Paperwhite Second Gen: First Impressions

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by jswinden

With the release of the PW1 last year we started to no longer take Kindle quality for granted.

I think it's because of the falling prices. The first Kindles started out at like... what... €400? Now a basic Kindle kost something like €50. Something has to break, and most often, it's quality control.

Originally Posted by Katsunami

Therefore, the pinhole would probably become invisible if you turn the light off.

Not necessarily. If the pinholes are actually holes within the light layer, or some sort of material defect, then they might still show up with the light off. Ambient room light might cause the defect to shine.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by sirmaru

I looked at your two images and didn't see any pin holes. Now I know its my vision and probably the vision of most others just not able to see pin holes.

Most people have less than perfect vision.

Edit: I looked again and spotted one very faint pin hole in the lower left of the second image. I believe that the Chinese kids doing the QC simply have vision like me and all these units are getting through. We Asians do have worse vision then Westerners for the most part.

You really need to stop saying you have 20/20 because if you can't see these then you need your eyes checked. I circled the pinholes for you and the one stuck pixel. These pinholes glow but you can't capture that on a photo.

Wow Sparklemotion that is one really defective screen. I can't believe it got passed QC!

[sparklemotion]

Originally Posted by Blossom

You really need to stop saying you have 20/20 because if you can't see these then you need your eyes checked. I circled the pinholes for you and the one stuck pixel. These pinholes glow but you can't capture that on a photo.

Wow Sparklemom that is one really defective screen. I can't believe it got passed QC!

I know it was pretty pitiful. And those were just the ones on the bottom of the screen.

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by sparklemotion

I know it was pretty pitiful. And those were just the ones on the bottom of the screen.

There were more? Oh my! You really got a bad one there. Which one was that?

Sorry I got your username wrong it's been edited. I just woke up.

[soulfuldog]

Originally Posted by ixtab

I guess that nobody would be upset if every Kindle was perfectly lit, had perfect contrast, etc. But for the time being, the technology just doesn't seem to be 100% perfect, and there are some small irregularities. I simply fail to understand the huge buzz around those. It seems like some people are simply unable to live with a 99.5% good device, but need at least 101%.

Fair point, to an extent. Some people are picky, and a times it does seem like a lot of people are over critical and looking for faults even if they aren't obvious. But you must be able to appreciate that even a single pinhole, if it's fairly bright and is somewhere on the screen that it shows up on the text of your book, can be very off-putting. The screen might be 99.5% perfect, but you might find your eye drawn to that imperfection all the time.

Amazon might be selling the PW at pretty much cost price, but when I am paying over £100 for something, I expect it to be without any obvious flaws. Slight imperfections like a single tiny pinhole near the edge of the screen are one thing, a scattering of pinholes, uneven lighting etc are entirely different. If the product isn't up to a high standard, why should I be expected to spend £100 on it? It's not a particularly insignificant amount of money.

Originally Posted by gouni

This is not yours but mine sent by mistake at home.

You must make it to me.

In Exchange I will give you a cookie.

Nice try!

Originally Posted by jgsmith

For those that are unhappy with their PW2s, given the following 2 choices...and ONLY these choices, what would you choose?

1. The PW2 you are unhappy with

or

2. A new Kobo Aura, running Kindle software

Hypothetically (since I don't have a PW2 yet) but if you replace the Aura with the Aura HD, then it's an easy answer to say the Aura HD with Kindle software. But since the Aura suffers from some of the same issues (pinholes) as the PW, and more of it's own (diamond pattern on screen, bright line near the top), I'd stick with the PW....

[Yolina]

Originally Posted by Blossom

Wow Sparklemotion that is one really defective screen. I can't believe it got passed QC!

That looks really bad indeed. They must have put it aside with a note that this unit must be sent to Sparklemotion

I've just loaded a fully black page on mine and I can confirm that I have absolutely no pinholes whatsoever

[Josieb1]

Originally Posted by jswinden

I posted this much earlier in this thread, but I will repeat it again here. I would prefer to pay $200 for a guaranteed good quality reader rather $120 for a crap shoot reader where you never know what you will get until you open the box. We never worried much about the quality of our Kindles until the Touch was released. With the release of the PW1 last year we started to no longer take Kindle quality for granted.

Mines due tomorrow, I've seen a gorgeous demo model but I know it's a 50/50 what I actually end up with.

Annoying tbh.

[sirmaru]

Originally Posted by Blossom

You really need to stop saying you have 20/20 because if you can't see these then you need your eyes checked. I circled the pinholes for you and the one stuck pixel. These pinholes glow but you can't capture that on a photo.

Wow Sparklemotion that is one really defective screen. I can't believe it got passed QC!

With the circles I can see them but they are so faint as to be irrelevant to me.

I get my eyes checked 4 times per year because of the macular degeneration for which there is no cure. Checking that won't cure it. I can also see through the cataract with just an effect of nearsightedness ever so slightly.

However, I can read on the PC monitor, my Kindle screens and other printed material PERFECTLY. I don't need to detect pin holes in my situation.

The fact that I am reading this now without any glasses or surgery and almost every pin hole "fan" probably has eye glass corrected vision may also be a factor here. Maybe the eye glasses exaggerate the pin holes.

As I said earlier, MOST folks have defective vision making PIN holes irrelevant to them. That is the reason I have always received Kindles with perfect screens. I cannot see the defects seen by others.

By the way, there was a video testimonial on the review section of the PW 2013 saying that a 90 year old woman with macular degeneration, who could not read any books for TEN YEARS, was able to now read clearly with the PW 2013. Maybe Amazon is catering to the elderly like me and focusing on giving us good reading experiences and simply forgetting those with eye glass perfected vision who are bothered by pin holes.

[sparklemotion]

Originally Posted by Blossom

There were more? Oh my! You really got a bad one there. Which one was that?

Sorry I got your username wrong it's been edited. I just woke up.

Yes! There were maybe 4 or 5 more (yes, really) in the middle and near the top of the screen. I kept finding new ones. Crazy, eh? It also had black specks too. Some were tiny, some larger. It was the last one I picked up at Best Buy. I returned it already - of course! I didn't even notice you had my user name wrong, too funny what you used. LOL.

Originally Posted by Yolina

That looks really bad indeed. They must have put it aside with a note that this unit must be sent to Sparklemotion

Clearly I have a black PW cloud hanging over my head!

[Yolina]

Originally Posted by Josieb1

Mines due tomorrow, I've seen a gorgeous demo model but I know it's a 50/50 what I actually end up with.

Annoying tbh.

When I got mine last week, I spent 5 minutes no daring to open the box and then followed with a huge sigh of relief when I saw it was a good one.

Fingers crossed for you.

[Chi Cygni]

Originally Posted by Yolina

When I got mine last week, I spent 5 minutes no daring to open the box and then followed with a huge sigh of relief when I saw it was a good one.

Fingers crossed for you.

I did the same with my box a while ago! Somebody said in another thread it felt like defusing a bomb

[Katsunami]

Originally Posted by Chi Cygni

I did the same with my box a while ago! Somebody said in another thread it felt like defusing a bomb

It's an "e-BOOM"!

[RDaneel54]

Originally Posted by sparklemotion

For those you don't have pinholes, and are curious what they look like, I took pics when I had my last PW2 which was literally riddled with them. Many of which fell right on top of the text. They also look worse in person and are more obvious/annoying when reading at night.

Like stars in the sky. That would be hard to avoid seeing.

Thanks, now I know what people are concerned with.

[sparklemotion]

Originally Posted by RDaneel54

Like stars in the sky. That would be hard to avoid seeing.

Thanks, now I know what people are concerned with.

You're welcome.