Are Amazon's "Kindle Version" mangas low resolution?

[ubraf]

So I recently got a 300ppi 7"8 e-reader and compared the same manga, one on the e-reader, and one the paper version. The paper version is 8" so not a huge difference in size.
The paper version has much crisper text that is easier to see. It particularly makes a difference for furigana and small but complex kanji.
I also tried reading the Kindle version on my PC but it seems the text is not as high-res as the paper format.

[ilovejedd]

Amazon tends to send different resolution/quality based on the device. In general, I think Kindle e-readers get lower quality compared to the Kindle for Android and Kindle for iOS apps. That said, if you have the latest Kindle for PC version, you should be getting highest quality, too.

Mind, resolution isn't the same across the board either even with the same publisher. Some have higher res, some have lower res and while that disparity is to be expected between older and newer releases, even on new releases, there are discrepancies. This is the situation in the US. Since you mentioned furigana and kanji, I'm guessing you're getting your books from Amazon.co.jp.

If you're interested, here's some further discussion:
https://www.mobileread.com/forums/sh...d.php?t=295611

[ubraf]

Interesting. My e-reader is the Likebook Mars which uses Android 6.0. My Kindle PC version is 1.17. I will try upgrading it and see if that changes anything but even if it does, I will still have a low res version on my e-reader, right?

Yes, I'm getting my books from Amazon.co.jp.

Will have a look at your thread. Would really like to be able to get high-res manga on my e-reader.

Edit: Well I just updated to 1.25 (the latest version) and the resolution seems to be the same on my PC.

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by ubraf

Interesting. My e-reader is the Likebook Mars which uses Android 6.0. My Kindle PC version is 1.17. I will try upgrading it and see if that changes anything but even if it does, I will still have a low res version on my e-reader, right?

Yes, I'm getting my books from Amazon.co.jp.

Will have a look at your thread. Would really like to be able to get high-res manga on my e-reader.

Edit: Well I just updated to 1.25 (the latest version) and the resolution seems to be the same on my PC.

What's the display resolution on your PC and how do you have the images displayed (fit to screen, fit to width, etc)? If your monitor is only 1080p, you'd likely need to zoom in on the images.

That said, I would think Kindle for Android would be getting highest resolution and quality possible.

[ubraf]

Resolution is 1440x900. 13" screen. Fit to screen. But even when I zoom in on the image, I can't say for sure that it's getting better. It looks like it's just getting stretched a bit.

I read that the human eye can't discern more than 300 PPI. Not sure if it's true or not but if it is, my e-reader should have paper-quality resolution. Also when I zoom-in on my e-reader, it doesn't seem like the text is getting better.

[gimble]

Originally Posted by ubraf

But even when I zoom in on the image, I can't say for sure that it's getting better.

High PPI helps only if the images are high resolution in the first place. If the base resolution of the manga image is low, zooming wont help clarify it.

You can see the "file size" under product details in the kindle edition store page. It gives you an indication of the resolution of the images.

Browsing through some of the titles on Amazon.co.jp, it seems to me that the Japanese versions have much smaller file sizes than the English language versions of manga. Maybe the publishers are using lower resolution images for Japanese versions.

[ubraf]

I know I just said it to address ilovejedd's point of me needing to zoom in.

I've been researching a bit and there is another store called eBookJapan. Googling in Japanese, I found comparisons of images between the Kindle version and eBookJapan's version. You can see the particular post here: http://denshishoseki-navi.net/ebookj...hikaku/#sec2_5 which compares the two.

Now, I tried for one file which is 66MB on the Amazon store & 88MB on eBookJapan (about the same size as the English version on the Amazon AU store), but just from the free samples, I'm unable to really make out any difference. eBookJapan might have a very very slight edge but I'm not sure if I'm being biased after having read the post above.

Other comparisons:
https://e-bookhikaku.com/wh-is-good/ebook-n-kindle
https://tsukimicoffee.com/densisyoseki_gasitu/#i-13

Overall it seems that maybe Amazon compresses their files slightly but I guess even looking at eBookJapan's version, I was hoping for an image quality near-identical to the print version.

[ilovejedd]

Decided to compare the size for one of my manga volumes (Skip Beat Volume 41).

https://www.amazon.co.jp/dp/B076F6WTG3/

• website: 33,071 KB

https://www.amazon.com/dp/B07FR13YYV/

• website: 118,847 KB (my guess: 1280x1920 res)
• azw3 download: 38,755 KB (variable resolution: 1280x1920 max, ~220 KB per image)
• PW3 kfx download: 35,180 KB (assets folder 35,028 KB, 965x1448, ~180 KB per image)

comiXology

• in-app, proprietary format: 384.6 MB

https://www.kobo.com/us/en/ebook/skip-beat-vol-41

• epub download: 151,273 KB (1400x2100, ~880 KB per image)

At 33,071 KB, that's even smaller than the PW3 download (designed for ~3.6" x ~4.75" screen) so I'm not at all surprised if Kanji is barely legible.

I don't actually read manga via the Kindle app. In the US, a lot of Kindle comics on Amazon are available as "Kindle & comiXology" so I use the far superior comiXology app for reading Amazon-purchased comics and manga. Granted, yeah, it's pretty killer on storage.

[ubraf]

Thanks I didn't know about comiXology before your post. It's quite cool. Too bad the don't have the mangas I want. Really hope it comes to Amazon.jp soon.

I checked the manga in my post just above yours. It seems the original seller is BOOK WALKER (I'm guessing because Amazon's version has a page with the BOOK WALKER logo as the last page) but their file size is only 53mb which is less than Amazon's!

But about the large file size, it shouldn't really matter because most devices have a lot of storage and you can delete & redownload them anytime you want right?

[ilovejedd]

Originally Posted by ubraf

But about the large file size, it shouldn't really matter because most devices have a lot of storage and you can delete & redownload them anytime you want right?

Yes, you can always redownload. My problem is availability of fast internet at the time of download (e.g. overseas trips, etc). Also, because of the larger first sizes, wait time to finish downloads is much longer, too.

On iOS specifically, background downloads timeout in ~10-15 minutes so it's not like you can just queue a bunch of comics to download overnight. Alas, no SD card support so if I want sufficient storage to store my favorites and reading list, that means ponying $$$ for internal storage upgrades. Shame since it's the iPad Pro 12.9" (2732 * 2048) that benefits the most from the higher resolution/quality images (line art and text look pretty blurry with low res images).

Granted, on a 7-8" device, a resolution of 1280x1920 should be sufficient to match print quality. Another consideration is the source. I expect English licensees use clean digital masters for ebook publishing. Meanwhile, some of the images on your links look like they were simply scanned.