*sigh* Another "need advice" thread :)

[lasherlaz]

Hello everyone,

I have decided that I will make the plunge into an e-reader. The ability to subscribe to newspapers and magazines has finally won me over.

However, I cannot decide between the Nook Color and the Kindle 3G.

Here is some information about me:

* I am a 2nd year law student. I use Westlaw often to download cases and secondary materials. These can be converted to .pdf or .doc format. I would love to able to read these on my device.

* Thompson West publishes some casebooks (for courses I will take) as ebooks. How does annotation work on the two devices?

* I subscribe to: the Economist, the New Yorker, and the New York Times. Does anyone here use an e-reader for their subscription? How does it work? How is the display? How is your reading experience?

* Novels. I do read them, but not as much as I would like as I am a student. However, general novel reading (particularly classics) is very important to me.

* The Bible and the dictionary. My fiance and I frequently get into debates about word meanings and Biblical happenings. Which device, in your opinion, provides products which would have the most overall utility for us to settle these debates? How do these large books work on the devices?

I am absolutely torn, at the moment. I love that the Kindle seems simple, however, it seems to have poor .pdf support and no ePub support. My university library uses ePub, and I imagine that I will use that often.

On the other hand, I love the Kindle's 3G support.

So...does anyone have any advice? As I said the important things to me are: 1.) periodicals, 2.) reading experience - for hours on end, and 3.) .pdf convertability (in this order: 3 > 2 > 1).

Web browsing, etc does not matter to me at all.

THANKS!

[boswd]

nook color sounds to be hands down the winner outside of 3G, but being on a campus and at home, finding a wifi connection shouldn't be much of an issue

The Pdf support and features is really solid, despite what some kindl owners may claim.
epub support the ability to pinch to zoom, pan back and forth without the sluggishness of eink. plus if some of your PDF have color introduced again it makes it a much better choice than even the Kindle DX which will be handicapped due to the slowness of eink as compared to the instant pan and scan and zoom that eink just cannot compare to LCD tech. It just can't.

also the look up word feature not only gives you a dictionary def. but also Google search and wikipedia options as well.

also the touch highlight feature and the ability to send passages or notes to your email or facebook etc could be advantougous for school work.

the note taking is head and shoulders above the kindle.

reading for hours on end will be whether or not you mind reading on an lcd screen. I find with some adjustments to the screen ie brightness and background colors, I find reading on it fantastic, the text is sharp, reading in low light is a joy. Magazines and newspapers imho are just incredible.

[fjtorres]

Interesting quandary because, frankly, the overlap between the two isn't that big.

NookColor is (mostly) about color ebooks for kids and magazines, Kindle is (mostly) about novels and recreational reading.

Kindle is about free 3G and extreme battery life; NookColor sacrifices both to provide color and a responsive touch screen.

Both will do magazines but if magazines are the bulk of your reading you want the NookColor most likely because of the color.

If color *isn't* that important then likely a Kindle will do.

But if PDFs are job one, neither is exactly great at it; depending on the file they will run from tolerable to good enough but nothing smaller than 9inches is going to be great at PDF.

What I would suggest, however, is that you might want to broaden your search.
If cost is an issue, an Android Webpad like a Pocketbook IQ or Velocity Micro T301 would give you the equivalent of a Color Kindle with the ability to also handle epubs and PDfs. Some can run Nook, too. All can run the Overdrive Media Console to access library ebooks and Adobe's own reader app.

A Kindle DX would give you a big enough screen to properly display PDFs plus all the other Kindle pluses. And if PDF matters more than magazines...

Or, if the budget allows for an iPad you could install both the Kindle and B&N apps and get a mix of all the desirable features.

[WillysJeepMan]

Originally Posted by lasherlaz

Hello everyone,

I have decided that I will make the plunge into an e-reader. The ability to subscribe to newspapers and magazines has finally won me over.

However, I cannot decide between the Nook Color and the Kindle 3G.

Here is some information about me:

* The Bible and the dictionary. My fiance and I frequently get into debates about word meanings and Biblical happenings. Which device, in your opinion, provides products which would have the most overall utility for us to settle these debates? How do these large books work on the devices?

I am absolutely torn, at the moment. I love that the Kindle seems simple, however, it seems to have poor .pdf support and no ePub support. My university library uses ePub, and I imagine that I will use that often.

On the other hand, I love the Kindle's 3G support.

So...does anyone have any advice? As I said the important things to me are: 1.) periodicals, 2.) reading experience - for hours on end, and 3.) .pdf convertability (in this order: 3 > 2 > 1).

Web browsing, etc does not matter to me at all.

THANKS!

I own an iPad, iPod Touch, nook, and Aluratek Libre Pro. Neither Kindle nor nook (color or classic) will offer a satisfactory experience with regard to Bible study and exploration. The ESV Study Bible for iPad, LOGOS for iPad, and YouVersion's Bible software, are three of my favorites.

If you have your heart set on one of those two, Kindle or nook color, I'd recommend the nook color. Primarily for the better support for pdf and epub. B&N has some aggressive plans for the nook color in 2011 and has been pushing the color far more than their classic.

[JimMcLaren]

fjtorres is right about PDFs. Bigger is better. 9 inches is what you want. I have a 7" reader, the Pandigital Novel, which is equivalent to the Pocketbook IQ. Reading PDFs on it is passable, much better than a 6" reader. I wouldn't want to read PDFs on it for long periods though. I'd probably think about an iPad then.

If you want the bible and reference material I'd look at a multipurpose device like the pocketbook IQ or iPad. Ereaders are lousy bible study platforms. Olivetree has good resources (many for free) that run on practically every mobile platform including android and iPad.

[OtterBooks]

If recreating the visual experience of a paper book is your primary goal, I would go with the Nook Classic ereader. If you want a low cost portable media experience with color, viable web surfing and a degree of interactivity, or even if viewing color documents is important to you, go with a media-tablet such as the Nook Color. Unfortunately right now you can't get both in the same device.

Aside from being based on an entirely different kind of technology than the Nook Color, the Kindle 3 is disqualified for any of the above uses if you want library access (without file alteration).

[=X=]

Originally Posted by lasherlaz

Hello everyone,

I have decided that I will make the plunge into an e-reader. The ability to subscribe to newspapers and magazines has finally won me over.

However, I cannot decide between the Nook Color and the Kindle 3G.

Here is some information about me:

* I am a 2nd year law student. I use Westlaw often to download cases and secondary materials. These can be converted to .pdf or .doc format. I would love to able to read these on my device.

* Thompson West publishes some casebooks (for courses I will take) as ebooks. How does annotation work on the two devices?

* I subscribe to: the Economist, the New Yorker, and the New York Times. Does anyone here use an e-reader for their subscription? How does it work? How is the display? How is your reading experience?

* Novels. I do read them, but not as much as I would like as I am a student. However, general novel reading (particularly classics) is very important to me.

* The Bible and the dictionary. My fiance and I frequently get into debates about word meanings and Biblical happenings. Which device, in your opinion, provides products which would have the most overall utility for us to settle these debates? How do these large books work on the devices?

I am absolutely torn, at the moment. I love that the Kindle seems simple, however, it seems to have poor .pdf support and no ePub support. My university library uses ePub, and I imagine that I will use that often.

On the other hand, I love the Kindle's 3G support.

So...does anyone have any advice? As I said the important things to me are: 1.) periodicals, 2.) reading experience - for hours on end, and 3.) .pdf convertability (in this order: 3 > 2 > 1).

Web browsing, etc does not matter to me at all.

THANKS!

I own an K2 and was gifted an nookColor for christmass, (my wife rocks).

So like any good eBook enthusies the first order of busniess I did was to load up my nookColor with PDFs to see how it could handle them. Since the K2 is not very good with PDF I was hopping the nook was.

Unfortunately there is no clear winner they both have draw backs.

Here is what I say
Good:
- Color made for a nice experience, since I do have some color PDF it was nice to see the color and not grayscale
- Pinch zoom makes it easier to zoom, but it is poorly implemented. You can't see the text while zooming so it's guess work how much to zoom in/out.
- PDF engine is not that good. Out of the 10 PDF I tested two did not display. (One was an image based PDF(scanned), the other was a plain text PDF)
- 7" makes it easier to read than 6". But it's narrow so it still fits in ones pocket.

Bad:
- No navigation, bookmarks(these are PDF bookmarks) are not supported and neither are hyperlinks
- No annotation (notes, highlights, bookmarks--place holders).
- Zoom does not stick, you have to unzoom to move on to the next page.
- No reflow
- No dictionary
- Not searchable

K3 (Note I have the K2 not the K3, so my knowledge is from what I read
here and the demos at the store)

Good:
- Full navigation (hyperlinks and bookmarks work)
- Zoom sticks so when you go to the next page you don't have to re-zoom.
- Perl screen is very nice and has great contrast.
- Full annotations (notes, bookmarks--page holder, highlight)
- Dictionary
- Searchable
Bad:
- No color
- smaller screen
- No reflow


My conclusion for the PDF is if you plan to read 1-10 page PDF that are color the nook is the clear winner.

However if you have to annotate and read lager PDF the kindle is a much better choice. One think you cannot under estimate is the ability to navigate and search with eBooks. With out these features you will have to page turn one page at a time to find your spot.


On 3G, I was not a 3G fan and did not even consider this when I got the Kindle, all I got to say about it is it's great and a HUGE plus for the kindle. It's not something I user everday, but when I need it I really need it and it's been a huge benefit to have. Also it is the way I download my books from anywhere in the world onto my device.



Also if money is not so much a concern and PDF is what you want you might want to look at the iPad or the Galaxy Tab. Both will do a fantastic job reading PDF. (Though none beat the Kindle)


Last point I'll make on the nook. If you are tech savvy and are willing to root the nook and install a full blown Android on the tablet it will be a much better experience. The reason the nook PDF support is so poor is because they chose a poor third party PDF app to support them (Quickoffice). Had they chosen Adobe or RepliGo it would have been a good choce. If the nook is rooted the user has the ability to install these apps