From Sony e-book to Kindle Scribe…
The very first e-book reader which I had was the one gifted to me by my brother since he knew I was an avid reader! It was the Sony e-book reader which at that time was a revolution of sorts! And one of the best gifts I ever got in my life!
It was a slim device which could hold lots of books and had a option of expansion via an SD card storage! and the best part was that it had an in built mp3 player!
Though it was not touch screen and had no light of its own so in effect it was like having a book! It was one of the best devices I had and one of my favorites! The amount of novels I have read in that book was too many to count! There were buttons for the chapters and also for the songs.
The performance was slow and it was black and white but it did the job and how! Even now if given a choice I would select that reader which unfortunately is no longer available…
One of the major issues with this was that the books need to be downloaded or loaded via the computer and unlike kindle Sony did not have any titles of its own. The e-book used to read many types of book though but since it was not in control of the book, some books had font issues! I was not able to increase some fonts while some books were not readable at all! Of course there used to be an amazing e-book convertor for windows at the time which used to solve these issues but sometimes it could not!
Also most new books were prohibitively expensive and I was forced to download books especially of the foreign authors via the net by using other sources! Slowly the number of books I could download became less and once again my focus shifted to the paperback. The Sony started misbehaving often and one fine day, it said good bye and never got on again.
Later on of course the tech was more favorable to Amazon Kindle simply because of it huge e-book library! Amazon has more than 80 percent share of the titles and with audible; there appears for now not much competition! In spite of the huge advertisements and offers, I somehow held out my own and did not get an e-book reader for years! Still the novel reading continued.
My next e-book was the Amazon Paperwhite which had touch screen and in built light and WIFI! Its shape was like a small notebook and it was just as light! Of course at the time I was getting my collection of paperback books and running out of space in my home! e-book reader was the way to go!
My constant book companion for last five years! For regular novels, it is great but if there is color or pictures then it is not at all recommended. Another irritating thing is that the Kindle does have Bluetooth and the capability to listen to audiobook! But it is region locked! So if you select UK region then these capabilities are not shown! Of course it is better to listen to audiobooks via the mobile since the control is better but still that is a choice which must be left to the consumer and not the company! That’s being APPLE!
The major issue with Kindle has always been that it is linked to your account and purchase and also it has absolutely no support for color books like comics which I also like to read occasionally. The kindle gives you a mail where you can send a specific format to read on your kindle in case you have a pdf of any e-book lying around but sometimes it will not take stating that the format is not correct. These books have no guarantee that they will be displayed correctly in Kindle and there was one novel which had everything but the last page!
Also if you like to listen to music or audiobook while reading then you need your phone! This is really frustrating since the Kindle has a Bluetooth inbuilt and the capability to perform but somehow Amazon does the Apple!
For all said and done, Kindle is slow; it takes some time for the book to load and the page turning is slow if you compare it with an iPad or any Tablet.
Since there is an inbuilt light, you can read in the night but that is the only advantage. Of course you get the Kindle only if you are an avid novel reader and that is the only thing you want to do!
So the trusty Kindle worked without a hassle for the past five years or so! No battery issue or any start up problem! In fact the only reason I upgraded the Kindle is because the cover of my old Kindle was looking dirty and to think that I have a piece of tech five years old is just not done!
My latest kindle is the Kindle Scribe which is not available in most parts of the world. The Kindle is a large tablet sized black and white device and the only good thing is that you have a pen and you can write! (Finally Amazon caught the pen train!)
I got this Kindle via import from USA and it was worth the wait or not!
This may be one of the biggest Kindle ever! It is bigger than an iPad (in some dimension at least!) and the shape is very different! I understood that the shape is like this so that you will buy the original cover and the other Generic cover will not fit! In fact even the cover was imported! The cover available in India is costlier than the Kindle Paperwhite!
Now since the screen size is big, what you get in area, you lose in speed! The start up and load time is similar to the Paperwhite which is more than five years old albeit a little bit faster but then maybe a tech guy can see the difference! I felt is was more or less the same! There is still no support for the color books and I selected UK region so audiobook and Bluetooth do not work! It is bigger and more pleasant to read but other than that, it is the same old Kindle with a hefty (very!) price tag!
The pen though is one of the best! I have the Samsung S pen which hands down is the best pen in any way! I also have the Apple Pencil which is really good but a little less than Samsung and I also have the Microsoft Surface pen which just does the job and that’s that! The Kindle Scribe pen though is not Bluetooth and does not need to be charged! It writes flawlessly and the Premium pen has an additional button which you can assign to an action and nothing else! You can take notes in a breeze and you can post notes within a novel but other than that, the pen is just an added accessory which you may not miss if it gets lost! Reading on a Kindle has always been a joy but then even Sony ten years back did the same thing!
There must be an option to read color books also where you can change the display to color or something! I am not an engineer so that is for the ones working in Amazon to think and come up with! In fact Amazon had a winner with them with the Kindle Fire tablet but somehow they did not promote it and now it is not in production.
The only reason why we buy the Kindle is the huge Kindle library support and nothing else! Even in the top five e-book readers in the world, Kindle may take only one place so buckle up!
The Scribe is hype and nothing else! Buy it only if you want to show off like me and later regret! But for serious book lovers, you can stick to regular Kindle and use the left over money (it will be a big amount too!) to buy more e-books!
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