Rubenerd

Given I've had my Kindle for just over a week now, I thought I'd do a quick followup review that follows up my previous review. Well that and the title were superfluous.

(Disclaimer: The screen and buttons aren’t scuffed, I’ve just kept the original temporary plastic film over the device until my Kindle screen protector is delivered. Yes, I don’t want any scratch marks on this screen that I’ll be looking at for hopefully many years!)

The practical stuff

As I said before, one of the reasons for getting the Kindle was my increasing addiction to eBooks on my iTelephone, particularly when I'm on the train or waiting at banks, etc. The convenience of whipping out the Kindle from my pocket and reading a book where I left off on a beautiful, sharp screen that looks like paper has been nothing short of glorious. Given I tend to read a novel and non-fiction book at the same time, the device is a fraction of the weight of two tomes, and infinitely more portable.

Synching has also been very simple. I've started organising books into folders by author, and renaming all the .mobi files by removing author names. The Kindle picks up these books in subfolders without any problems. I've also added the Kindle's folders to my global rsync backup program, so whenever its plugged in, the books are backed up onto my file server. Can't do that with paper!

One practical consideration has been the lack of a backlight. The very feature of LCDs that allows books to be read in the dark also causes much of the eye strain. In lieu of a booklight or case with a light, I bought a warm coloured, low wattage lamp for the side of my bed that creates enough ambient light to read by. Its rather nice in the evening to have the room bathed in this mild glow and reading for a couple of hours.

I also use it for… reading!

Which brings us to how well it has functioned as an ebook reader for me. In the week and a few days I've had it, I've read three novels cover to cover, and one of them was a Michael McCollum! The barrier to entry for reading is obviously that much lower, at least for me.

I often read people's lamentations that ebook readers aren't as good as books, but I argue they're better. The Kindle 4 is lighter than even a paperback which lends itself well to holding up in bed, and lightly tapping a button is so much easier than holding a book open and turning pages, particularly in confined spaces like train seats.

The next step is to review the books I've been reading, and to potentially make a list here :). I suppose I could resurrect my Listal account, they're owned by Amazon now aren't they?

If you’re thinking of buying one, feel free to use my referral code to support the site, or go here if you don’t like the idea of referrals. Thanks :)