Quote:
Originally Posted by Doranwen
I should have mentioned that yes, he wants something with good battery life and easy on the eyes (LCD screens are not so much). Sorry it wasn't clear from my first post! I've never really considered a tablet because none of us in my family even have a smartphone; we don't do apps or any of that sort of thing. I have a massive desktop with a huge screen, but I'm of the sort that prefers to have more dedicated devices (and so's the rest of my family, pretty much). If we want a computer, we want a powerful computer, not a tablet (which is limited in its capability; none of us are that tied to our e-mail or Facebook or anything, so we don't feel the need to have it at our fingertips when away from home). (We do compromise on that by having laptops, but only because it'd be ridiculous to set up a desktop at someone's house unless you're there for several weeks at least.) If we want portable reading, we'd rather it be just for reading--easy on the eyes and last as long as possible, battery-wise.
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fair enough. the battery life issue is one i don't generally agree with since it's rare for anyone to sit and read for 6-8 hours straight with no breaks and without access to electricity of any kind. it's nothing more than a convenience. an eink device will last longer since the screen takes almost no power to display a static image, but with outlets all over the planet that's almost a moot point. potty break / food break = plug into charger time. no biggie.
"easier on the eyes" is about the only thing i'd agree with. there's methods to make a tablet's LED display be less tiring, and the upshot is that a tablet generally gives you (more) options. i read in night-mode all the time and it's not tiring at all. outside in the summer, an eink will win easily. in the evening, most eink devices rely on some form of room light to make text visible (not all have built-in lights). if your dad intends to read in bed in the evening, that might limit your choices (and those choices might be at odds with other things that he deems important)
if you / your dad are OK with a 6" device and primarily epubs, then an eink reader is the best option, of course. but once you say pdf and large screen, the trade-offs come quickly and options are limited. imagine a 2014 eink device handling a pdf the way a 1989 monochrome laptop handled pdfs. get your dad to watch some youtube video reviews of the devices and see if how they perform is OK with him or if it's far short of what he'll expect of a device.
it's nice to have a dedicated device for a task, but that usually means you pay more and get less. you don't need a smartphone to justify a tablet - my mom has a blackberry that she uses as only a phone and my old iPad mini that she uses for all sorts of tablet stuff (books, magazines, news feeds, games, etc). she's 65 and has crap eyes.
i use both tablets and einks, but i tend to grab whichever device that's easier and less limiting to actually use for what i want to read. 95% of the time it's one of the tablets.