E reader for impaired sight?

[Elegantsuffish]

A search in this forum for specific advice about ereaders for someone with MD produced answers from 2013, so please, forgive me for asking the question again. I appreciate the advice offered in earlier threads - thank you - but perhaps there are now new e-readers worthy of recommendation?

My 90 year old m-i-l, recently diagnosed, currently uses an old, original Kindle 3 with the 6" screen. We read about the DX and the larger screen, but it appears to be discontinued. As a result, maybe we need to look beyond Kindle?

Any advice would be gratefully received.

[meeera]

Originally Posted by Elegantsuffish

A search in this forum for specific advice about ereaders for someone with MD produced answers from 2013, so please, forgive me for asking the question again. I appreciate the advice offered in earlier threads - thank you - but perhaps there are now new e-readers worthy of recommendation?

My 90 year old m-i-l, recently diagnosed, currently uses an old, original Kindle 3 with the 6" screen. We read about the DX and the larger screen, but it appears to be discontinued. As a result, maybe we need to look beyond Kindle?

Any advice would be gratefully received.

Tablet or e-ink? There are plenty of large tablets on the market, and the pluses there might be the potential for voice control, text-to-speech etc to cater for future needs; as well as a bright screen and various choices of app (including public library apps as well as various reader apps etc). They're also less fragile than e-ink devices.

Downsides can be battery life, weight, and the fact that _some_ people find reading on an LCD/LED screen more tiring (though fine-tuning brightness and background colour can help a lot with that).

Choices in e-ink are much more limited, but search the forums for recent threads on large screen e-ink readers - there are a fair few discussions about it.

If you're just looking for a slightly larger screen than the standard six inch rather than much larger, the Kobo H2O is a lovely device.

[Feher]

You can wait for Onyx i86 ML. It will be an 8 inch eReader with front light

[HarryT]

Are you looking for devices with a large screen, or devices with a text-to-speech capability?

[Elegantsuffish]

Thank you for such prompt replies.

Since m-i-l is used to the Kindle interface, I guess that's where we begin, but I realise that there's a wider choice now than when we were when we last purchased an e reader and of course, the parameters have changed with her recent diagnosis. What your answers have prompted me to do is to give her one of our tablets to try (we both have Android 10" screens) to see whether the reflection of the shiny screen is an issue. Of course, one of the benefits of an e reader vs a tablet is the relative weights - holding a tablet for any length of time could be uncomfortable and though we could rig up some kind of stand or support, right now we are trying to minimise the impact of any changes in "normal" life. So, sitting in an easy chair and picking up a book to read for the odd ten minutes is still something she can do without the need to make elaborate arrangements.

Another question - will changing from Kindle to another e reader mean losing all the books she already has on her Kindle account?

Lots to think about!

[darryl]

If she can read on your tablet comfortably with Kindle for Android, you could probably do a lot worse than a Kindle Fire. They start at 6 inch, the next is 7 inch, and larger. There will be no problems reading existing Kindle Books.

If E-Ink is preferred, then the Kindle Voyage has a great frontlight and very high resolution text (300 dpi). It is a huge leap forward from her existing Kindle, but still 6 inch. If you prefer a larger screen, the Kobo Aura H2O is probably your best choice. In this case you would need to use Calibre to convert her existing Kindle books to EPub. For those ebooks with DRM (DIgital Rights Management) you would also need to install Apprentice Alf's tools to remove the DRM before you would be able to convert. Reading books with DRM in the actual Kindle format generally requires a Kindle or a Kindle Application. This pretty well means a Kindle or Kindle Fire, or a PC, Mac or Android device running the Kindle App. Otherwise you need to remove DRM and convert to read.

Finally, later Kindles, even the Voyage, do not support Text to Speech, nor does the H2O. I believe Kindle Fire tablets and Kindle software on Android Devices do, but you would need to check this. If you want TTS on an e-ink device, this does limit your choices. In this case I would not recommend the Lynx T68, but a Boyue T62 works well and represents good value for money. But Android is not optimised for either e-readers or e-ink, so battery life is usually much less and some applications do not work well or at all without a colour display. I can't talk about other alternatives off the top of my head, but I'm sure others will contribute.

[susan_cassidy]

The Fires also have Voice Guide, which talks you through selecting everything on the screen, so that even a blind person can use it. Might be a wise choice.

[Elegantsuffish]

What interesting and useful thoughts! I'm a Kindle Voyage user myself, so she can give that a try pretty easily and my dh uses a Kindle Paperwhite, so I guess you can tell why we haven't much of an idea of what else is out there :-)

Of course, the main thing is that m-i-l herself is involved in the decision making process. We need to take her out for a few test drives. When/if we reach a decision, I'll let you know what and why. In the meantime, many thanks from us for the shared experience to manage what is, for all of us, a somewhat challenging diagnosis for someone who values her independence so greatly. It's small (?) things like being able to take refuge in a favourite book which make all the difference to all of our lives, isn't it?