Did you change your mind about touch screens?

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by Blossom

I want a T1 but hubby says I have too many readers as it is.

uh...what's his point?

[Blossom]

Originally Posted by Harmon

uh...what's his point?

Money. It's always about the money.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by Pomtroll

It is hard to tell if there is any real difference to the background. The T1 background appears a bit lighter, but not by much & I mean not by much. That may have to do with the fact that the T1 I have has a black bezel. I certainly hadn't noticed a real difference. That is until you asked me to check it out.

As for the print, the print on the kindle seems bolder or a bit darker except for the font style Frutiger Neue on the Sony.

I'm sitting here with my T1 and my KDX. The screens appear identical, although I can use Customize View on the T1 adjust the T1 screen to change that.

The font on the KDX is obviously darker, so the contrast between the font and the screen is greater on the KDX. However, I can manipulate the fonts, font size and screen/font contrast on the T1 to get extremely close to the overall appearance of the font on the screen of the KDX. I agree with what you said about Frutiger Neue.

I wonder if the CV feature might not get your T1 to the same - or better - screen view than that on the KT.

[Harmon]

Originally Posted by Blossom

Money. It's always about the money.

Sigh...

[WT Sharpe]

Originally Posted by hopkinsenglish

Even though I use a Sony Touch (PRS-350) I still find myself using the physical buttons more for page turning. For navigation, however, I still prefer it hands down to navigating on the K3 or K4

Prediction - Amazon will release another touch edition with physical page turn buttons (probably not anytime soon, though).

I have the earlier-generation Sony Touch (PRS-300). I never liked it, don't like the navigation, and don't like the dim screen, but I readily admit that's hardly fair to compare an older model with more current ones, and from what I hear, the later Sonys are greatly improved.

So the Kindle Touch was my second touchscreen. I thought I'd probably take to considering this more a gimmick than anything else, but I was pleasantly surprised. It's quickly become my favored reader over the K-3 with the physical keyboard. Fingerprint smudges are pretty much a non-issue because I nearly always have a micro-cloth handy, and in any case the eInk screen isn't nearly as quick to show smudges as a backlit screen. There are only two areas where I think the K-3 excels over the Touch: (1) When highlighting, you can only copy what's on the current screen. If you want to continue, you need to navigate to the next page or location and add a second note to your My Clippings file. With the K-3, you can get it all in one bite. (2) When holding the reader in the left hand, it's harder to reach over with my thumb and navigate to the next page. Page-turn buttons on at least the left side (or right, if you're left-handed) would be nice.

But these are minor issues. Put me down in the converted column.

[Pomtroll]

Originally Posted by HarryT

Thanks, Pomtroll. So, like me, you wouldn't agree with Stingo's view that there is a "clear difference in contrast"?

I don't see it (I'm talking about the background). BUT some people do. As for contrast, Stigo seems to be talking about the K3 & I compared the KT to the T1. But I do have a K3 & once again I don't see a lot of difference with the backgrounds. BUT font boldness does make a difference of course. So if you are comparing the bold font to a background, the KT does have more contrast than the T1.

[WT Sharpe]

Comparing my K-3 and K-Touch screens, I can't see a nickel's worth of difference. If anything, the Touch has better contrast, but that may be because it's new and the K-3 has seen a lot of reading, both in and out of direct sunlight.

[tomsem]

In terms of display quality, I haven't compared my KT and T1 screens directly (I would take a screenshot of the former and display it on the latter, lest font differences enter in) but suspect they are about the same. I did request a replacement unit for my KT at one point (to see if ghosting would improve) but wound up returning the replacement because display quality was worse. I set refresh-every-page option because the ghosting bothered me.

I think the touch interface of KT could be improved considerably by abandoning conventions established by previous Kindles. The Home screens for example look nearly identical to my K3's which doesn't make a lot of sense. Some people never discover that tapping on 'Page x of y' brings up a 'quick search' dialog, for example. It's great to have that feature but one would probably not guess that the labels above the item list respond to touch by looking at them, even if one had used other touch interfaces, and especially if you've used previous non touch Kindles. It doesn't LOOK like a touch interface. They should have just started from scratch, but I guess it is too late now.

Also I don't see any advantage to the asymmetrical and idiosyncratic touch zones. I keep tapping the center of the screen to bring up options, only to have the page turn (I switch between KT and Fire). 'center tap for options' is pretty ingrained in me after using many different touch interface reading apps and devices, all of which follow this convention. At least they should give an option to select the more conventional left/center/right instead of the default top/left/right.

KT is about what I expected at ship time but I expected a major update by now (to add KF8 support, orientation option, and localized UIs). Maybe that is coming with international launch later this month.

Beyond that, however, I'm not expecting them to address any other annoyances I've had with KT like inability to adjust selection, or to use selection as search term for google/wikipedia, among others. I still prefer decisively it to my KK, I just think it should have had a better touch interface than it does.

[Andy_T]

Originally Posted by Serpentine

Tablets I couldn't possibly care less for, and touch screen ATMs thankfully still have the reassuring buttons

Hmm, I'm not so sure that I prefer the buttons at an ATM, given the fact that this is where the con artists typically mount their phishing devices.

[Stingo]

As a couple of the commenters noted, they had to take back KT's because of contrast issues. Many have noted variations from KT to KT. While one person doesn't seem to notice a huge difference, another sent her KT back because it looked so much worse than her K3. In other words, all screens are not alike. They very from device to device and manufacturer to manufacturer. The key issues that differ are font rendering and ghosting. These in turn affect the overall look/contrast. The T1's that I have compared to my KT have been consistently lighter in the background and have had a crisper look to the screen. They also ghost less. Just my experience.

I am starting to get hopeful that we can look forward to significant upgrade. Landscape and dictionary fixes have been mentioned in Europe. The growing talk about slowing e-ink reader sales may finally provide an incentive for user dissatisfaction to be addressed.

[Dragoro]

Originally Posted by Blossom

I've attached the pic. I will say I don't know if it's my Marware case to blame or the finish is coming off. My guess is the case but I read reviews of my case and no one has reported anything like this. I've never taken anything but a damp cloth with water to back. It stays in the case 95% of the time. I read and use my K4 heavily each day for about 5 to 6 hours.

Yeah, mine has done that too, but it doesnt really bother me. Its a reading device, not a work of art lol.

[pphilipp]

Originally Posted by carld

Well, I've been using my Kindle Fire (not exactly the same thing) for a while now, and it hasn't really changed my opinion of touch screens much. I still find them to be finger print magnets that are still a little too finicky. I much prefer side-buttons for turning pages. Ideally, I'd like a reader with both, side-buttons when I want to read, and a touch screen for other uses.

This first response pretty well sums things up accurately... at least for a person simply reading ebooks. I agree wholeheartedly regarding touchscreens for reading ebooks!

But (there's always a but) for most other purposes, the touchscreen is the best interface there is for almost all types of creative endeavors. Art, music, photography, games, etc. are much more intuitive on a touchscreen. If you don't believe this, all you have to do is give a keyboard/mouse computer to someone who has never used one before and then give them a touchscreen device. Guess what? I have my doubts that anyone would pick the keyboard over the touch. Keyboards are based on centuries-old technology which had it's start in the era of mechanics. Touch is based on what we're born with, an important part of our five senses!

But (here's the second but) when you're typing a novel, nothing beats a good keyboard... providing you know how to type well.