Japan - Only 32GB Kindle Paperwhite Announced.

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by Richwood

Quite probable as they are still available meaning Woot has a lot of them!

And sold out. I wonder how many bought 10 units for ebay or something.

[Wearever]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

The Manga version is the regular version just with 32GB because Manga is all graphics and take up much more space.

That makes sense, they would need the extra space.

[Wearever]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Manga
Manga
Manga

Please, not "magna"!

When considering the choice between the PW and the larger Oasis 2, another factor to consider is portability. The larger screen of the Oasis is great, but the device is almost square, and you really need a bag to carry it in. You can slip the PW into a pocket - it's much more portable.

Oops Sorry !

[ZodWallop]

Originally Posted by ilovejedd

And sold out. I wonder how many bought 10 units for ebay or something.

I was thinking the same.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by ZodWallop

I was thinking the same.

There are already a few eBay sellers offering "refurbished" Mangas. They start at $149. Which, really, if you're going to buy a Paperwhite anyhow, isn't too much more to pay for 28 more GBs of RAM.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Manga
Manga
Manga

Please, not "magna"!

An easy mistake to make. I had no idea what "manga" meant so just assumed my misread "magna" was something like "magnum" – like a more powerful magnum bullet compared to a standard one.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by ilovejedd

Brand new Paperwhite Manga model are still readily available and sold alongside 32GB 7" Oasis on Amazon JP. Again, the PW3 on Woot are just used models (which probably would have sold at half-price or less in Japan).

And I'd like to reiterate, the Paperwhite and Oasis target different market segments.

Paperwhite 32GB: ￥ 15,280
Kindle Oasis 32GB: ￥ 32,980

The question is ... why don't they sell the 32 GB Paperwhite in the U.S.? I would be tempted to say because they want to drive business to the 32 GB Oasis but, unless I'm wrong, the Manga was out long before the 32 GB Oasis. Meanwhile the Kindle line has one more member in Japan than in the U.S. (Also interesting, to me, is that there is no 3G option for the Manga.)

[jhowell]

Originally Posted by rcentros

The question is ... why don't they sell the 32 GB Paperwhite in the U.S.?

I suspect that answer is that they know Kindles bog down when too many books are installed and they want to avoid that problem.

The 32GB PaperWhite is meant for manga and the 32GB Oasis is meant for Audible, both of which require more storage per book than with regular e-books.

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by rcentros

The question is ... why don't they sell the 32 GB Paperwhite in the U.S.? I would be tempted to say because they want to drive business to the 32 GB Oasis but, unless I'm wrong, the Manga was out long before the 32 GB Oasis. Meanwhile the Kindle line has one more member in Japan than in the U.S. (Also interesting, to me, is that there is no 3G option for the Manga.)

Well, it's a Japan-only model. It's not like it's officially available in any other country and not just US.

I remember reading somewhere that one volume of One Piece sells like 6-8 million copies in Japan. Amazon's devices are really more a means to a goal - sell more Kindle books, get more Prime/Kindle Unlimited subscribers, etc. Viewed from that perspective, it makes sense that they'll want an inexpensive device targeted to manga readers in Japan.

Maybe Amazon doesn't expect a lot of e-ink manga readers in the US? Most US readers are also used to bigger books. I think American comics are typically 6.75" x 10". Even the smaller Tokyopop trim commonly used for manga is bigger than the typical Japanese tankobon. And given the prevalence of free pirated/unofficial manga scanlations, I think physical is the preferred format for actual manga buyers.

Iirc, someone (maybe HarryT?) did a test on a 32GB Oasis 2 and mentioned indexing greatly suffers somewhere past 5,000 books so keeping storage low on less expensive Kindles probably makes sense from a CPU perspective, too.

As for 3G, regular ebooks are what, typically less than 1MB to ~3MB? At 40MB for just one manga volume (maybe a 15 minute read), it's probably not practical to offer lifetime free 3G data for Amazon-purchased manga.

[ilovejedd]

By the way, last I checked, Batman sells ~100,000 copies per issue (pamphlet format), The Walking Dead ~70,000, Amazing Spider-Man ~60,000 and Superman ~50,000. Digital sales is estimated at 10-20% of those numbers.

Dunno how manga does in comparison but I assume the manga market in the US is not quite as lucrative as the one in Japan.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by jhowell

The 32GB PaperWhite is meant for manga and the 32GB Oasis is meant for Audible, both of which require more store per book than with regular e-books.

Okay, that makes sense. If Paperwhites bog down with a large number of titles then it makes sense that it's designed mostly for the manga market (I think i read that about 700 mangas fit on a 32 GB Paperwhite). That's probably also why they don't offer 3G on the manga edition – files would be much bigger and take up a whole lot more bandwidth, which could get expensive.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by ilovejedd

Dunno how manga does in comparison but I assume the manga market in the US is not quite as lucrative as the one in Japan.

Probably not, but I just figured that people (especially those who want an SD card slot in their Kindle) would like having the option of getting more RAM on their Paperwhite. It didn't occur to me that too many files might bog down the Kindle "experience." I also think Amazon with the fact that most of their customers probably use the Amazon to store their books.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by rcentros

The question is ... why don't they sell the 32 GB Paperwhite in the U.S.? I would be tempted to say because they want to drive business to the 32 GB Oasis but, unless I'm wrong, the Manga was out long before the 32 GB Oasis. Meanwhile the Kindle line has one more member in Japan than in the U.S. (Also interesting, to me, is that there is no 3G option for the Manga.)

Hmmm.... given the average size of a manga in ebook format, 3G might get expensive for Amazon. One number I ran across is that the 32GB Paperwhite would hold 700 mangas which gives an average 44MB each (assuming 2GB for OS and other fripperies).

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by DNSB

Hmmm.... given the average size of a manga in ebook format, 3G might get expensive for Amazon. One number I ran across is that the 32GB Paperwhite would hold 700 mangas which gives an average 44MB each (assuming 2GB for OS and other fripperies).

It's around 27-28GB usable space after OS and binary/decimal discrepancy.

Interestingly enough, for the Oasis 2, Amazon JP estimates only 650 manga volumes on the 32GB model and 140 on the 8GB one.

[DuckieTigger]

Originally Posted by ilovejedd

It's around 27-28GB usable space after OS and binary/decimal discrepancy.

Interestingly enough, for the Oasis 2, Amazon JP estimates only 650 manga volumes on the 32GB model and 140 on the 8GB one.

Not surprising. The screen is bigger allowing a higher resolution to be delivered to Oasis 2.