Why are prices so high?

[Quoth]

Most people reading ebooks do use a phone or tablet.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I cannot seem to find a PW5 at a reasonable price. They are all way too high. Someone I know is looking to get a Kindle as a gift and the prices are a lot high.

Not enough people are like your someone. Too many of us are insufficiently price sensitive.

With eInk patents expiring, I hope that there will be radically cheaper basic readers. But demand at the low end may be insufficient.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by Victoria

I agree - I think the kindle prices are ridiculously high. I just ordered the basic kindle as a Christmas gift for $120 as a black Friday deal. It’s listed as $145 in Canada. It’s makes me wonder if Amazon is trying to push people to read on their phones, so they can phase out the ereaders.

The price of the basic Kindle is on sale for $84 (US). But I remember when the PW5 was on sale for Black Friday for $99 (US). Now even prices for a refurbished PW5 are silly prices.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

Not enough people are like your someone. Too many of us are insufficiently price sensitive.

With eInk patents expiring, I hope that there will be radically cheaper basic readers. But demand at the low end may be insufficient.

I don't want low end. I want a good Reader. For the hardware, the PW5 is good. The Basic Kindle not as good because the screen is smaller. 6.8" is a good starting point.

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

I don't want low end. I want a good Reader.

I think the Kindle 3 (Kindle Keyboard), introduced in 2010, was in some ways the best ever. It had good physical page turn buttons. I even liked that the reading area did not start until a couple inches above the bottom. It made it better to read in bed. In the dark? No, but I do not read in the dark.

That device was US$139 when released in August 2010. Black Friday 2010? Not sure. But a lot less.

And it should be way less today, because electronics with the same specs, if you can find them, go down in price.

The improvements over time seem to me minor, as in your example of 6 inches vs. 6.8 If the case was white (a Kindle 3 option I preferred) you could bring the black on white text right to the edge of the eInk, with the white margin around the text being the bezel. That makes it pretty similar to the 6.8 inch form factor. (And it was easier to precisely adjust the margins on the Kindle 3 than on my current Kids Edition.)

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

I think the Kindle 3 (Kindle Keyboard), introduced in 2010, was in some ways the best ever. It had good physical page turn buttons. I even liked that the reading area did not start until a couple inches above the bottom. It made it better to read in bed. In the dark? No, but I do not read in the dark.

That device was US$139 when released in August 2010. Black Friday 2010? Not sure. But a lot less.

And it should be way less today, because electronics with the same specs, if you can find them, go down in price.

The improvements over time seem to me minor, as in your example of 6 inches vs. 6.8 If the case was white (a Kindle 3 option I preferred) you could bring the black on white text right to the edge of the eInk, with the white margin around the text being the bezel. That makes it pretty similar to the 6.8 inch form factor. (And it was easier to precisely adjust the margins on the Kindle 3 than on my current Kids Edition.)

You cannot adjust the margin on the Kindle beyond a certain point and that point is too large. You can adjust the margin if you use negative margins in the eBook. You also have to use a font such a ChareInk6 to lessen the overly large line height. Again that cannot be done on the Kindle.

But the thing is, right now, a refurbished PW5 is more expensive the a new PW6. That's crazy. The PW5 should be a lot less then it is.

IMHO. the best Kindle is the PW5. I would go with the PW6 except for the games Amazon is playing with it.

[issybird]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

IMHO. the best Kindle is the PW5. I would go with the PW6 except for the games Amazon is playing with it.

People obviously can and do have their list of priorities, but I think that's short-sighted if not silly. No point in buying older tech in general and in this case the PW6 is larger, has a 1300 Carta screen, a bigger battery, more LEDs and faster page turns. Did I miss anything? And with a PW5 you're already starting out with an older battery. Nuts, IMO. Most (and by which I mean overwhelmingly most) users don't care about D&T. I personally slaver over those page turns, but can't justify it compared to the PW5 I already have. And what a great price!

[John F]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

I think the Kindle 3 (Kindle Keyboard), introduced in 2010, was in some ways the best ever. It had good physical page turn buttons. I even liked that the reading area did not start until a couple inches above the bottom. It made it better to read in bed. In the dark? No, but I do not read in the dark.

That device was US$139 when released in August 2010. Black Friday 2010? Not sure. But a lot less.

And it should be way less today, because electronics with the same specs, if you can find them, go down in price.

...

But the specs are different. The price has gone down, but the specs have gone up (faster, higher PPI, better contrast, front light, ...). The latest Kindle is currently $89, normally $109.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by issybird

People obviously can and do have their list of priorities, but I think that's short-sighted if not silly. No point in buying older tech in general and in this case the PW6 is larger, has a 1300 Carta screen, a bigger battery, more LEDs and faster page turns. Did I miss anything? And with a PW5 you're already starting out with an older battery. Nuts, IMO. Most (and by which I mean overwhelmingly most) users don't care about D&T. I personally slaver over those page turns, but can't justify it compared to the PW5 I already have. And what a great price!

From what I've read, with the 5.27.1 firmware, the page turns of the PW5 have been sped up so they are equivalent of the PW6. All I know for sure is that the page turns of the PW5 have been sped up. As for the screen size, I don't notice any difference between 6.8" and 7". From what's been said about the Kobo Clara BW, I've not seen anyone say they notice a difference between Carta 1200 and Carta 1300. I've not seen any problem at all with the light on the PW5.

The battery being larger and new is better for sure. Probably a newer processor as well.

[JSWolf]

Originally Posted by John F

But the specs are different. The price has gone down, but the specs have gone up (faster, higher PPI, better contrast, front light, ...). The latest Kindle is currently $89, normally $109.

And the new Basic Kindle is overall smaller then the K3/KK.

[slm]

Originally Posted by issybird

People obviously can and do have their list of priorities, but I think that's short-sighted if not silly. No point in buying older tech in general

I don't agree that newer makes it better. I own several kindles newer than my Voyage--two Oasis, and a Kindle 4, among them. I almost always use the Voyage.

In fact, I'm still perfectly happy with my first generation Paperwhite. I keep it charged and use it when I'm in its room.

[Frogm4n]

Originally Posted by SteveEisenberg

That device was US$139 when released in August 2010. Black Friday 2010? Not sure. But a lot less.

And it should be way less today, because electronics with the same specs, if you can find them, go down in price.

That $139 would be about $200 today with inflation. The price has gone down quite a lot.

The improvements over time seem to me minor, as in your example of 6 inches vs. 6.8

The .8" gain is in the diagonal, which means at the same aspect ratio both the horizontal and vertical grow. That small gain is actually about a 23% gain in screen area. That's a lot less minor.

[JSWolf]

I find the larger screen make for more enjoyable reading.

[DNSB]

Originally Posted by issybird

People obviously can and do have their list of priorities, but I think that's short-sighted if not silly. No point in buying older tech in general and in this case the PW6 is larger, has a 1300 Carta screen, a bigger battery, more LEDs and faster page turns. Did I miss anything? And with a PW5 you're already starting out with an older battery. Nuts, IMO. Most (and by which I mean overwhelmingly most) users don't care about D&T. I personally slaver over those page turns, but can't justify it compared to the PW5 I already have. And what a great price!

You did forget to mention that the PW6 uses MTP instead of USBMS which makes for issues for Mac and Linux users. Amazon got enough complaints that they now include their own MTP driver with K4Mac. Perhaps a mention that Amazon decided to hide the system folder and so the thumbnails folder so calibre is no longer able to fix missing thumbnails

[SteveEisenberg]

Originally Posted by JSWolf

You cannot adjust the margin on the Kindle beyond a certain point and that point is too large.

In the older models, you had fine control over the global margin used for all books and other documents, as explained here:

Mobileread Wiki - How to Change Margins

Originally Posted by JSWolf

You can adjust the margin if you use negative margins in the eBook. You also have to use a font such a ChareInk6 to lessen the overly large line height.

This may be true, except I do not quite understand your point.

With newer eInk Kindles, I have to individually adjust the margin by doing a conversion in calibre. Under Look & Feel - Styling I always put in this extra CSS:

html {
margin-right: -66px;
margin-left: -50px;
}

In recent years, I always use the Bookerly font, but I think the above is fine with most of them.

This still leaves some margin that I think of as wasted space on the eInk, since I do not have a white bezel that would be the margin.

The problem with the method for adjusting the margin of newer Kindles is that AFAIK it is impossible to adjust the margins of a library borrow with DRM. If I am wrong about that, anyone is invited to correct me.

My point here is that, for my personal purposes, Amazon hasn't significantly improved the Kindle; newer models are better some ways and worse in others. The biggest improvement I do see is more resistance to screen cracking.