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Old 11-02-2024, 11:31 AM   #187
Hollow Man
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Posts: 425
Karma: 2000000
Join Date: Feb 2011
Location: Connecticut
Device: Kindle Colorsoft, Oasis, Keyboard; iPhone 13 Pro, Air
Here are a few comments on the Colorsoft, which I've had since Thursday night. The only other readers I own are the Kindle Keyboard and original Oasis (although my wife has owned a couple of the original Paperwhites that don't have a flush screen).

The "screen door" effect that is on the competitions' readers is there, but for me it isn't an issue; it's simply a different texture. The text is slightly less sharp than my Oasis. Neither of these things are noticeable when I read at a standard distance. If I take my eyeglasses off, I have to read with it closer to my face, and then I can see these things, but neither bother me.

The slider to adjust the warmth of the lighting has a wide range. At the lowest setting, with my room's warm lighting on, the screen is very blue. At the high end, it's extremely orange. Somewhere between 5 and 10 gives a nice balance of warmth that looks more like book paper than the Oasis can do (the Oasis is more akin to white computer paper). All of this varies on your room lighting, plus how much natural light is also hitting the screen.

Using the light is essential, because the screen without it is very dark (I'd say slightly worse contrast than my Kindle Keyboard). This means that when inside you'll always want to use the light, and when outdoors, while acceptable, isn't nearly as nice an experience as my Oasis. This also means that if you set the "screensaver" to show a book cover, even though it's now in color, it doesn't pop the way I'd hoped.

It is absurdly quick compared to my Oasis. Page turns are instantaneous, and going through the menus and their options is much speedier. All the color covers make scrolling though your library a more pleasurable experience.

The biggest issue, by far, is the dreaded "yellow hue" at the bottom of the screen you've likely read about on Reddit. To elaborate, it manifests itself as an overall unevenness in lighting (it is not present when the light is off) over the whole screen. This will change slightly depending on the warmth chosen, but overall, it manifests itself as being slightly cooler/pink in the upper-left, and warmer/amber in the lower right. The shift from left to right is very hard to notice, and most people also don't notice the top shift.

I am convinced this issue is on all Colorsofts (multiple people say they've exchanged it and the replacements also have the issue), and seems to also affect the new Paperwhites. Some people don't notice it; it will vary depending on the lighting conditions in the room, how much brightness and warmth you've dialed in, and one's overall sensitivity to it.

Amazon has told some people that engineers are working on a software fix. This seems like a hardware problem, but maybe they can do something via software, depending on how much control they have over each individual light, to minimize it.

I'm going to hang onto it. With luck they'll tweak the lighting issue, and for days I want to read outside, if I find I want the best contrast I can get, I'll go back to my Oasis those days. Considering it also has some unevenness in the lighting (but you have to be really particular to see it!), and Amazon never made another reader with a rechargeable cover (I'm still dealing with the issues that has created over the years), let's just say I'm used to their lack of being able to get things right the first time.
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