Tablets are the future of eReading

[Kitabi]

Originally Posted by Belfaborac

To be honest, I really can't see tablets being the future of my own e-reading. I love E-ink and I find the 6-7" format perfect in regards to reading and portability. I'll always want a device I can slip into a coat pocket, or just carry in my hand and that isn't too big to use on a crowded bus, while sitting on a bar stool or some similar circumstance.

I'll no doubt get a tablet at some point too, when variety available is up and prices down, for use both on travels and instead of my laptop at home. I'm in no hurry though.

It seems you are using the iPad as a reference tablet. Tablets come in a variety of sizes. The 7 inch form factor is comparable to most e-ink readers on the market. You can read them one handed and carry them around easily.

[EowynCarter]

Originally Posted by Kitabi

Unfortunately, the ongoing trends are in support of multi-purpose devices. Take the example of the iPod and iPhone. iPod sales have plateaued or are dropping (depending on which iPod we are talking of) while iPhone sales continue to rise. People did not want to carry an mp3 player AND the phone. Increasingly, people do not want to carry a portable game console AND a phone. And IMHO people do not/would not want to carry an eReader AND a tablet.

Till now, they have been forced to do this because the iPad was the only tablet selling in volume till some time back and it is unwieldy for many and because most tablets have the 3 issues I mentioned in the first post. Provided, tablet makers can solve those issues, eReader sales would fall in favor of tablets.

Yes, trend is multi purpose device. But, selling lots of multipurpose device don't prevent selling dedicated devices. Just mean selling less of them.

[Kali Yuga]

Originally Posted by EowynCarter

Yes, trend is multi purpose device. But, selling lots of multipurpose device don't prevent selling dedicated devices. Just mean selling less of them.

In the short term, this seems to be the case, as indicated by large overlaps of Kindle and iPad owners.

Long term might be a different issue, it's very hard to say. Single-purpose devices do persist far longer than many people presume, but this relies on them offering real advantages to the users. It also does require some discipline on the part of the vendor -- which may not be easy to maintain when, for example, a large pool of users push the capabilities of the device (e.g. hackers buying Nook Colors with the intent of using them as cheap 7" Android tablets).

I do expect epaper devices to have an edge in terms of readability, power usage, size and weight for many years, and don't expect Pixel Qi to produce the optimal solution. Even if they do manage to ship it in a product.

[DMcCunney]

I'm not interested in a dedicated reader. I specifically want a multi-function device. I'm also not interested in a converged device. The problem is form factor. We tend want our cell phones small, but that means a small screen, and too much of what I do wants a bigger one. A device with a screen that met my requirements would be too big to be a phone.

My cell phone is the smallest, cheapest low end monochrome device Nokia makes. All it does is place and receive calls and SMS messaging, and that's all I want it to do. It lives in a holster clipped to my belt.

My current usual reading device is an old Palm OS PDA. About half its purpose in life is to be an ebook reader, and there are about 4,000 volumes occupying most of a 2GB SD card. One advantage is the ability to read just about everything, with ePub the only major format it doesn't handle. (But ePub sans DRM is easy to convert to a format it does view.)

Aside from viewing ebooks, it also has the standard Palm OS PIM functions - Address Book, Calendar, Memopad, Todo list, and software for viewing and editing Word documents and Excel spreadsheets, writing documents with a good word processor, displaying photos, viewing videos, playing MP3s, serving as a handy reference on a variety of topics using databases that aren't ebooks, is capable of going online to browse the web and get email (though I seldom do), and oh, yes, it plays games. It has a folding keyboard for instances where text entry is required. I got it as a replacement for an earlier device that failed, and chose the one I did specifically to get the 480x320 screen it offered. It's a bit on the large size to carry in a pocket, but that's not how I normally carry it. (I got cured of that when a couple of older PDAs failed the "Drop Test".)

I'd like an even bigger screen. I don't have problems with an LCD screen, and don't care that hard about battery life. I already have a reflex of charging things like my PDA and cell phone daily. It's no problem to add another device to the list.

What I'd really like, no one seems to make at the moment. I want a device in two parts, each of which will operate stand alone, but will work together if both are present. One part would be a cell phone, tiny and light. The other would be a tablet with a relatively large color display that did everything else.
The tablet would perform normal tablet functions and connect via wifi, but could use the cell phone as a modem to a 3G network if a wifi hotspot wasn't handy. Add a folding keyboard for things that require any extensive text input, and there's a potentially very nice combo that could replace a laptop with a lighter more portable device.

When I travel, I'm willing to carry a phone and a tablet. I'm not willing to carry a phone, a tablet, and a dedicated reader.
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Dennis

[Belle2Be]

Unless the tablet has a duel function, LCD to eInk option, I'll never replace my eInk eReader with a LCD tablet. As it is, I feel no need to be that connected to the world that I need a wifi tablet to carry with me everywhere. Simpler is better

[Logseman]

Have you seen the Motorola Atrix 4G? It can get docked to a laptop (a certain one made by Motorola of course) and then you can have the phone and the laptop together.

[Belfaborac]

Originally Posted by Kitabi

It seems you are using the iPad as a reference tablet. Tablets come in a variety of sizes. The 7 inch form factor is comparable to most e-ink readers on the market. You can read them one handed and carry them around easily.

I was probably unclear, or rather incomplete. It's more a case of not considering a tablet under approx. 10" worth buying or using. Just like I have never used my mobile phone for browsing, I wouldn't be at all interested in browsing on a 7" tablet. If or when I do buy a tablet, I want something that is well suited to the job, not sub-par or merely almost adequate.

[Andrew H.]

Originally Posted by Kali Yuga

In the short term, this seems to be the case, as indicated by large overlaps o
I do expect epaper devices to have an edge in terms of readability, power usage, size and weight for many years, and don't expect Pixel Qi to produce the optimal solution. Even if they do manage to ship it in a product.

And remember that there are two sides to an equation. You have to give the readers what they need to give up their ereaders. But (keeping in mind that heavy readers are maybe 10% of the population), you also can't burden the device with characteristics that will annoy non-readers: i.e., the screen needs to be as good as an LCD, and the weight, battery power, and cost need to be on par with other tablets.

[CazMar]

Originally Posted by Logseman

Have you seen the Motorola Atrix 4G? It can get docked to a laptop (a certain one made by Motorola of course) and then you can have the phone and the laptop together.

The Blackberry also has this function - it can be used as a modem by docking it to virtually any laptop. It's slow but good in an emergency.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by Logseman

Have you seen the Motorola Atrix 4G? It can get docked to a laptop (a certain one made by Motorola of course) and then you can have the phone and the laptop together.

That's the sort of thing I'm thinking of, but I don't want the other device to be a laptop.

Folks here might remember the UMPCs Microsoft and Intel were pushing a few years back. MS and Intel had a simple reason: growth. MS wanted to expand the market for Windows, which was largely saturated. Intel was losing market share to AMD. What to do? A whole new class of device, that would run Windows and use Intel chips.

But they never took off because there wasn't a compelling use case. Users likely already had a laptop, and possibly a desktop as well. Why would they buy a UMPC? What would they do with it that they didn't already do with what they had?

The UMPCs were carefully speced to make them less of a threat to laptops, and the existing laptop makes like Dell and Fujitsu didn't make them: they were offered by vendors like Via and Samsung not thought of as PC makers. They were also pricy.

I'd buy such a thing to replace a laptop with a smaller, lighter, and less expensive device, and certainly wouldn't carry both when traveling.

The ASUS eee created the netbook market by making a device that could replace a laptop, yet was smaller, lighter, and significantly cheaper, and a raft of entrants followed, largely absorbing the market the UMPC targeted.

Apple created the tablet market with the iPad, which a friend aptly called a "media consumption device", which was small and light, but worked well for things that required minimal input from the user to perform.

The popularity of the iPad, and the availability of the Google Android OS created the market for the raft of Android based tablets hitting the market. Android has name recognition, and the fact that a device uses it is a selling point. Android powered tablets running ARM processors have good battery life (low power is an ARM design goal) and steadily increasing functionality. I was wondering back when Android hit the street when we'd see devices based on it that weren't smartphones, and it didn't take long to happen.

An Android based tablet with a decent sized screen and a folding BT keyboard can do about 80% of what I'd use a laptop to do. Add a cell phone that could tether to it and serve as a modem for places where wifi wasn't available, and you start to get a compelling combination. Keep the weight low enough, hit the right price point, and you have something sweet indeed.
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Dennis

[Ladyrixx]

I'm interested in a tablet for reading because, besides "normal" books/knitting/crochet patterns, I also have all of the gaming books as .pdfs. (It's soooo much lighter than the rolling suitcase I normally use when I'm DMing.) The only problem is my nice little EZ reader does not do multi-column books well. (Let's not even start on all the comics that I have as .cbz so I can read them on the go as opposed to the several long boxes in my closet...)

I want a tablet about the size of a piece of paper, that will support multi-columns. Being able to run the Kindle app would be a bonus. (Amazon is apparently the only ebook retailer with Cold Comfort Farm, but reading it on my Blackberry isn't bad.)

I've played with an iPad, but I don't like that it has no SD-slots and I don't like how closed the development is. The Android marketplace might be a little Wild West, but I'll take that over Big Brother.

I'm waiting to see the Playbook "in the wild", at least with my phone, you can get the SDK for free and make your own apps for the BB, I'm hoping their tablet will be similar but with more options.

[DiapDealer]

How about we change the title to; "Tablets are the future of mobile computing/entertainment/communication... of which eReading is a tiny portion." ?

Makes more sense to me that way.

Because I'm having a hard time envisioning how having a tablet will increase my ereading pleasure in any way (keep in mind that I'm a "novels only kind of guy"). I realize that tablets may be the future for the rest of the world, but I'm just not a mobile guy... I have a desktop PC, an ereader and no cell phone. I'm set.

[DMcCunney]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

How about we change the title to; "Tablets are the future of mobile computing/entertainment/communication... of which eReading is a tiny portion." ?

Makes more sense to me that way.

You aren't the only one: http://latimesblogs.latimes.com/jack...re-ebooks.html

Because I'm having a hard time envisioning how having a tablet will increase my ereading pleasure in any way (keep in mind that I'm a "novels only kind of guy"). I realize that tablets may be the future for the rest of the world, but I'm just not a mobile guy... I have a desktop PC, an ereader and no cell phone. I'm set.

It depends on what you do and read. I'm interested in a tablet because I'll do other things besides read ebooks on it. The fact that it does do other things won't be a distraction when reading, as I expect to be able to set things up so I won't be distracted by other functions.

And I read non-fiction as well as fiction, and some of what I read needs color and down the road will benefit from the possibilities the hardware offers. ("Enhanced" ebooks are a hot topic, though there';s a lot of confusion about what that means and what sort of books will benefit from what sort of enhancement.)
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Dennis

[Kitabi]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

How about we change the title to; "Tablets are the future of mobile computing/entertainment/communication... of which eReading is a tiny portion." ?

Makes more sense to me that way.

But is is not as catchy or likely to attract comment.

[HansTWN]

Originally Posted by DiapDealer

How about we change the title to; "Tablets are the future of mobile computing/entertainment/communication... of which eReading is a tiny portion." ?

Makes more sense to me that way.

Because I'm having a hard time envisioning how having a tablet will increase my ereading pleasure in any way (keep in mind that I'm a "novels only kind of guy"). I realize that tablets may be the future for the rest of the world, but I'm just not a mobile guy... I have a desktop PC, an ereader and no cell phone. I'm set.

I do think the title is correct --- tablets are the future of reading, but now is the present and tablets are not there yet. To fully replace readers they need to be lighter, thinner, embrace new screen technologies (if only for longer battery life but for many also for more comfortable reading), and be cheaper. Making them cheaper, however, is a problem. If you make them real cheap and slow then they may work as readers but are lousy browsing and media consumption devices. And let us face it, browsing and media are more important to the vast majority of tablet buyers. My guess is that big tablet makers are more concerned with making them substitute netbooks than aiming for the reader niche market. Exceptions will be small companies like Notion Ink and specialty products like the Nook color.

Perfect would also be screens that can be rolled or folded. But if we have that then such devices could be small enough to also work fine as phones and these two device types would converge.

At the moment tablets are definitely compromise solutions, a lot of people are fine with making those compromises, but tablets are still far from ideal for reading.