommend the Nook HD+ and consider it to be one of the best tech bargains on the market.
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