Kobo vs. Kindle

[dirtyvu]

I was able to buy the Kobo for really cheap due to Borders closing. It only cost me $65 out the door. For that price, I couldn't justify going with Kindle. The pros for the Kobo for me was low price, very light, great form factor (love the soft back!), and it is very flexible with regards to book formats (hacker friendly).

But if both the Kobo and the Kindle are about the same price, it's no question I would go for the Kindle. It's much faster. It has a keyboard. The page turning buttons are really well done ergonomically. Sure, I sacrifice flexibility (with Kindle, you do things the Kindle way) but performance is important. It also has a lot of other features besides better performance (MP3 player, web browser, etc).

The Kobo is fine for reading novels because you don't need to flip pages that quickly. But if you want to use your Kobo for school notes or for PDFs or for any technical documents where you have to go between pages quickly, the Kobo is less than ideal.

I do love my Kobo but I know its limits. I did load up my medical school notes onto it so that I can easily read them wherever I am. But if someone came up to me and wanted to swap his Kindle for my Kobo, I would do the swap. But now that I have the Kobo, I plan on keeping it until it dies and has no warranty. It's not so inferior to the Kindle to justify buying a Kindle for replacement.

CAVEATS:
- my only experience with the Kindle is when I play with it at the store. So I've only logged in maybe 15 minutes of hands-on experience. I also only flipped pages in a couple novels with no pictures. So that probably was a big factor.
- I mostly use my Kobo for my school notes which do have a lot of pictures. I did have to break up my notes into smaller segments so that loading and flipping pages was tolerable.
- I have tried loading novels with no pictures to see if Kobo could be as fast as Kindle and it's still noticeably slower. But again, with reading novels, unless you're a speed reader, you don't particularly need fast page turning.

[jtdolphins]

Originally Posted by monaski

My birthday is coming up and I am planning to ask for an e-reader for my birthday but I am having a difficulty in choosing between the kindle and the kobo. Can any of you please help me decide.

If they are the same price get the Kindle. Having said that, I bought a Kobo today because Best Buy had them on sale for 99$. I had narrowed it down to these two machines, but thought the Kobo was better priced at 100 or less.

After using it most of the day there are three things that struck me...

1. I think the placement of the page turn buttons on the kindle are better. I find the kobo awkward to hold and use for long periods of time with the button on the lower right hand corner. I have large hands and have had similar problems with other things. This is something I didn't notice while testing these out in the store.

2. The dictionary, which I knew before hand. I plan on using this mostly for my fiction books, so I didn't rate it as an issue. Yet it came up today already, where I thought it would be nice.

3. Being able to search your library. With the 100 free books plus my books, I kind of wished I could search for what I was looking for. I don't think this is an issue, since I don't plan to store books on the ereader. The navigation is pretty quick, but I wouldn't want several hundered on here.

The only one that would make me take it back right now is #1. I have 30 days to test it out and see how it goes with holding it.

I do like the machine for what it is, a no frills ereader. I had no problems getting all my books from my ipod to the Kobo, books from Amazon, B$N and my free epubs.

Oh and the most important thing is I like reading on it. Nice screen. I don't even notice that the pages turn slower than the kindle.

[ltr]

Originally Posted by jtdolphins

The only one that would make me take it back right now is #1

1. I tried the Kindle and found just the opposite. I found the Kindle has so many buttons that I tend to inadvertently hit them. The single page turn button of the Kobo seems much better (for me anyway).

2. Books loaded from the Kobo book store do have a dictionary.

3. Did you know that it's easy to hide those 100 free books? It's an selectable option.

ltr

[jtdolphins]

Originally Posted by ltr

1. I tried the Kindle and found just the opposite. I found the Kindle has so many buttons that I tend to inadvertently hit them. The single page turn button of the Kobo seems much better (for me anyway).

2. Books loaded from the Kobo book store do have a dictionary.

3. Did you know that it's easy to hide those 100 free books? It's an selectable option.

ltr

I could see myself hitting those buttons while in the store. My palm was over it at the store and I didn't think it would be long before problems started.

I haven't bought any books from Kobo yet, but thats good to know. I got rid of the 100 free books, since I already had a lot of them on my ipod. I was just testing it out with a bunch of books.

[omgfire]

Originally Posted by jtdolphins

3. Being able to search your library. With the 100 free books plus my books, I kind of wished I could search for what I was looking for. I don't think this is an issue, since I don't plan to store books on the ereader. The navigation is pretty quick, but I wouldn't want several hundered on here.

I've got 917 books on my kobo and it really isn't that hard to navigate my library. If I know what book I'm looking for I just go through alphabetically by selecting the letter at the top of my library. I do understand what you mean though and it would be nice to have a search, but it's easy to get by without it.

[zaphae]

I have had my Kindle for 6 months now, and can't imagine being without it. I love the speed, the 3G access (I am not the only person who is looking for a book to read at 3am), and I haven't had any technical issues. I bought a book cover with a built in reading light that I only use when I'm travelling or reading in bed. Easy to read and I love that I can use it to listen to audio books in the car on long trips. Along with built in Reference books and free web access, why would I want anything else?

[historyb]

I just got my kobo, my first ereader and I really like it. The page turn is a bit slow but it's nice to have many many books at hand.

[voracious71]

I have both and like them both. The Kobo people really did a nice job with this one.

[ltr]

Originally Posted by zaphae

why would I want anything else?

Because you may want to borrow ebooks from the library, which you can't legally do with a Kindle.

[know-one]

I will agree on one point for sure with the poster who said that that the Alluratek (s/p?) 5' screen is too small. I have held one in my hands (the only thing I've touched besides the Kobo) and it the thing that really ticked me off. Cbr (comics) are already small as they are, I can't think of going smaller.

[Meemo]

Originally Posted by ltr

Because you may want to borrow ebooks from the library, which you can't legally do with a Kindle.

Yet. But it's coming soon - probably in the next couple of months. So there goes that argument, unless you need instant gratification.

[the.Mtn.Man]

Originally Posted by zaphae

I have had my Kindle for 6 months now . . . why would I want anything else?

The only real advantage the Kindle has is that it's the only e-reader that works with Amazon.com which has one of the largest selections of digital books for sale on the internet, but if you're like me and don't care about buying digital books then I find the Kobo to be a much better option. I can spend my lunch hour at Gutenberg.org or epubbooks.com (this one is my favorite) and find another three dozen to add to my quickly growing digital library: 300 books and counting, all without spending a dime... well, except for the Kobo, of course.

[rashkae]

The first 2 Kobos..were... I think, pretty horrendous devices. Kobo really got it right with the Touch however.

It remains a matter of preference if you prefer touch page turning to the phisical buttons on the eges, but at least now the kobo is easy to use and fast/responsive, with the same Pearl screen.

[filmo]

Originally Posted by Meemo

Yet. But it's coming soon - probably in the next couple of months. So there goes that argument, unless you need instant gratification.

It is going on 4 years years now for Kindle users not able to check out DRM library books. It is way past time for kindle to get that capability. Not a hard problem to solve if their main goal wasn't to lock Kindle users into Amazon ebook store.

[Meemo]

Originally Posted by the.Mtn.Man

The only real advantage the Kindle has is that it's the only e-reader that works with Amazon.com which has one of the largest selections of digital books for sale on the internet, but if you're like me and don't care about buying digital books then I find the Kobo to be a much better option. I can spend my lunch hour at Gutenberg.org or epubbooks.com (this one is my favorite) and find another three dozen to add to my quickly growing digital library: 300 books and counting, all without spending a dime... well, except for the Kobo, of course.

Of course, you can do that with the Kindle as well.

Originally Posted by filmo

It is going on 4 years years now for Kindle users note able to check out DRM library books. It is way past time for kindle to get that capability. Not a hard problem to solve if their main goal wasn't to lock Kindle users into Amazon ebook store.

If that was their main goal they did a poor job of it, by the looks of my Kindle's home page...