Should I Get a Kindle DX for Reading Textbooks in Bed and Around Campus?

[Shakenbake158]

Hey guys, I am thinking about picking up a Kindle DX for about $100 so I could read some of my textbooks more easily in bed, and in the coffee shop.
I am tired of carrying around my textbook everywhere, especially when I just need to read them, for calculs I can understand taking the book to do problems out of.
But if I am just reading, I feel like the Kindle DX would be a good option.
What do you guys think? Worth it? or get an iPad for $300 more, which is money I would like to save.

[Anagnostis]

My opinion is that for textbooks an e-reader with e ink is the more convenient way to read .
But why you choose the "bulky" DX instead the Paperwhite ?
It is lighter,smaller,"goes everywhere" with ease , you can read comfortably with one hand and under every lighting condition .

[Shakenbake158]

Originally Posted by Anagnostis

My opinion is that for textbooks an e-reader with e ink is the more convenient way to read .
But why you choose the "bulky" DX instead the Paperwhite ?
It is lighter,smaller,"goes everywhere" with ease , you can read comfortably with one hand and under every lighting condition .

Well I thought that the DX would be nice because of the larger screen, more words on the page and such.

[eschwartz]

Originally Posted by Anagnostis

My opinion is that for textbooks an e-reader with e ink is the more convenient way to read .
But why you choose the "bulky" DX instead the Paperwhite ?
It is lighter,smaller,"goes everywhere" with ease , you can read comfortably with one hand and under every lighting condition .

Because any textbook will most likely be a Print Replica, and is a PDF in a wrapper. You NEED a bigger screen so you don't have to constantly zoom and pan around to read it. The DX was created for one reason and one reason only -- to work well with PDFs where the rest of the e-ink Kindles are absolutely horrible at it.

Originally Posted by Shakenbake158

Well I thought that the DX would be nice because of the larger screen, more words on the page and such.

And there is that too.

But if I were you, I'd go with a tablet, since the Kindle DX is an aging device . Try the Kindle Fire, it's much cheaper than the iPad, and is integrated with the Kindle Store.

There are people who get very excited about the clarity of the iPad's retina display and highly recommend it (I'm thinking of you, HarryT!) but even he would agree that it's only worth it if you really want to spend the money on it (as a premium feature), as the Kindle Fire still has a very decent display


EDIT: And apparently Print Replica is not yet supported on anything other than the Kindle Fires and the device/PC apps anyway.

[JimMcLaren]

I have a Pocketbook 912 which I bought for reading PDFs. It's good for that but it's kind of bulky. I'm trying to sell it at a huge loss now. I've switched to the Nook HD+ for reading PDfs. As far as I'm concerned, Mantano is the absolute best software for reading (most) PDFs. There are a few it has a hard time with but for the vast majority of documents it's great. It will automatically crop margins and if you don't like the way it crops you can set manual margins. If you crop the document and read in landscape there is very little downside. Full page graphics are a problem but not as much as you might think.

I'm currently running Kitkat on my HD+ but Mantano ran just fine even before I installed a custom ROM. I'd recommend the Nook over the PB, probably the DX but can't say for sure. I've stopped reading on anything else and the price is right. I got it for $179 six weeks ago.

[markom]

Originally Posted by Shakenbake158

Hey guys, I am thinking about picking up a Kindle DX for about $100 so I could read some of my textbooks more easily in bed, and in the coffee shop.
I am tired of carrying around my textbook everywhere, especially when I just need to read them, for calculs I can understand taking the book to do problems out of.
But if I am just reading, I feel like the Kindle DX would be a good option.
What do you guys think? Worth it? or get an iPad for $300 more, which is money I would like to save.

Kindle DX is very good reader for pdf, djvu, epub, mobi, cbz and html files but only after installation of kindlepdfviewer thereon.

https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...d.php?t=157047

If there is need for handwriting capability, color, multitasking etc. you can use cheap iPad 1 or iPad mini simultaneously while reading on DX as I usually do.

You can even use iPad for reading outdoors but you will need good ultra antiglare matte screen protector.

[Dr. Drib]

Although I agree with most of the comments above, I would like to add that $100 is an EXCELLENT price, as long as it's the Kindle DX-G.

If that price is for the DX (and not the 'G'), then my advice would be to stay away from it.

[LiterateFish]

Just a word of caution in reading etext books purchased through Amazon is that not all have real page numbers; a good many still use location numbers instead. I'm currently in the last semester of an MS program and this was an issue I ran into when I excitedly bought my first etext books. Without the page numbers it was difficult to cite the text for research and it posed some issues when communicating with classmates and the professor. I ended up having to purchase the print editions and paid extra that semester for books.