Amazon Kindle Review

Being a gadget aficionado, I placed my order for the Kindle yesterday when it was announced and promptly received the new device today. I've now spent about 3-4 hours with the Kindle, including reading a book at the hair dresser, having my hair stylist and friend recommend Anne McCaffrey's Talents series to me, and using the Kindle right then and there to promptly buy Pegasus in Flight and have it download to my Kindle wirelessly within a minute.

But before I begin with this review, let's put a few things straight: (a) I love books - my parents have always had tons of them, my wife and I have thousands of them, and I will never give up paper books; (b) this review is not being paid for by anyone (however, if you click on a link to Amazon.com from this site and then purchase something, I will earn a small percentage under he Amazon Associates program); (c) I've started using the original Sony Reader over a year ago and just upgraded to the newest Sony Reader about 2 months ago - the reason is that I travel a lot and I like to read when I'm traveling, but I don't like to either lug around 5-6 books with me or run out of reading materials during a trip.

To make things interesting, I purchased a few books and a couple of magazine subscriptions for the Kindle through the Kindle Store yesterday after placing my order for the device. Amazon promised that these would "magically" be delivered to my device once I unpacked it.

So when the package arrived today and I unpacked it this evening after coming home from work, I was immediately surprised by the lightweight nature of the Kindle. I had expected it to be heavier based on the leaked photos, but it is actually quite light - it appears to even be lighter than the Sony Reader. The package is a bit of an homage to the Apple iPod (as is the white color of the Kindle, the power supply, the cables, etc). Luckily the book cover that you can attach the device to is still black!

The actual Kindle is not even half as ugly as the previously leaked photos seemed to imply. The alphabetic keyboard at the bottom takes a bit of getting used to, but the page-turning buttons are cleverly located where they ought to be (the lack of those was a big flaw in the original Sony Reader, that was, however, fixed in the newer version this year). Once you put the Kindle into its book cover, it has the right touch and feel of a book, and is very comfortable in the hand.

The first time starting it up took a little while, but after it had booted I was very pleasantly surprised to find the following on the home page (after going through a few basic introductory help-file pages of how the device works): (a) a letter from Jeff Bezos that started with "Dear Alexander"; (b) all the books and magazines that I had purchased online the previous day; (c) all the blogs that I had previously subscribed to via the Amazon.com Kindle Store. Furthermore the device was pre-configured to be linked to my Amazon.com account so that all shopping from the device was linked to my account and credit card right away without any setup. The promise that is works right out of the box without any kind of setup is actually quite true.

http://www.xmlaficionado.com/2007/11/amazon-kindle-review.html

Kindle from Amazon

I’ll be the first to admit that e-books suck. They’re great in theory, but they’ll never catch on. There’s nothing that screams dork more than an e-book. E-books are the future. Apparently there is some miscommunication going on and some are under the impression that I think e-books are not the future. I, like many others, enjoy the real thing. There’s just something comforting about having a paper book to carry around, to bunny ear, scratch notes on, highlight words/phrases and whatever else you may like to do. The refresh rates suck and you just want to pull your hair out while waiting for the next page to load. You don’t know how far along you are in the book. Those are just a couple reasons among a slew of arguments to hate e-books. Although, part of me thinks it’s a waste of resources even if it’s made from recycled paper. Traditional books have their pros and cons, but e-books are just janky and stupid, right? Well, yes, they are, but the Kindle from Amazon is a different beast.

My initial impressions were pretty off. I just wasn’t all that impressed and sort of left it on my desk for half a day, but I always want to floss the latest in technology when traveling so I brought it along for my trip to the Bay Area for turkey day. I figured I’d at least have Internet access while waiting at the airport. Then I started to tinker around with it as I got bored with the browser, which is phenomenal, but we’ll get to that later. The Kindle is a well thought out product. It incorporates the New American Oxford Dictionary and Wikipedia, which is extremely helpful when you have no idea what’s being said in an article from the NYT, Time, CrunchGear or any one of the books available from Amazon. I often find myself not knowing the definition of a particular word and I always tell myself I’ll grab the dictionary and look it up. I also tend to highlight phrases or passages that I’d like to share with others or just keep for myself, but I can’t always find them when I need them. These are just a few examples that I know many of you find yourselves in as well. Kindle takes care of all that. If you’re reading a book/magazine/newspaper and you need to look up the definition of something then do a quick search without ever leaving that page. It’s that simple. The Search function on Kindle is superb as it checks the Web, Wikipedia, New American Oxford Dictionary, Kindle Store and any book/magazine/blog that’s on your Kindle. It’s the most comprehensive search engine I’ve seen and it’s on an e-book of all places! If you need to highlight something then go right ahead. Want to take a few notes in a particular section then do it. Any notes or highlighting you do shows up on the main menu under the “My Clippings” category. Need to know how far you are in the book? If you’re like me then yes you do. At the bottom of the screen is an indicator bar that fills itself in as you go along. Navigating through books is as easy as any paper book. If you need to check out the table of contents or you need to jump to the beginning or go to a specific location then do so by way of the menu. You can add a bookmark, though, the last page you were on is always remembered. Bookmarks show up under “My Clippings” as well. Can it get any easier? I don’t think so.

http://www.crunchgear.com/2007/11/21/amazon-kindle-review/

Amazon Kindle Real-Life Review

It's dumb to test the Amazon Kindle by sitting at a desk, pressing a lot of buttons. The real judgment as to its usefulness has to come after experiencing it throughout the week in three key real-life reading scenarios:

• In the bedroom
• On an airplane
• Atop the porcelain throne (yes, I'm talking about the toilet)

Join us as we take you where we don't like to take too many strangers, and experience the real-life Kindle review:

I understand the Kindle. Book reading is always a one-on-one activity, and there is more or less only one way to experience a book—from a rectangular object in your hand. An e-book reader that's PC-free, connected directly to the book source, is even smarter than an MP3 player or phone that's connected to a music store, because music ends up all over the place, while books will always stay in your lap.

People bitch about a lack of Wi-Fi, but as a fan of wide-area wireless, I think Sprint's EV-DO was a good way to go, because it's available in more places. And as far as the lack of backlight, I am inclined to believe the messaging from both Amazon and Sony, that E-Ink is easier on the eyes than anything backlit, and that long battery life is more important. I used the Kindle regularly without charging for four days straight before it completely crapped out just this morning.

As for the criticism about document and e-book format compatibility, I suspect these problems will work themselves out over time, as the Kindle's Linux platform is surely easy to enhance through software. At any rate, you already know many of the issues, so there's no point rehashing them here, especially when much of it is a matter of personal preference.

No, none of these theoretical concerns were in my mind as I read using the Kindle this week, but that's not to say I didn't uncover some issues. Here's what I discovered this week while reading a book on Kindle—Heat by Bill Buford— that I was already halfway through in its old-world hardcover paper form

http://gizmodo.com/gadgets/our-kindle-verdict/amazon-kindle-real+life-review-verdict-lightweight-long-lasting-and-easy-to-grip-in-bed-325939.php

2008 hottest gadget is the Amazon Kindle

Amazon Kindle

Cost: $399.99

Where to get it: Amazon.com.

What is it? Weighing less than a paperback at 10.3 oz, Amazon’s new e-book reader includes 88,000 titles, with all bestsellers listed at $9.99. It can hold 200 titles at one time and has a battery life of up to a week without a recharge. It also includes exclusive subscriptions to top U.S. and international newspapers and magazines, 250 blogs, e-mail capability, and Wikipedia access. It’s a one stop shop for all things literary and it’s all delivered wirelessly in under a minute from the Kindle store.


http://www.askmen.com/toys/top_10_200/240b_top_10_list.html

Gadgets and Gizmos

A gadget is a device or an appliance that has a useful specific practical purpose and function but is often thought of as a novelty. Gadgets are invariably considered to be more unusually or cleverly designed than normal technology at the time of their invention. Gadgets are sometimes also referred to as gizmos.

History

The history of invention of gadgets is almost as old as humanity itself. ^[1] But, the introduction of the word is relatively new. ^[2] According to the Oxford English Dictionary, there is anecdotal evidence for the use of "gadget" as a placeholder name for a technical item whose precise name one can't remember since the 1850s; with Robert Brown's 1886 book Spunyarn and Spindrift, A sailor boy’s log of a voyage out and home in a China tea-clipper containing the earliest known usage in print.^[3] The etymology of the word is disputed. A widely circulated story holds that the word gadget was "invented" when Gaget, Gauthier & Cie, the company behind the casting of the Statue of Liberty (1886), made a small-scale version of the monument and named it after their firm; however this contradicts the evidence that the word was already used before in nautical circles, and the fact that it did not become popular until after World War I.^[3] Other sources cite a derivation from the French gâchette which has been applied to various pieces of a firing mechanism, or the French gagée, a small tool or accessory.^[3] The spring-clip used to hold the base of a vessel during glass-making is also known as a gadget. The first atomic bomb was nicknamed the gadget by the scientists of the Manhattan Project, tested at the Trinity site.

The iPhone is a gadget that was released June 29, 2007.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gadgets