PRS 650 or Kindle 3

[DrZoidberg]

For me the biggest difference is ideological. Do I want to be tightly controlled by one company for my content, or do I want the freedom to turn anywhere?

The good thing with tightly controlled environments, is that there are zero hassles. Everything just works. The bad thing is that your options are limited as to where you get your books from.

Remember that a Kindle book is only readable on a Kindle reader. What happens in a few years if you want to read the same book again, on a newer and better reader? Creating monopolies in the market has historically never ended well, and ultimately I think the Kindle model is doomed, which will leave you pretty stranded when it does (if you have a Kindle).

[phenomshel]

Originally Posted by Prince Hal

So, I cancelled my order for the Kindle 3 and went to order the PRS650. Got through to the confirm page on the SonyStyle website and got a message that there was a technical error on the site and I should try again later. Took this as a sign from the eReader angel that it should be a K3. So re-ordered the Kindle, with a ship date of the 20th September. Considering re-cancelling and getting a PRS650. I need counselling and medication. I am glad I am not like this in my job.

Bless your heart, and again, no offense intended, but this made me laugh out loud. I so know where you're coming from, I've been on the "K3/Nook Nook/K3" carousel recently....which is probably why I found it so funny.

Originally Posted by Prince Hal

Funny thing is that when I cancelled the Kindle, the case had already shipped. I thought about just buying paperbacks and putting them into the Kindle case, then I wouldn't have to worry about whether it should be a Kindle or a Sony.

What I did notice however is that Sony charge tax and Amazon didn't. So the Sony with a case was going to be about $280 and the K3 with case only $174.

Stay glued, who knows where I might end up..... with a Nook? I see the PRS600 is down to $139 plus tax at Borders. So, over $90 cheaper. Maybe at that price it's worth a try and then see what the next generation will be like next year.

You see, now I need more medication!!

It was a reallllyyyy close race for me between Sony and Nook. What did it for me (besides availability when I had the money), was that I don't like the separation of stuff you buy from "their" store vs. stuff you buy everywhere else. I didn't get a screaming deal on the 600 I bought this weekend, but it was good enough that I didn't mind the amount over a Nook.

Originally Posted by sigma8

Have you played around with the Nook's LCD screen? It's horrible. It's like a using jailbroken iPhone multitasking a half dozen apps at once. Choppy. Laggy. One wonders why they bothered using LCD instead of eInk if it's going to be that laggy. What good are animated transitions when the whole thing is running at 6 frames per second?

This is just my opinion, but I don't think B&N stands strongly behind their product. It looks to me like some qualified person put together a christmas list of features, but nobody seemed to ensure that they were implemented well.

You must have played with an early in store model. The new firmwares have substantially changed the behavior of the touchscreen. All the ones I've seen have been snappy to respond and seem like they'd be fun to use on a daily basis.

Originally Posted by polly

One consideration that no one's mentioned is organizational abilities on the reader. As I understand it, the Kindle and Nook both let you list by author, title, and maybe date added. The Sony collections, built from metadata provide an impressive ability to group books by type, series, etc. I like being able to carry lots of books on my reader, so being able to organize into collections or folders is a key requirement for me. Say what you like about the Sony readers, they have a nice user interface.

If you read books with table of contents or periodicals with links to articles, a touchscreen is much better than a keyboard for navigation. And speaking of navigation, swiping the screen, rocking a switch, or tilting the reader is better for my arthritic thumbs than pushing a button to turn pages. Alas, the PocketPro is the only one with a rocker and tilting the reader requires an accelerometer, missing in both the Sony and Kindle.

Personally, yeah, I'm loving the Collections on the Sony. I'm using Calibre to manage the content, and it's putting them on the Reader just like I have them organized in Calibre. Nice.

Originally Posted by DrZoidberg

For me the biggest difference is ideological. Do I want to be tightly controlled by one company for my content, or do I want the freedom to turn anywhere?

The good thing with tightly controlled environments, is that there are zero hassles. Everything just works. The bad thing is that your options are limited as to where you get your books from.

Remember that a Kindle book is only readable on a Kindle reader. What happens in a few years if you want to read the same book again, on a newer and better reader? Creating monopolies in the market has historically never ended well, and ultimately I think the Kindle model is doomed, which will leave you pretty stranded when it does (if you have a Kindle).

Well, there are ways around that, which have been mentioned. But for straight no breaking DRM, no conversions, the Sony is good for buying from just about anywhere that sells ePubs...and most places other than Amazon do. Amazon scared me with the whole MacMillan and Penguin debacles earlier in the year. Imagine...you have a bright shiny new K3, and Amazon decides to make a statement and pull books by the publisher that you're eagerly awaiting a release from one of their authors. Suddenly, you're left with no way to buy that book...unless you want to acquire a new skill really fast...(how to break the DRM and convert to mobi). There's no saying Sony might not take the same stand later, but even if they do, there are a lot of other sources for ePub books, not only the Sony store.

[sigma8]

Originally Posted by phenomshel

You must have played with an early in store model. The new firmwares have substantially changed the behavior of the touchscreen. All the ones I've seen have been snappy to respond and seem like they'd be fun to use on a daily basis.

I play with Nooks almost every time I walk into a B&N. One time I asked if it was the new firmware and they said yes. For a Nook user, maybe the firmware seems significant, and I'm sure if I had a list of what it had improved, I'd be impressed. But for an outsider who just picks one up, both pre- and post- firmware, and gives it a quick test drive, they seem the same to me. I think the book cover scrolling was a little bit nicer (still bad), but the normal menu vertical scrolling was just as poor as before.

Blame Apple, but I don't want to deal with choppy, laggy, graphical UI's anymore. If it's going to be choppy and laggy, I'd rather forego with it entirely and use a non-animated and/or text-based UI that works well with its limitations.

I really want to like the Nook, it sounds awesome on paper, but as far as I'm concerned, they're cutting too many corners. Of course, the big silver lining is that--as with any eBook reader--once you get past the UI and are into reading your book for the long haul, the UI is largely irrelevant.

[darex2]

I very nearly bought a K3, but it sounds like they're having lots of quality control issues: poorly assembled cases, things rattling around inside, units that die after only a week, frequent crashes, etc... No this wasn't the majority of units, but it was a sizable number of them (at least one guy was on his third replacement unit, and it too was failing).

Maybe my impression is inaccurate, but I'm not accustomed to reading about so many failures in a new product. I wonder if many of the others' are similarly soon to fail. It made me too nervous to buy one, since upgrading my 505 is a questionable exercise in the first place, since there's nothing wrong with it.

Sony's, as we know, are built rock-solidly, and are reliable and don't crash.

I just don't want to risk buying a lemon of a book reader, so I'm sticking with Sony (the 350 or 650).

[eswarjj]

Originally Posted by sigma8

Have you played around with the Nook's LCD screen? It's horrible. It's like a using jailbroken iPhone multitasking a half dozen apps at once. Choppy. Laggy. One wonders why they bothered using LCD instead of eInk if it's going to be that laggy. What good are animated transitions when the whole thing is running at 6 frames per second?

)

concur on the nook interface and over clunkiness. It is as though they came out with the best interface design and then reversed all their decisions on purpose. I don't think an interface can be this clunky unless by design.