Kindle 3 gripes - Page 7

Harmon · 09-04-2010, 10:11 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

Mimesis?

It would be within that category, but that's not specific to printed words.

Kumabjorn · 09-04-2010, 10:21 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Harmon

It would be within that category, but that's not specific to printed words.

And onomatopoeia is?

Ben Thornton · 09-04-2010, 11:58 AM

I've been having a few lock-ups. Seems to happen most when moving the cursor around to get to a link. The book that I'm reading has quite a few notes.

My only other gripe isn't really (mostly) Amazon's fault - it's the old gripe about sloppy formatting from publishers. The justification is also patchy (which is their fault) - a long word leaves a ragged right rather than increasing the kerning within the words.

So, my vote would be: (1) fix the reboots, then (2) improve the typography.

To be fair, they have made some improvements on (2) with this model.

Ben Thornton · 09-04-2010, 12:00 PM

On another topic on this thread (cases), I didn't like the look of the big cases either, and use the K3 without one. I carry it around in a padded envelope, which cost nothing.

ian-ep · 09-04-2010, 01:14 PM

I've now had my K3 since monday - my first ereader! Initial impressions were very positive, but I have to say my enthusiasm has cooled a bit in the ensuing days.

My three main gripes are thus:

1. It's shiny! Although fine in bright diffuse daylight, used under artificial light in the evening, I find it very hard to find - and maintain - a reading position that doesn't reflect my reading lightsource as big bright searchlight in the middle of the screen. Even the dark grey bevel, being slightly rounded, seems to catch every available light in the room and throw a big specular highlight at me.

2. It's grey! Again, the dirty grey 'paper' colour is OK in bright daylight, but in shade or under artificial light it becomes annoyingly - well, grey. I find myself constantly shifting reading position to get in a better light only to get blinded by the dreaded reflection!

3. Typography from hell! Perhaps naïvely, I had hoped the Kindle would have better typography than my 10+ year old Palm III. It doesn't. After all, it pretty much uses the same file format as the old Palm. But justified text without hyphenation? And no way to turn off the justification ... C'mon! That is insulting. Especially as it apparently used to be a feature of earlier versions of the Kindle. Hmm.

But lack of hyphenation (and inability to turn off justification) is only the most obvious of the typographical shortcomings. There seems to no widow/orphan support or 'keep options' as they would be called in a dtp app - eg. how many lines of text should always 'keep' with a heading etc. And subscripts/superscripts seem to add an ugly space to the leading.

Although PMN Caecilia is one of my favourite fonts, and works very well on the Kindle, it's, to say the least, miserly to have it as the only serif option. And Helvetica as the only sans-serif ... Again, insulting.

I have other small gripes - the 5-way doodad is pretty fiddly, and the whole thing really slithery when reading bed - but that's the big three.

Ian

Harmon · 09-04-2010, 02:50 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

And onomatopoeia is?

Yeah - that's limited to the sound of the word.

I'm looking for the equivalent - something limited to the written appearance of the word.

Mimesis would cover both.

(Gee, this might be the opportunity to make up a word! Something from the Latin or Greek should do the trick - but I don't know those languages.)

Harmon · 09-04-2010, 02:55 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ian-ep

I've now had my K3 since monday - my first ereader! Initial impressions were very positive, but I have to say my enthusiasm has cooled a bit in the ensuing days.

My three main gripes are thus:

1. It's shiny!

2. It's grey!

3. Typography from hell!

I haven't noticed the "shiny" but I have not found myself reading with just one light source.

I have noticed the grey. I had the chance to compare my K3 to a K1 yesterday, and there seemed to be exactly no difference in the shade of the paper. The fonts on the K3 were a little sharper, though.

The typography really is a bummer. It's an opportunity for Amazon to greatly improve the reading experience, yet for some reason they don't. What can that reason be? Sheer ignorance? Failure to include a font designer on the team? Failure to include a reader on the team? Failure to include ME on the team?

TheKindleWorm · 09-04-2010, 03:02 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Harmon

The typography really is a bummer. It's an opportunity for Amazon to greatly improve the reading experience, yet for some reason they don't. What can that reason be? Sheer ignorance? Failure to include a font designer on the team? Failure to include a reader on the team? Failure to include ME on the team?

I have a PocketBook 360 and you can load up basically as many fonts as you want on there to use - trouble was I found that I was spending way more time fiddling around, trying to find the "perfect font" instead of reading! In fact I found the PocketBook 360 just way too customizable overall which was cutting into my actual reading time.

So I'm wondering if Amazon are deliberately limiting the font choices because having too much choice is sometimes worse than having no or limited choice.

I have to say that once I get into a book, I'm not sitting there thinking "oh I'd prefer this in a different font"

Sometimes we need to be careful what we wish for!!!

carld · 09-04-2010, 03:18 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Harmon

I have noticed the grey. I had the chance to compare my K3 to a K1 yesterday, and there seemed to be exactly no difference in the shade of the paper. The fonts on the K3 were a little sharper, though.

I find that kind of amazing. Looking at the home pages on my K1 and K3 side-by-side the difference to me is dramatic. The K3's paper is much whiter than my K1's, there really is no comparison at all.

jj2me · 09-04-2010, 03:40 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by tomsem

The 5-way is a little tricky so far, at least when I try to use my thumb. My thumbnail is a little long (for guitar) and 'up' is a little hard to execute without hitting Menu. And 'down' tends to press Back also. Hope I develop a feel for it.

Yes, for me too, with regular clipped fingernails.

These are my two gripes so far:

5-way too close to Menu and Back keys.

Too tiny lettering on the keys. I find that in marginal lighting when I'm still able to read a book in a small font, I have trouble making out the keyboard lettering. Maybe a design compromise to avoid reflections?

kacir · 09-04-2010, 04:45 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by Kumabjorn

Who, in their right mind, would want to touch type on the Kindle keyboard? 4 year olds?

A lot of effort went into making K3 usable by visually impaired users, so they can utilize the Text To Speech function.

kacir · 09-04-2010, 04:49 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by ian-ep

3. Typography from hell! ... And no way to turn off the justification ...

Have a look here
https://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kind..._Change_Margin
Besides the Margin option, there is also Justification option.
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...83#post1088583
Give it a try.

Oh, and come back and tell us if it works. ;-)
You will be the first to report working left justification working. Full justification would be a bid dealbreaker for me if I wanted to get K3.

vega07 · 09-04-2010, 04:58 PM

1. Why can't the Kindle show more metadata? I want to be able to read the synopsis on books I purchased but forget what they're about.

2. I've had 5 freezes and had to do a forced reboot. I had zero on my K2.

TheKindleWorm · 09-04-2010, 05:20 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by vega07

2. I've had 5 freezes and had to do a forced reboot. I had zero on my K2.

Many people have had freezes but I've read reports that Amazon already have people testing new firmware which should sort this out. So that should be solved in the next week or so I hope.

grizedale · 09-04-2010, 05:34 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by kacir

Have a look here
https://wiki.mobileread.com/wiki/Kind..._Change_Margin
Besides the Margin option, there is also Justification option.
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sho...83#post1088583
Give it a try.

Oh, and come back and tell us if it works. ;-)
You will be the first to report working left justification working. Full justification would be a bid dealbreaker for me if I wanted to get K3.

Left justification and reduced margins achieved by altering the reader.prefs file

#User preferences for Reader Booklet
#Sat Sep 04 22:50:20 GMT+01:00 2010
FONT_SIZE=17
DICTIONARY=Oxford Dictionary of English
LINE_SPACING=1
JUSTIFICATION=left
LAST_BOOK_READ=/mnt/us/documents/The Stand-asin_B0037TPMP4-type_EBOK-v_0.azw
HORIZONTAL_MARGIN=10
FONT_FAMILY=condensed

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09-04-2010, 11:58 AM	#93
Ben Thornton Guru Posts: 900 Karma: 779635 Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: UK Device: Kindle 3, iPad 2 (but not for e-books)	I've been having a few lock-ups. Seems to happen most when moving the cursor around to get to a link. The book that I'm reading has quite a few notes. My only other gripe isn't really (mostly) Amazon's fault - it's the old gripe about sloppy formatting from publishers. The justification is also patchy (which is their fault) - a long word leaves a ragged right rather than increasing the kerning within the words. So, my vote would be: (1) fix the reboots, then (2) improve the typography. To be fair, they have made some improvements on (2) with this model.

09-04-2010, 12:00 PM	#94
Ben Thornton Guru Posts: 900 Karma: 779635 Join Date: Jan 2010 Location: UK Device: Kindle 3, iPad 2 (but not for e-books)	On another topic on this thread (cases), I didn't like the look of the big cases either, and use the K3 without one. I carry it around in a padded envelope, which cost nothing.

09-04-2010, 01:14 PM	#95
ian-ep Junior Member Posts: 3 Karma: 10 Join Date: Sep 2010 Device: Kindle	I've now had my K3 since monday - my first ereader! Initial impressions were very positive, but I have to say my enthusiasm has cooled a bit in the ensuing days. My three main gripes are thus: 1. It's shiny! Although fine in bright diffuse daylight, used under artificial light in the evening, I find it very hard to find - and maintain - a reading position that doesn't reflect my reading lightsource as big bright searchlight in the middle of the screen. Even the dark grey bevel, being slightly rounded, seems to catch every available light in the room and throw a big specular highlight at me. 2. It's grey! Again, the dirty grey 'paper' colour is OK in bright daylight, but in shade or under artificial light it becomes annoyingly - well, grey. I find myself constantly shifting reading position to get in a better light only to get blinded by the dreaded reflection! 3. Typography from hell! Perhaps naïvely, I had hoped the Kindle would have better typography than my 10+ year old Palm III. It doesn't. After all, it pretty much uses the same file format as the old Palm. But justified text without hyphenation? And no way to turn off the justification ... C'mon! That is insulting. Especially as it apparently used to be a feature of earlier versions of the Kindle. Hmm. But lack of hyphenation (and inability to turn off justification) is only the most obvious of the typographical shortcomings. There seems to no widow/orphan support or 'keep options' as they would be called in a dtp app - eg. how many lines of text should always 'keep' with a heading etc. And subscripts/superscripts seem to add an ugly space to the leading. Although PMN Caecilia is one of my favourite fonts, and works very well on the Kindle, it's, to say the least, miserly to have it as the only serif option. And Helvetica as the only sans-serif ... Again, insulting. I have other small gripes - the 5-way doodad is pretty fiddly, and the whole thing really slithery when reading bed - but that's the big three. Ian

09-04-2010, 04:58 PM	#103
vega07 Enthusiast Posts: 48 Karma: 50 Join Date: Jul 2010 Device: Kindle 2	1. Why can't the Kindle show more metadata? I want to be able to read the synopsis on books I purchased but forget what they're about. 2. I've had 5 freezes and had to do a forced reboot. I had zero on my K2.

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