PW2 Problems?

[booklover1]

Hi I have problems with the PW2 and want to know if others have and whether a replacement will fix it?

1. What does having black dots on the screen indicate?

2. How long does a battery charge last for you guys. Mine doesnt last more than a month?

3. Finally I have grey shading/line at the bottom of the screen when the light is bright why is this?

[pidgeon92]

If you're going to be looking for problems on an eink reader, you will inevitably find them. It's not a perfect technology.

#1 depends on how large the dots are. All of my eink readers have tiny little black dots if I look closely enough. A larger black dot would indicate a broken eink capsule and would be considered a flaw in the screen.

#2 depends on how much you use the Kindle. I have to charge mine every couple of weeks.

#3 is subjective. It's hard to say if it is a flaw without seeing the screen in different lighting conditions. I suspect you are seeing this when you are in a low-lit room with the light on a bright setting?

[Section8]

About PW2 battery life - I haven't seen any noticeable difference in battery life between the PW2 and other eink readers I've used - Nook simple touch and Sony T1. One issue that I understand can shorten the PW2's battery life is indexing. If you put many books on it all at once, it can eat up the battery charge indexing them all. I always do that with it plugged in and leave it plugged in for a while to give it a chance to index them all.

[booklover1]

Originally Posted by pidgeon92

If you're going to be looking for problems on an eink reader, you will inevitably find them. It's not a perfect technology.

#1 depends on how large the dots are. All of my eink readers have tiny little black dots if I look closely enough. A larger black dot would indicate a broken eink capsule and would be considered a flaw in the screen.

#2 depends on how much you use the Kindle. I have to charge mine every couple of weeks.

#3 is subjective. It's hard to say if it is a flaw without seeing the screen in different lighting conditions. I suspect you are seeing this when you are in a low-lit room with the light on a bright setting?

The grey shading is there usually when I put the brightness up.

[Ripplinger]

The only real problem you might have is black dots on the screen. Do they never go away and stay in the same locations after every page turn? If they're always there like that, I'd call that a flaw, I've never had a reader with any black dots (or white dots or pinpricks of light either).

The battery life and shading is normal. The shading is caused by the LEDs at the bottom of the screen, and turning the light up to the highest setting just makes them more noticeable. It's from the placement of the LEDs right under the bezel at the bottom, and happens on every lighted reader to an extent. It's still more even lighting that you'd have on a real book, or with a light attached to an ereader.

[booklover1]

Sometimes the black dots to go away, its not permanent.

Also I have noticed after every page turn it refreshes the page with a black background, is there anyway to stop this from happening constantly as it can be distracting?

Ok so the shading is normal, thanks. What lighting setting would you advise and prevent the shading being more noticeable especially when at the highest setting?

[pidgeon92]

Originally Posted by booklover1

Also I have noticed after every page turn it refreshes the page with a black background, is there anyway to stop this from happening constantly as it can be distracting?

This is how all eink readers work. That said, on the PW2 you can go to Settings -> reading options and change the page refresh to off. This will change it to, I believe, a refresh every 6 page turns.

Originally Posted by booklover1

Ok so the shading is normal, thanks. What lighting setting would you advise and prevent the shading being more noticeable especially when at the highest setting?

Completely depends on the lighting in the room. If the light is low/very dark, I find somewhere between 6 and 9 to be perfect.

[Ripplinger]

Originally Posted by booklover1

Sometimes the black dots to go away, its not permanent.

Is it possibly a really poor quality book? Like a scanned PDF where whoever put it together didn't clean it up? Or do they pop up in every book no matter where purchased?

Originally Posted by booklover1

Also I have noticed after every page turn it refreshes the page with a black background, is there anyway to stop this from happening constantly as it can be distracting?

That's something that users quickly get used to. E-ink requires a refresh after xx page turns, otherwise you start to see ghosting from previous pages of the text and images. Have you actually used this reader often? It's sounding more like a first time user picking up an ereader and not knowing how e-ink works at all.

Originally Posted by booklover1

Ok so the shading is normal, thanks. What lighting setting would you advise and prevent the shading being more noticeable especially when at the highest setting?

As pidgeon92 said, it depends on your room light source, it depends on your eyes, it's all personal choice for the light level. For myself on the PW2, I keep the light on full all the time. When reading out in the sun, it just makes the page whiter, and the light on my PW2 isn't near as bright as on my Kobo Glo. There I keep the light set around 50% always. I don't have a need to keep changing it on either reader. Again, that's my personal choice, feel free to adjust it to whatever you're comfortable with while reading.