Hey guys - this is my first post here. I was wondering if anyone has tried the new Amazon Kindle or know where I could get a less expensive one because I can't really afford the RRP at the moment. If you have tried it out please let me know if it's worth the money.

Thanks!

Between your local library system, book clubs and B$ members finding free or low cost magazine subscriptions, a tech toy that cost around $360 is big bucks, IMHO. Even Apple found it needs to drop the prices on Itunes or folks will go elsewhere. Plus Apple has decided to remove that copyright crap.

My in laws have one and they love it. But it is pricey for sure.

To my great annoyance, I've misplaced mine at the moment, but I picked it up last summer off ebay for $212 after live.com cashback (unfortunately dead now) and IMO it was definitely worth what I paid for it, although if I was looking to get one now I would probably wait because it's rumored that the 2nd generation Kindle might be released soon.

I read a lot but don't like to read novels off the computer monitor, so the Kindle is great for me. It's actually easier on the eyes than a traditional book, and being able to carry around a hundred books in something the approximate size and weight of a paperback is really nice; the Amazon downloads are also convenient, although a lot of my books are free downloads. (Baen Books, for example, makes many of their titles available online cheap or free)

I don't at all regret getting one.

rumors of a new kindle dropping soon...February 9th?

http://i.gizmodo.com/5140106/amazon-prepar...2-on-february-9

Heh, cron, was just coming here to post that.

Looking forward to seeing what the changes are aside from the new shape, although I don't have any intention of replacing mine anytime soon.

And now it's official :-)

As a 1st gen Kindle owner I got an email from Amazon letting me know I'll have priority if I want to upgrade (though there's no discount off the $360 price)

here's my take on the new kindle;

What were they thinking? $359!!!

3G for a ebook reader? Why do you need 3G for a ebook reader. WIFI connectivity is all you need !!!

2 GB internal storage: Should have had minimal internal storage and a SD slot.


dumping the evdo modem/3G support and all the unneccesary internal storage would have dropped the price to a reasonable level.

Not sure the storage would make a difference since it's a matter of a few dollars....maybe less in that kind of volume

i agree they should have dropped the price a bit. Wonder how much the older version will go for in the used market.....

The price is the same as the older version (actually it was $400, but they dropped it to $359 a few months back)

The older one did have less storage and the SD slot, which I prefer. I gather the reason for dropping the SD slot and replaceable battery was so they could make it thinner.

das: So you don't have to find a wi-fi hotspot? I can be pretty much anywhere and downloading new content to my Kindle.

I admit I was tempted to just sell my Kindle right before the announcement and then buy a new one for cheaper. Price for a used one has dropped from over $350 to under $300 in the last few days.

Not enough improvements in v2 to get me to upgrade, but I probably will when v3 comes out.

I just don't see why 3G/Modem is necessary right now? With WIFI or a SD slot, I can d/l all the books I want from home.

They should have focused on reducing the price.

Sure, YOU can....but I think one of the big selling points is that ANYBODY can download books, anywhere. Not just those of us who are technically inclined.

Personally I take mine with me when I'm out of town and it's nice to be able to just download whatever I'm in the mood for without worrying about whether I can find a connection.

My coworker has a first-gen Kindle and it rocks. The initial price is a bit steep, but if you read a lot of books, the discount you'll get on e-book versions will eventually make up for it.

Only downside - it's not the best for reading on the beach

What makes it bad for the beach? I thought the screen was supposed to be good in bright sunlight.

Has the technology (e-paper?) matured enough that this is a usable device? The last time I looked at one of these ebook readers, I wasn't impressed.

it has improved. It can display more shades of gray. But there are already rumors of a kindle 3.

There a company called plastic logic coming out with their own e-book reader (8.5x11) sometime in 2010.




http://www.plasticlogic.com/index.html

You can see a video of their reader here:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=v226DYqlbHQ

My adviser just got his - he didn't know about the K2 and thought he was getting a K1 like mine, so he was surprised when it showed up! I think I prefer the larger buttons on the K1, but the thinner body and better screen is nice. Mostly it's laziness that kept me from upgrading (since I coulda sold the old one for more than the new one cost) - didn't want the hassle of moving over the non-Amazon stuff. I'll stick with K1 until I can get a K3 :-)

Have you tried converting pdf's/ebooks/chm's to be readable on the Kindle? When it first came out people had a lot of problems with that, I was curious if that has been fixed.

Yes. How well it works depends on the file. PDFs are inherently image files - they're not going to display properly on anything that isn't the size of a standard sheet of paper - but for ones that are all text it can work ok.

Thanks for the info. I still can't decide if I should pull the trigger, I'm leaning towards no due to the cost. But it would be nice since I travel so much.

When it gets to within one order of magnitude of the price of a paperback, I'll consider it worth the expense.

Depends on what paperback you're looking at ;-) I have paperbacks with retail price over $100..

Textbook maybe? Can you purchase textbooks for a Kindle?

Good to know. Reading ebook pdfs would be the single biggest reason I would consider a device like this and Kindle from what I can see does not seem to be geared towards that.

Yes, and it depends on the publisher. Some (like O'Reilly) are moving to put their textbooks on Kindle, some aren't.

I purchased one for my GF for her upcoming birthday. She's been hinting at it since b4 xmas. But no way I could have got one in time for that. I played with it when I first got it...was cool....came up and said "Hello, Sean" right off the bat..connected to my Amazon account withot me even doing anything. I just have to get her an Amazon account come May and switch it to her.

I like the fact that it's 3G...she's not as technically savvy when in comes to networking stuff (though she teachs computer business app classes..lol), and I think this will save here a lot of frustration looking for open hotspots, etc. Would be nice to have a SD slot, but you can save all your books at Amazon, so no biggie there. I think the price will drop over the next couple years as competition arises and they start putting more textbooks out for it..that's the MAJOR plus I think. Being back in college myself, I can appreciate paying 1/2 or less for the same book and having ALL my texts on a single kindle...wow...save a lot of back pain (my A++ class has 3 books..jeesh..).

I hope they come with wifi featue too so that it can be used in Canada to link to wikipedia to read the manually downloaded books.

Kindle DX

basically a super sized kindle 2

PDF reader part is huge for me. I'm actually thinking of getting one now. I'll probably wait until more reviews hit though.

If/when O'Reilly provides Safari subscribers the ability to sync books on their bookshelf with Kindle, I would buy one in a heartbeat.

PDF reader is awesome, agreed. Does it have a slot for storage now? 3.3GB isn't all that much if you fill it with PDFs.

The PDF thing is huge for me as well. I may seriously consider trading in my 1st gen Kindle for one of these.

Supposedly the New York Times and a few other papers will be subsidizing the purchase of a Kindle DX when you subscribe; waiting on more details

Note that if you're thinking about buying a DX, you probably want to order now to get in line - you can always cancel up til they start packing 'em up.
Based on past experience there will probably be a backlog of several months.

I recently had the opportunity to look at sony ebook reader and kindle side by side and I like the sony better.

Preorder Page for the Kindle DX