Help convince me that my PW1 is good enough! :-)

[Blossom]

I can't even read on my PW1 it's horrible. I've tried to give it away a few times no one wanted it due to how uneven it is so buy yourself a new Paperwhite. If I had the money I would get myself one till then I'm stuck using my Kindle Fire or K3.

Sent from my Moto E

[NiLuJe]

Yeah, I'm also in the "ditch the PW1" band: the PW1 has hands down the worst-looking screen of 'em all.

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by Blossom

I can't even read on my PW1 it's horrible. I've tried to give it away a few times no one wanted it due to how uneven it is so buy yourself a new Paperwhite. If I had the money I would get myself one till then I'm stuck using my Kindle Fire or K3.

Sent from my Moto E

But you seem to have a Kobo Glo HD? That device should have a good screen, or so I've heard.

[twowheels]

Originally Posted by Blossom

I can't even read on my PW1 it's horrible. I've tried to give it away a few times no one wanted it due to how uneven it is so buy yourself a new Paperwhite. If I had the money I would get myself one till then I'm stuck using my Kindle Fire or K3.

Sent from my Moto E

Yeah, I seem to remember you being one of the people who was in the running for the most returns trying to get a good one. Maybe I'm remembering incorrectly.

Maybe I should take mine to BestBuy and look at them side-by-side.

[twowheels]

Originally Posted by NiLuJe

Yeah, I'm also in the "ditch the PW1" band: the PW1 has hands down the worst-looking screen of 'em all.

To be honest, it did feel like a step backwards from my Kindle 3 (keyboard), and I sometimes longingly look at my wife's K3 and feel a bit jealous. :-)

[Almamida]

Originally Posted by twowheels

To be honest, it did feel like a step backwards from my Kindle 3 (keyboard), and I sometimes longingly look at my wife's K3 and feel a bit jealous. :-)

Buy the new one, read in the bath and make her jealous!

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by twowheels

One question I have for people who've had a PW<4 and a PW4. Is the new flush screen more susceptible to glare when used outdoors? I don't read outdoors often, but do sometimes.

Yes, it's slightly more susceptible to glare but it's nowhere near LCD level bad. I live in sunny SoCal and often read on the PW4 while in the car (passenger).

[barryem]

I have a Paperwhite 1, 2 Paperwhite 3's and 3 Paperwhite 4's. I prefer the Paperwhite 4 but I still use the Paperwhite 3 about as much. I alternate readers. I don't use the Paperwhite 1 much. Just every now and then so I won't forget what it's like.

My suggestion is stick with the Paperwhite 1 if money is an issue and upgrade if you can afford it. They're all good devices. The newer ones are a lot nicer, though.

I'm fine with the Paperwhite 1 screen. It's not as good as the newer ones but there's not a lot of difference. There is a big difference in speed. Being used to the faster devices it seems awful slow to me. I get impatient. Also the feature set of the newer devices is much nicer.

Barry

[AnemicOak]

Originally Posted by twowheels

To be honest, it did feel like a step backwards from my Kindle 3 (keyboard), and I sometimes longingly look at my wife's K3 and feel a bit jealous. :-)

LOL, I remember when the PW1 came out. I pre-ordered and got one right away and returned it in favor of continuing to use my Kindle Touch and Kindle 3. The PW made me feel like I was reading something under glass. Still not a huge fan of frontlit eInk compared to many folks ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

[Sirtel]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

LOL, I remember when the PW1 came out. I pre-ordered and got one right away and returned it in favor of continuing to use my Kindle Touch and Kindle 3. The PW made me feel like I was reading something under glass. Still not a huge fan of frontlit eInk compared to many folks ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Probably I would have felt the same way, if I had gotten the PW1 or possibly even one of the later PWs. I held out with my old non-touch Kindle Basic until the Voyage came out. And even then I waited till the spring of 2016. By that time I'd read so much praise about the Voyage screen that I decided to risk it. And I wasn't disappointed. The Voyage has a really nice screen when the frontlight is on, much better than my old non-lit Kindles.

[tomsem]

Originally Posted by AnemicOak

LOL, I remember when the PW1 came out. I pre-ordered and got one right away and returned it in favor of continuing to use my Kindle Touch and Kindle 3. The PW made me feel like I was reading something under glass. Still not a huge fan of frontlit eInk compared to many folks ¯\_(ツ)_/¯

Yeah, it has the same screen resolution as those Kindles but lacks the clarity factor. I still have one. The lighting has some color blotches in some conditions. I think I returned one in an attempt to get a better one but the replacement was worse. And with only 2GB (minus system files) I actually ran out of space for the first and only time on any Kindle. I would recommend basic Kindle (no front light) over it.

[Shad Plante]

Originally Posted by twowheels

Custom fonts, not so much, though I did like the built in Bookerly font, that my PW1 does not have -- I kept going back to that one while playing with the demo unit. That said, I usually keep it on Publisher Font, unless it's a bad font.

Boldness, maybe... that might be nice too.

I didn't realize that the PW1 never got the update with the Bookerly font. That means it doesn't have Ember Bold either to at least have a bold font. I have been enjoying Bookerly and the ability to bold the font on my PW2.

[rcentros]

Originally Posted by Shad Plante

I didn't realize that the PW1 never got the update with the Bookerly font. That means it doesn't have Ember Bold either to at least have a bold font. I have been enjoying Bookerly and the ability to bold the font on my PW2.

I think the PW1 will use the old (Touch-style) font hack, though. So you could add the Bookerly font if you wanted. You won't get the bold settings, though.

[binaryhermit]

Originally Posted by barryem

I alternate readers.

And I thought I was weird for carrying around a Kindle Keyboard with 3g and using a Paperwhite 3 Wifi at home.

EDIT: I didn't mean weird as an insult, I realize it could be taken that way now.

[twowheels]

Well, I made a trip to BestBuy, PW1 in hand. I held the two devices side by side and walked through the majority of the functionality. I tethered my PW1 to my cell phone, and the store model was on their wifi. I downloaded a sample of the book on the demo unit.

Speed... almost identical. I could hardly discern a difference when opening books, changing pages, changing font settings, looking up words, selecting text, browsing the online store, etc, etc. In some instances my PW1 actually finished first when touching with thumb and pinky simultaneously.

Lighting... the lighting on the PW4 was definitely more consistent. The screen was definitely more white. That said, I kind of liked the slightly yellowish lighting and screen color of my device better. Maybe it's from being used to it, but it was warmer -- something that people keep asking for on the Kindle -- warmth adjustment, so I'll take that as a win for the PW1.

Screen quality... the PW4 screen definitely had more depth to its images. I compared some of the images in the book and one in particular really jumped out at me as having more apparent shades of gray. I took a picture of it.



Wow... that's quite a difference, not something that I see mentioned in most reviews. Fine detail in images was slightly better on the PW4. In addition, the PW1 screen had to do full-screen flashing refreshes more often, and did leave more faint artifacts now and then when opening images/menus/etc.

Glare... I actually tried to induce glare from the lights in the store, and with my phone flash... it turns out that the PW4 actually looked BETTER than the PW1 in that regards, but only slightly. (funny, my picture shows the glare on my PW1 screen, but not the PW4 screen -- but that could be the angle)

Anyhow... after about 40 minutes of playing with them both side by side I decided that the differences weren't significant enough to cause me to upgrade, and there were actually some things I like better about my old one (especially the old official case, which is nicer than the new official case)

So, I left the store empty-handed. I think I've scratched my itch and it went away. :-) Maybe the PW5 will tempt me again next year and then I'll be glad that I held out for some new feature.