I've been thinking about e-Readers for over a year now. More and more, the books I read are available in on-line form, sometimes for free. I'll download these, print them at work then read them in bed.
The e-Reader market seems to be very full with dozens of offerings. The Kindle, nook (I hate it when product's don't use proper capitalization) and Sony e-Reader being leaders. Until recently even the small eReaders have been $200.00 or more. For some reason, in the past month prices for the popular readers have dropped to $150.00. Blame it on the iPad, or the Kobo.
I seriously evaluated the Sony e-Reader, the Kindle and the Nook.
The Kindle doesn't work with eBooks from my local or work library. That's where I get most of my eBooks, so the Kindle was out.
Initially I was worried about the nook. Older reviews weren't exactly glowing. Also, it's from a bricks and mortar book store. Old style companies rarely produce great new-market technologies. If Barnes and Noble decided that hi-tech electronics and web services were not their forte then the nook would be abandoned.
Sony and Amazon have a great history of inventing new markets. Barnes and Noble does not.
But, when you compare the nook to the Sony, the nook wins. Esthetically, the nook has a clean minimalist design. The 6'' nook is $30.00 less than the 6'' Sony. The Sony's display has more glare, a problem for a reading device. The nook has wi-fi. Sony's does not. The nook's online abilities appear to be better thought out than the Sony's-- I can download books, even free books, without plugging the device in. That is a very nice.
Now, the nook does have it's problems. Navigation can be clunky-- it took me half a day to learn how to do the 'swipe' gesture. Regular RSS Blogs cannot be synchronized to the nook, not a fatal flaw, but it would be nice.
So, overall I'm very happy with it. We'll see if this device sticks or as Tyco said, if it shifts from gadget to device
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