Thinking of a Nook Color

[aagstn]

Originally Posted by jocampo

Actually, it is not. In terms of contrasts, measured with a colorimeter, the pearl screen is better than initial versions of the eink screen. Human eyes need good contrast for reading and that is better achieved with the pearl eink screen. A statement from the company who manufactures both, clarifies the same topic and confirms it.

Pearl is so overrated. The differences between the two are very slight and the fact the nook supports ePub greatly trumps any minor advantage of Pearl. The Kindle is a fine piece of hardware, but being forced to break the law if you want books from the library or any other DRMed source besides Amazon kills any interest I could ever have in one.

I have both Nooks and I read mostly on the Color. I don't have the LCD problems some people have and find the high res screen of the Color to be easy to read on for hours. I would highly recommend it as the first choice for anyone getting a reader with the classic nook second. I think the Color is worth the extra cost even if you don't root it. I had mine rooted for awhile and went back to stock. It does a great job out of the box with ePubs and PDFs, plus you get a solid browser, Pandora, video playback and a few games. Soon we will also get a bunch of new apps that should give a lot of options for people that don't want to root their devices. Its a steal for $250.

[jocampo]

Originally Posted by aagstn

Pearl is so overrated. The differences between the two are very slight and the fact the nook supports ePub greatly trumps any minor advantage of Pearl. The Kindle is a fine piece of hardware, but being forced to break the law if you want books from the library or any other DRMed source besides Amazon kills any interest I could ever have in one.

I have both Nooks and I read mostly on the Color. I don't have the LCD problems some people have and find the high res screen of the Color to be easy to read on for hours. I would highly recommend it as the first choice for anyone getting a reader with the classic nook second. I think the Color is worth the extra cost even if you don't root it. I had mine rooted for awhile and went back to stock. It does a great job out of the box with ePubs and PDFs, plus you get a solid browser, Pandora, video playback and a few games. Soon we will also get a bunch of new apps that should give a lot of options for people that don't want to root their devices. Its a steal for $250.

I do not advocate for illegal stuff, but if you browse the forums people break DRM protections all the time, it is has nothing to do with the azw format or Kindle vs Nook, regardless of the reader you have.

Now, not all people read or lend from public libraries. Actually, the kind of books that I read and like cannot be found in a public library, so the importance of ePub ends there. Most books and major best sellers can be found in any mobi or azw store.

I don't want to debate why you like the Nook or not, that's a personal choice of course, but the long and discussed topic of ePUb vs MOBI looses any means when you put non-DRM protected books on the plate; on that particular case any format can be read on any reader via conversion, period.

Color for novels or short tales is useless in my opinion. Color is important, like I said in my previous post, when you read Magazines or documents which of course need color. El Quijote reads the same in color or black and white.

With all respect, PDF and Browsing on an stock Nook Color are really bad. If you think is good, try Dolphin in an Android Device or ThinkFree for PDF, so you can see the difference.

On a stock Nook Color you cannot retain the page you are. So let's say you are reading a 500 pages PDF document; next time you open same PDF, you will have to scroll or move lot of pages just to find that one again. That's annoying.

The stock browser has major problems as well. It does not read some email attachments and is painfully slow when you compare to other Android browsers, even the default one.

Going back to the OP's main question: for a mix reading/browsing experience, the Nook Color would be the best choice, even without rooting, but as a dedicated ereader, any of the popular eink devices would be a wise choice.

[MsCG1]

To the OP;

I have both an eink Nook and a Nookcolor. I was forced to sacrifice my eink Nook for about 3 weeks after my daughter's eink Nook broke and we had to send it back to BN, so she used mine.
In it's place, I had to use the Nookcolor solely for reading.

My NC IS rooted, but I don't use any of the reading apps, I still prefer BN's stock reading program. While I didn't experience a lick of eye strain or hand fatigue from it's weight, I just thought it was weird reading on it during the day. One of the reasons I love eink is because once you're engrossed in the story, it really does feel like you're reading a physical paper book.
I was never able to quite get past the shininess and loveliness of the Nookcolor. I think it was a bit "too" pretty, if that makes any sense.

But at night? It's invaluable, and I've pretty much retired my eink Nook for night reading, period. No hassling with book lights, being able to snuggle under the covers and lie any way I want without having to adjust the light is the best, and at night, my mind didn't have trouble accepting the fact that I was reading on an LCD screen rather than eink.

I would also like to note that I own a netbook, and have tried reading on an iPad for an extended period of time, and I found both to be annoying and unsuitable. I'm not sure what kind of anti-glare screen BN has on the Nook, but I can't really compare reading on the Nookcolor to any other LCD device. It's just far superior.

So, my issues with having the Nookcolor as my primary reading device was pretty much a mental thing, I just can't get over that I'm supposed to read on something that looks like printed paper. But it had nothing to do with eye strain, or eye fatigue or anything like that.
I now read magazines, comics, and all web and news blogs exclusively through the Nookcolor as well, so I spend a ton of time reading on it. Just with books during the day, I prefer the eink Nook.

Since you already know what it's like reading on a Nook, I would suggest buying the Nookcolor and giving it a test run. The worst that can happen is that you won't like it, and you'll have to return it back to BN for a full refund.

[aagstn]

Originally Posted by jocampo

With all respect, PDF and Browsing on an stock Nook Color are really bad. If you think is good, try Dolphin in an Android Device or ThinkFree for PDF, so you can see the difference.

On a stock Nook Color you cannot retain the page you are. So let's say you are reading a 500 pages PDF document; next time you open same PDF, you will have to scroll or move lot of pages just to find that one again. That's annoying.

The stock browser has major problems as well. It does not read some email attachments and is painfully slow when you compare to other Android browsers, even the default one.

Going back to the OP's main question: for a mix reading/browsing experience, the Nook Color would be the best choice, even without rooting, but as a dedicated ereader, any of the popular eink devices would be a wise choice.

The PDF reading is not bad. Yeah there are better options out there for rooted devices, but I have read 10 PDFs on my Nook Color and had no issues at all. You copy your book over from Adobe and it formats nicely on the Color and you can put bookmarks and change font sizes. It also remembers the last page you are on. Really all I ask for in a PDF reader. What you are complaining about is the other PDF reader for non DRMed books and that one doesn't remember where you left off. However, I expect that to be fixed in a future update. If they can get PDF working well for DRM content there is no reason they can't fix it for non DRM books. If that is a major concern you just root the device. At least color has an option. On eink devices PDFs are unreadable and there is no way around it but buying a giant DX Kindle.

I also use the stock browser and find it very useful. I used Dolphin for awhile, but found the built in browser to work just as well for the websites I use. There might be an exception here and there, but it works fine overall.

The built in PDF and web support are definitely better than anything you will find on a regular eink device. I also take issue that a color device is not good for reading novels. I find the contrast excellent and the fonts razor sharp. I can also switch the background colors depending on the place I'm reading. I know there are a few people that can't read on LCD, but if you can the Color is a better reading experience anywhere but outside in sunlight. Outside is the only place an eink device is better.