Turning Your E-Reader Into a Cheap Tablet

grahamsaa writes "NPR's Weekend Edition aired a story today on how rooting the Nook Color can turn it into a full fledged and relatively inexpensive Android tablet. The story claims that the process takes about half an hour, and only requires the purchase of a Nook and a microSD card, and points listeners to a YouTube tutorial on how to root the device. Could this signal a change in how mainstream users see devices like this? Could rooting Android devices like the Nook ever become mainstream?" We ran a story about this in December, and I haven't seen a flood of hacked readers anywhere so I doubt that tablet makers have anything to worry about.

Comments

Courier

[moskzs]

I still wish Microsoft would had released Courier. It would be a perfect tablet, especially for reading ebooks.

Re:Courier

[Anonymous Coward]

I still wish Microsoft would had released Courier [gizmodo.com]. It would be a perfect tablet, especially for reading ebooks.

I am confused. Why would the courier be perfect for reading an ebook?

The truth is that the format for a physical book is a compromise made to deal with the limitations of the physical world -- the ideal surface for reading is an infinitely large, flat, weightless, continuous page with infinite resolution and durability, which never bends under any circumstances. But obviously, books are made of lots of little teeny fragile wobbly pages that must be bound together in a particular order, and protected by a huge and clunkly binding.

The courier takes all the bad parts of physical books, and all the bad parts of ebooks, and combines them in one package.

In short, if you don't understand why a book is shaped like a book, you might think the Microsoft Courier is a good idea. Once you really look at a book and become aware of the the compromises made in the design of the physical objects, you'll realize that the courier is an awful idea.

Re:Courier

[davester666]

Was Courier ever anything more than a video of "imagine how cool it would be if somebody made something like this"?

Re:Courier

[hairyfeet]

So let me ask you a question: Do you get paid to herd 100 or so shill accounts, AKA the HB Gary troll herder software, or do they pay you to set up accounts one at a time, ala the old slow way? How are the benefits? Do you get dental and vision? 401K? I'd really like to know as frankly I could do about 1000% better job than you shills without even trying, your so damned obvious it ain't even funny.

As for TFA, we and the posters must have different definitions of "cheap". Those $100 aPads are cheap, $250 for an E-reader? The hell with that. Hell at that price I can get a netbook, why would I wan t this thing rooted or not? hell the iPad I is selling now for $300, this thing is too high with a capital T.

Re:Courier

[itzdandy]

to back this thought up, consider how you use books that are spirally bound. When holding in hand and reading, you flip the page all the way around and look at a single sheet.

A single screen, in a portrait layout is just about right. 7"-10" seems to be the best range. ideally about 10-16oz, which is the #1 reason the iPad is not great for reading books, it is just too heavy. #2 being that the screen wears on the eyes after about an 1 hour of reading where eink is comfy for much longer. I have read for 8+ hours in a 16 hour timeframe on my sony reader on an airplane with no eink induced eyestrain whatsoever.

A pixel qi screen on an iPad along with some weight reductions might do the trick. the 'eink' mode should boost battery life nicely as well.

Re:Courier

[satuon]

The Courier's form factor resembles more an ordinary laptop than a real slate - the laptop is a 'clamshell' design too. The idea of the slate is that you don't have to open and close it, and that you can hold it with one hand while standing. The Courier lacks the very features that differentiate the iPad from regular laptops. So people who would rather buy a Courier than an iPad, would probably also rather buy an ordinary laptop than the Courier anyway.

Re:Courier

[Jeremy Erwin]

It depends on how many of the cool features are encumbered by patents.

Re:Courier

[Dog-Cow]

If you truly believe that an infinitely large anything is perfect for reading from, you are the single most stupid organism on the planet.

Re:Courier

[Mr. Slippery]

to back this thought up, consider how you use books that are spirally bound. When holding in hand and reading, you flip the page all the way around and look at a single sheet.

No, I don't, unless I'm in a very cramped environment. Often, I will want to refer back to something on the previous page -- a table or diagram, for example.

Re:Courier

[itzdandy]

book reading and reference material are opposite ends of the spectrum of book use. Thats why I specifically said 'when holding in hand and reading', not while doing research or assignments etc.

Re:Courier

[Anonymous Coward]

Often, I will want to refer back to something on the previous page -- a table or diagram, for example.

You know you're allowed to flip the whole book over, right? :)

Re:Courier

[countertrolling]

These posts come from one of those "no-reply" email accounts. Don't seriously expect a response. Unless you're talking to a personal friend, you'll never know if the person on the other end is human.

Re:Courier

[UnknowingFool]

Courier was never a real product. It was never a prototype. It never made it to the demo stage. If you look at any of the "demos" you'd see that all the screens and animations were simulated. It's sorta like saying you wish that Dr. Emmett Brown actually made a time-traveling DeLorean.

Even if somehow had made Courier, it would have made a terrible reader. Judging by the sheer horsepower required for the Courier, it probably would not have been battery efficient. Also MS would have probably picked OLED or backlit color LCD as the screen which is not great in direct light. The eReaders work great because text is much easier on the eyes; however, they are not great at multi-media situations. Also eReaders have great battery life. Lastly, two screens = more weight.

Re:Courier

[Anonymous Coward]

The fact that it's never been released truly makes it the best Microsoft product, ever.

Wish they'd use the identical strategy on all their products and ideas, and the world would be a much better place.

Re:Courier

[Totenglocke]

I already have the perfect format for reading a book - it's called a "book". I just picked up the entire collected works of several authors last night - grand total? $30 (including tax). You'll be lucky to get three ebooks for that price, yet I got 47 (just counted).

Re:Courier

[geminidomino]

Now take them on a plane with you.

Re:Courier

[moortak]

I got a few hundred ebooks for free from Project Gutenberg. Depending on your habits ebooks can be vastly cheaper.

Re:Courier

[hairyfeet]

Oh I didn't expect one (although I think its funny him or one of his buddies came along as an AC to insult me LOL) but I do think it is important to point out astroturfing wherever it shows its ugly head as i think it is a serious threat to freedom.

I mean it is bad enough you can get astroturf campaigns like the Tea Party, aka the Koch Brothers Express, but at least there they have to pay people to actually show up, pay press to report, etc so it leaves an easy to follow money trail, but online discussion is one of the few places where one can speak openly anymore thanks to all the government and corporate spying (which is why many want you to be tied to an online identity, so they can punish you when you don't toe the party line) but now even that is being threatened by obvious paid shills like the poster I was responding to.

For now it is easy to spot, as they can't quit kissing ass or speaking corporate buzzword bingo, like in the above where an article on a completely different device gets a plug for a vaporware product designed to kill iPad sales that frankly a good 98% of the average folks would have never even heard of. So NOW is the time to nip that shit in the bud, NOW is the time to make sure their corporate master know their money is being wasted as it turns off those that might otherwise buy by "poisoning the well" and building bad will.

So we really need to point these clowns out, before we get drowned out by HB Gary shillbots. It is pretty easy to spot a real person VS a shill. Look at me for an example, everyone who takes a look at my history knows I like Windows desktops, Linux embedded and Web Servers. I'm more than happy to point out shitty attributes of any and all products I use, hell if they were to lock me in a room with the Windows development team I'd spend the day pointing out things I think are shit .

But shills, especially the HB Gary shillbomb type, can ruin the whole thing by burying the good under the shit and frankly I LIKE /. and I LIKE having discussions on geek items that you actually have to think and which go deep. These shillbombs are about as deep as a kiddy pool, they are just "You should use Brand X, now with SmileX!" and frankly sour the whole discussion. And sorry about the length, but for the past few weeks it has been pretty obvious MSFT has targeted /. with a shill team and frankly it stinks. I can guarantee that while I may still need to sell Windows there will be NO WinPhones and NO X360s going through this shop or allowed in my home. I won't support shilling.

Re:Courier

[countertrolling]

Yeah, I just thought responding beyond something like, "shill account, please ignore" is kind of a waste. Makes me wish there was a "spam" mod to eliminate the need to respond at all. It's getting pretty deep in here.

Re:Courier

[blackpaw]

I had lots of books, then my house flooded (Brisbane). Now I have lots of pulp.

However my eBooks are fine, even if I lost my Kindle I can access them online - plus I have them backed up independent of Amazon.

Re:Courier

[Totenglocke]

What's the battery life on your ebook reader? My books have infinite battery life (even better than a T-800 Terminator!)

Re:Courier

[blackpaw]

Kindle - round 4 weeks. Takes less than 30 minutes to charge.

Re:Courier

[Nikker]

While I agree with you shill/troll bots will be the new virus/malware/black all I see now is an obvious shill counter shilled[sic] then that post being shilled, no one is actually talking about the underlying tech. I think it is about time to set up honeypot threads and really watch how these beasts behave and poke them with sharp pointy sticks. On a side note WTF has happened at /. guys! This is becoming a load of garbage just bitching about who's buzz word is better than some other, did all the geeks and EE's die this past few years or did they just move on to other things? Seriously I've heard enough apologists for all three of the holy trinity (MS,Apple,Linux) to make this all a hilarious joke. I have dropped my bookmark and am moving on to ScienceDaily maybe come back in a few months to see if the boards are nailed to the windows.

Re:Courier

[Dr Max]

Not the e-reader in this question. Sure they call the nook colour an e-reader but its really just a low powered tablet cause its running an ips screen (same as the ipad). You may as well call the ipad an e-reader as well. If you want a tablet the last thing you should be doing is trying to covert a nook. Just go and buy a view sonic gtab much more powerful; comes with full android; and not much more expensive. and if you want a colour e-reader the last thing you should do is get a nook colour (you don't want anything back lit), wait for qualcomm to bring out the proper colour e-reader. If you could get rid of the gap between the screens of the courier (so it could be one big screen) then it would make a great tablet, but i agree terrible for e-reading.

Re:Courier

[tehcyder]

The truth is that the format for a physical book is a compromise made to deal with the limitations of the physical world -- the ideal surface for reading is an infinitely large, flat, weightless, continuous page with infinite resolution and durability, which never bends under any circumstances.

That is simply your misguided opinion; in actual fact it is very hard to read words when there is no page or line boundary, as adults read by scanning phrases or whole lines, rather than reading each individual word in a linear plod. .The structure of having pages makes it much easier and faster to read.

Re:Courier

[hairyfeet]

Personally I think the loonies have pushed the sane out of the tent, kinda like what we have seen with politics. I mean I used to be able to come here and being a Windows builder have a nice discussion on the pluses/minuses of Windows and other OSes (my personal plaything, I even have an old G3 i got just to play with OSX on PPC) and even when we disagreed the posts were always thoughtful and you really needed to think.

Now you can have an article about Windows or OSX or hell even OS/2 and the "FOSSies" as I call them come out of the woodwork to thump their GNUBibles and spout the most unbelievable horseshit that even true believers would have trouble with the stench. For a good laugh go to this site TM Repository and see how many of these cliches you have run into here because frankly you'll be surprised how much of the FOSSie speak is so cliche they have a TM. Sadly the FOSSie RDF has long surpassed the one Jobs built, and frankly the worst Windows fanboi on his worst day can't even touch these guys.

So I have to agree 110% the quality here is severely going down. I've started hanging out at OSNews and other tech sites just hoping to find wherever the old /. crowd went to, it is like watching MySpace die its slow death here now. Instead of interesting arguments like NTFS VS EXT3 or POWER VS ARM VS x86-64 we get "U Suxorz! Our (insert product) is awesome and u sux!". Hell I like a good deep discussion but things here are now about as deep as a kiddy wading pool.

So if you find a place with decent OS discussions, let me know okay? Between fixes at the shop frankly I'd like something better to do than play Solitaire. And I'd support your honeypot idea 110%, the shillbots are getting pretty thick around here and are like having commercials dumped in the middle of the comments section,. And you can't even ABP them out because fanbois will mod down anyone that doesn't follow groupthink so if you don't stick with -1 you end up missing the good but controversial posts, although sadly those like every other intelligent post have been fewer and fewer of late. Where did everybody go, and can I go there too?

Re:Courier

[Mr. Slippery]

book reading and reference material are opposite ends of the spectrum of book use.

1) I didn't say anything about "reference material"; 2) Reading a reference book is still reading a book.

Now, if you want to argue that ebooks are great if all you do is "light reading", fine. But there are many forms of reading that are not light reading and are not the use of reference works. For example, some editions of Shakespeare's plays have notes on facing pages. Many technical books have code listing and explanations on facing pages. It is advantageous to not have to flip back and forth, to just move your eyes.

Re:Courier

[Anonymous Coward]

Your points are good I admit. I would argue that in the case of shakespeare's plays and the accompanying notes, the reader and the ebook file should have a more appropriate for the form factor interface such as a notes overlay or 'mouseover' style note or something. Simply put, an ebook reader should be very light and easy to use to be appropriate for the most common use of the device. two screens and a hinge immediately doubles the weight and makes the device much MUCH less useful for 'light reading' and much more cumbersome. These devices will be most often used for light reading. So the answer here is to either make the digital product more appropriate for the form factor or to have a completely separate device to handle those types of use scenario with a more appropriate form factor.

Technical books fall obviously into reference material, which again should either be formatted to the most common form factor or be handled by a separate device. The Courier looks like it would be a great product for this type of content, but very poor for light reading.

I think that ebooks have yet to come into to their heyday and that ebook readers are still very young. I would expect that over the next 5-10 years the form factor will solidify and some novel approaches to these issues will be developed to make a universal reader, that fits the fast majority of use scenarios exceptionally well.

As an alternative, lets just put a link cable or bluetooth connection between two devices and an appropriate case. two iPads/Kindles/nooks side by side with software that adapts them to function as one makes a modular option. I'm ignoring cost here hoping that technology makes these devices more affordable over time.

Re:Courier

[Anonymous Coward]

to back this thought up, consider how you use books that are spirally bound. When holding in hand and reading, you flip the page all the way around and look at a single sheet.

No, I don't.

Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[arob28]

For not suing everybody like Sony is.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[Sulphur]

For not suing everybody like Sony is.

These are not the 'droids you are seeking. Nothing to see. Move along.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[hort_wort]

SHHHHhhhhhhhhhhhh!!!
What are you thinking?! You're gonna jinx it! :P

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[Anonymous Coward]

Well, if they were behaving like SONY, I think the first approach would be to discontinue the ability to read etext. Then, if anyone dared restore that ability, they'd exploit their choke-hold on the legal system.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[symbolset]

They seem to be getting behind it. Reportedly they're going to have a regular Android App marketplace on the thing. There are rumors of an official full Android software update. Why fight it? The more people who buy it, the cheaper the economies of scale become for their reader.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[Anonymous Coward]

Wait, you mean we could have been suing everybody? Thanks for the heads up!

Warmest regards,
Barnes & Noble

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[hedwards]

Nook has been going that way for a while. Shortly after I got mine they upgraded the web browser to release status rather than beta. They included a chess program and audio player with the release as well. I've been wondering how long it was going to take them to include at least basic programs like a to do list or calendar program.

Mind you that's the Nook WiFi without the fancy color screen, the one with a color screen seems even more of a no brainer.

I suspect what's going on here is that Barnes & Noble figured out that allowing this is good for their sales, and that as long as the devices still can read the books they sell that there isn't really much to worry about.

Shocking I know, that a major corporation would be that open minded to people using the devices they buy as they like.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[Anonymous Coward]

They're too busy not going bankrupt.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[taustin]

They plan to make money selling books, not book readers. The more readers they sell, the cheaper each one is to manufacture, and the more readres they sell. People who root aren't very likelyt o buy books, but the cheaper the price, the more people who will buy books will buy readers.

Plus, B&N are a brick & mortar store, and always have been. Unlike Amazon, where having employees dealing one on one with customers is an expense to be minimized, at B&N, it's the whole point.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[Nerdfest]

I would also assume that they're not actually *losing* money on them either.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[peragrin]

well that and in the barnes and noble i was in the other day the lady behind the counter told the customer who was buying one, is that you just had to follow some instructions on a website and you could do so much more.

Of course this Barnes and noble was on a tech college campus, so it isn't that surprising.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[Dr Max]

Why would you bother when you could get a viewsonic gtab for an extra $50, be 4 times as powerful and come with all the proper android pre-setup. Especially since the nook is using an ips screen so it doesn't even have the soft on the eyes e-reader appeal or work well outdoors.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[symbolset]

Why would you bother when you could get a viewsonic gtab for an extra $50, be 4 times as powerful and come with all the proper android pre-setup. Especially since the nook is using an ips screen so it doesn't even have the soft on the eyes e-reader appeal or work well outdoors.

Please. I can't be bothered to buy a nook color until it's got what I want: the full Google experience. A few bucks aren't going to shift me this way or that. I want what I want, and that's a tablet that obeys me, that gives what I want. If Moto or Samsung deliver that in a reliable brand, why should I look an your third market crap?

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[Anonymous Coward]

This plus Microsoft's attitude re: the Kinect, WTF is going on?

captcha: Compile

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[Sinning]

price.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[MikeBabcock]

The problem is, if they allow any old Android software, I can buy a Nook and install Amazon's Kindle software on it, then not buy B&N books for it :)

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[MBGMorden]

True, but given that logic, if you were THAT set on using the Kindle store, chances are you would have never bought a Nook without this capability anyways.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[DragonWriter]

The problem is, if they allow any old Android software, I can buy a Nook and install Amazon's Kindle software on it, then not buy B&N books for it

B&N would probably prefer you buy a Nook to do that with than that you buy a locked-to-Amazon Kindle to buy Kindle books.

Again, as GP stated, even if people aren't buying Nooks, anything that increases Nook sales volume is good for them. As long as they aren't losing money on the hardware, which I doubt they are, people buying it for any purpose other than buying Nook books is good, people buying it and buying Nook books is better.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[tlhIngan]

They seem to be getting behind it. Reportedly they're going to have a regular Android App marketplace on the thing. There are rumors of an official full Android software update. Why fight it? The more people who buy it, the cheaper the economies of scale become for their reader.

It's a B&N alternative marketplace, it's not the Google Marketplace because the Nook Color doesn't qualify (no modem, no phone, no bluetooth, no camera, no GPS), and B&N isn't a member of the OHA, so "with Google" isn't possible, and that includes the Google Marketplace.

Instead, it'll be like the Amazon Marketplace, SlideMe, or one of the many others.

It's also why the first thing people do on non-Google Android devices is put in a pirated version of the Marketplace because that's where all the apps are - and the availability of apps outside the marketplace is tiny. Most people just put up a QR code and that's it, with the QR code being a marketplace link.

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[MikeBabcock]

I was only stating this as part of the assumption B&N has that you'd buy their books.

Presumably as others have pointed out, the Nook is not sold as a loss leader. And if there's profit on the hardware and a low return rate for warranty work, they'll probably do fine even selling them for Amazon readers to use :)

Re:Thumbs up to Barnes and Noble

[yurtinus]

Interesting timing. I bought and rooted a Nook last night. Then I installed Kindle from the android app store - more for shits and giggles than anything else. I didn't get the device for books, I wanted a cheap 7" tablet with capacitive touch. I may buy books down the road for it, and if I do I'll probably buy them from B&N simply because I appreciate the decent, cheap hardware and lack of significant barriers to rooting it.

Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[WrongSizeGlass]

turn it into a full fledged and relatively inexpensive Android tablet
...
It's a little slower ... [t]here are occasional glitches. Sometimes things don't appear correctly on the screen in certain applications. If you're just using it to surf the Internet, use some apps, play angry birds, etc., it works very well

Either the author's expectations of an Android tablet are low or they have created an 'acceptable' Android tablet. They even compare it to the Galaxy tab but like their Frankendroid better because it's lighter & thinner.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[Lumpy]

From someone that has done this and used a Galaxy tab for a short time... It's not the same, not even close. the Nook Color is slow as molasses compared to the Galaxy tab or even a 1st gen ipad.

It's a great hack for the poor, but useability is very low due to the limited ram and really slow processor.

IF all you want to do is run the facebook app and the twitter app along with your ebooks, it's great. If you think you will use it as a full-on tablet.... well get used to S-L-O-W.....

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[basotl]

I purchased my NookColor just after launch and preceded to root it.

I use it for reading books, PDF's, Church Applications (a nice Scripture program), taking notes, calendaring, news apps, irc and some games.
It experiences glitches less than my Android phone but others experience may be diffeerent.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[basotl]

The Nook Color has the same amount of ram as the Galaxy Tab. I don't know what you are talking about there.
http://www.androidtablets.net/forum/nook-color-technical/3483-nookcolor-full-specifications.html
http://www.gsmarena.com/samsung_p1000_galaxy_tab-3370.php

In addition rooting allows overclocking the Nook Color which greatly increases the speed.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[Anonymous Coward]

"Preceded" to root it? You mean you rooted it even before you bought it?

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[larry bagina]

I think you proceeded to root it.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[Aighearach]

What he said was that usability is low because of a combination of two things:
* limited RAM
* really slow processor
Perhaps the Galaxy Tab's faster processor makes up partially for the limited RAM. Maybe there are other differences.

I remember back in the old days when this place was filled with nerds.

Lesson finished, get... off... my... lawn!!!

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[RightSaidFred99]

But it doesn't have a really slow processor. It's UC'd to 800MHz, you can easily OC it to 1.1 GHz.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[Aighearach]

The one useful thing about root-ing it, other than giggles, might be underclocking it even more to improve the battery life.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[ZosX]

Uh it has the same memory as a galaxy tab and can be overclocked to 1ghz. While the arm core may not be as fast as a galaxy, it can't be nearly as slow as my ancient G1 at 600mhz, which is happily running froyo at the moment and has the least amount of RAM of any android device. (192MB) If 512mb in android isn't enough for you maybe you need to lay off all the widgets and background apps stealing CPU cycles. I would imagine that a lean Nook running froyo would be more than just usable.

The galaxy tab is nice, but also over twice the price of a nook. For some speed isn't everything. I mean what are we really talking about here? Another 2-5 seconds to load a web page? Another 2-3 seconds to load an app? Does everything have to be immediate? I don't see the appeal of the tab either. The honeycomb based tablets are the next generation. It will be interesting when that level of hardware starts hitting close to the price of a nook now.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[ladoga]

Underclocking doesn't necessarily improve the battery life. The idea is that faster the processor can get thru the task on hand the sooner it can go back to idling, which is good for battery life. I.E. In case of N900 moderate overclocking actually increases the battery life as the processor will spend more time idling. For systems with fixed clock speed you might be right though, but you will have hard time finding modern tablets with CPUs that aren't capable of frequency scaling.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[basotl]

But as I pointed out... it doesn't have limited ram in comparison to his baseline device it has equal to the Galaxy Tab and twice as much as the iPad. Which makes it comparatively on the high end as far as tablets of that generation.

In addition the processor can be clocked faster than the default under-clock the device comes with. I get a quandrant score of 1164 which is slightly better than the Galaxy Tab's score of 1064.

There are other differences such as having 3g and bluetooth out of the box but that doesn't play into the speed scenario. Those are the features you should be looking at to weigh the price increase.

I remember back in the old days when this place was filled with geeks that were knowledgeable of device specs and hacked every device out there.

Lesson finished, get... off... my... lawn!!!

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[NitroWolf]

From someone that has done this and used a Galaxy tab for a short time... It's not the same, not even close. the Nook Color is slow as molasses compared to the Galaxy tab or even a 1st gen ipad.

It's a great hack for the poor, but useability is very low due to the limited ram and really slow processor.

IF all you want to do is run the facebook app and the twitter app along with your ebooks, it's great. If you think you will use it as a full-on tablet.... well get used to S-L-O-W.....

My rooted Nook Color has replaced the iPad (1st gen) tablet that I had and has done everything I wanted to do with a tablet. With the Groupon deal, $125 for the Nook Color was a steal and it allowed me sell the iPad before the price drop, recouping my investment and I couldn't be happier. I had thought the screen being smaller would be a problem, but honestly, the ability to hold the tablet in one hand outweighs the extra screen real estate. I thought I would be compromising the tablet experience I had with the iPad going to the Nook, but it turns out it was an upgrade in almost every way.

I would like to try out a Galaxy Tab to compare it, though. There's definitely some room for improvement, but for a quick, easily handled tablet to keep around the house and car, the Nook Color is really kick ass for the price.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[Anonymous Coward]

but as I pointed out Android NEEDS more ram. You can circle talk all you want, the nook color is a utter DOG compared to the Galaxy. convince yourself all you want, it will not change that fact.

ALL android tablets and devices really need to give android more ram. The manufacturers are being cheap bastards by giving them a miniscule amount.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[lysdexia]

Only if they cut their hair. Seriously, don't mess with long haired Hebraic types carrying the jaw bone of an ass. It's murder on property values.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[herojig]

And don't you have to remove the sim first every time you reboot? sounds like a pain in the butt to me.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[Dr Max]

Yeah but a view sonic gtab is dual core, can be overclocked to 1.5 ghz, and only costs an extra $50. I for one don't mind paying that for everything to be done 5 seconds quicker.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[Sinning]

As a comparison, users who have flashed the most recent CM7 nightly on the nook color have seen quadrant scores in excess of 2000; nearly double that of a G Tab. Also, CM7 gives working (although not very well) bluetooth.

Re:Full Fledged Android Tablet?

[Sinning]

You've obviously not used a Nook Color with CM7 nor an OC'd NC running any other ROM. At 1.1ghz, the NC is pretty damn snappy and outperforms the G Tab on most benchmarks.

Time

[jmitchel!jmitchel.co]

I'd put the process at closer to an hour. The big time sink is figuring out WTF is going on and what you want to do about it - there are no less than four major options, with a dozen smaller decisions to make, all wrapped up in a slightly hermetic nomenclature. It still ain't for the weak kneed and non-technical. HOWEVER, the nightly CyanogenMod 7 build is getting really close to maximum awesomeness - video playback doesn't work quite right, bluetooth doesn't work quite right, but both of them work. By late april it should be a clear winner, and that will make the decision much easier.

Re:Time

[bmo]

>video playback on an e-ink device

Wat. Seriously. Wat.

E-ink is little spheres in a fluid. It's not a bloody TFT display.

It's never going to work. You can't defeat physics with code no matter what you think you can do. It's like the HFT idiots thinking they can get trades down to picoseconds.

--
BMO

Re:Time

[ThatsMyNick]

Nook Color comes with LCD, not E-ink.

Re:Time

[Anonymous Coward]

The Nook Color has a 1024x600 resolution multi touch touchscreen LCD display, https://secure.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/wiki/Nook_Color

Re:Time

[Anonymous Coward]

>video playback on an e-ink device

Wat. Seriously. Wat.

E-ink is little spheres in a fluid. It's not a bloody TFT display.

It's never going to work. You can't defeat physics with code no matter what you think you can do. It's like the HFT idiots thinking they can get trades down to picoseconds.

--
BMO

Nook = first gen hardware release, e-ink ereader
Nook Color = second gen hardware release, touch screen tablet running Android under the hood but normally locked down to being just an ereader

Obviously people are doing all this rooting on the second gen hardware. Get your facts straight before talking.

Re:Time

[Anonymous Coward]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=24srQXX81Oc

It looks like you have no idea what you're talking about...

Re:Time

[0100010001010011]

video playback doesn't work quite right, bluetooth doesn't work quite right, but both of them work. By late april it should be a clear winner, and that will make the decision much easier.

And people on here wonder why the general populous just wants an iPad.

Re:Time

[LLKrisJ]

nook is LCD dumbass...

And learn to spell before you start talking about physics, the concepts of which are obviouly well beyond your grasp...

Re:Time

[basotl]

That's only if you are a geek that sucked into the options. Just doing a basic root is extremely quick now days.

Re:Time

[basotl]

Well he is talking about on a rom. I have found video playback to be fine on default root. Bluetooth is not officially supported so that should be a consideration. It was a major win that it could be unlocked later at all.

Re:Time

[oakgrove]

Wait. You're actually comparing a rooted and hacked e-reader hobbyist project to the ipad? Wow. Just wow.

Re:Time

[Aighearach]

You think video playback on e-ink is like a temple? I thought it was kindof a lame idea, myself.

But then you don't think it will work.

You seem confused. I prescribe more time at the Wat.

Re:Time

[Veritas1980]

I have noticed the video issue as well as a couple others. ONLY on my nook color with cyanogen does the nook app not find my books I purchased already, and the google talk app does not show received messages, only sent. Its quite frustrating.

Re:Time

[jmitchel!jmitchel.co]

That was not my experience - you have to know if you want to auto-nooter, nookie froyo, CM7 or gingerbread, and you have to find genuinely authoritative documentation for performing the work. Once you're rooted and have done if a few times, it's really easy. But my first try (only a few weeks ago) ended up using somebody's not quite right autonooter kit for 1.10, the second or third try instructed me to wipe my /boot fs (requiring a reflash to stock). And it was a few times around before I figured out that a lot of my boot problems were due to having leftover boot sectors on my SD cards. So - it's extremely quick and easy once you understand it, and find authoritative instructions,

Re:Time

[93 Escort Wagon]

Wait. You're actually comparing a rooted and hacked e-reader hobbyist project to the ipad? Wow. Just wow.

Uh... so now people aren't reading the summary? The parent post had a good reason for comparing it to a mainstream tablet. Here ya go, just the relevant lines (emphasis is mine):

"Could this signal a change in how mainstream users see devices like this? Could rooting Android devices like the Nook ever become mainstream?"

Re:Time

[oakgrove]

The summary is just a bunch of BS somebody spouted off. The ggp was actually trying to say that the relative shittiness of the rooted nook color compared to the ipad had something to do with how popular ipads are. That's just stupid. And you are even stupider for endorsing it.

Re:Time

[Zerimar]

BS, it takes a half hour, tops. Following this wiki http://nookdevs.com/NookColor_Rooting will walk you through it. The only decision you have to make it deciding which software version of nookCOLOR you have. The only reason it would take longer is if you are messing with replacing the whole system, but a basic root with marketplace support takes very little time at all.

Re:Time

[Anonymous Coward]

And learn to spell before you start talking about physics, the concepts of which are obviouly well beyond your grasp...

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muphry's_law

Re:Time

[hedwards]

Nook Color uses an LCD, but the regular Nook uses E-Ink, hence the confusion.

Re:Time

[narcc]

Wait. You're actually comparing a rooted and hacked e-reader hobbyist project to the ipad? Wow. Just wow.

Sorry, I don't understand why you're so 'shocked' by the comparison. Both products are tablets. That one is a hobbyist project is what makes the article interesting.

Spec wise, it's not far off from the iPad and even matches some iPad 2 specs. 512mb ram, 800 MHz A8 processor (OC to 1.1GHz), muti-touch display, expandable 8GB flash.

The iPad and iPad2 seem to be popular right now with tablet enthusiasts, so why not make the comparison?

Re:Time

[Digicrat]

The trademark feature of the E-ink version of the Nook is that it ALSO has a small LCD display. Your not going to be able to play videos on the big screen, but there's no reason you can't watch them on the tiny one. Now, whether or not there's a point to that may be another question, but the option is there.

People are definitely rooting both versions of the Nook, E-Ink and Color.

Re:Time

[oakgrove]

Why is it so hard to understand that the "shock" comes from the fact that he's implying the ipad owes any of its success to the relative quality of a nook color. I know it's Sunday and everybody's hungover but, really?

Re:Time

[narcc]

Where did he imply that the iPad owes any of its success to the relative quality of a nook color? I know it's Sunday and everybody's hungover but, really?

Re:Time

[oakgrove]

video playback [on the nook color] doesn't work quite right, bluetooth doesn't work quite right, but both of them work. By late april it should be a clear winner, and that will make the decision much easier.

And people on here wonder why the general populous just wants an iPad.

What he said. Emphasis mine.

Re:Time

[geminidomino]

I think you missed his (admittedly trollish) point.

He was saying that the drooling masses just want an iPad rather than having to dick around with rooting an NC (since taking that 5-10 minutes out of their day makes them cry), not that rooting NCs makes people want iPad's more.

Re:Time

[hey!]

Well, been there, done that. I'm generally happy with the results. I thought I'd address the issue with playing videos, then make a few remarks about the advisability of rooting your Nook.

I have not had a problem with playing videos I transcoded from DVD, but it took a little fiddling to get the transcoding details right. Thus far I've had pretty good results with the following (on Linux);

(1) Rip the DVD program to a file like so:
      mplayer dvd://1 -dumpstream -dumpfile myfile

This takes the first program (dvd://1) on the DVD, dumps the video and audio (-dumpstream) to a file you specify (myfile). I do this so I can muck around with the transcoding.

(2) Transcode the file into H264 baseline profile like so:
      ffmpeg -i myfile -threads 0 -vcodec libx264 -acodec aac -strict experimental -ab 128k -vpre hq -vpre baseline -b 600k myVideo.mp4

Your distro may require "-acodec libaac" instead, and you might want to double the audio bit rate ("-ab 256k") if you really care about the sound. Expect the transcoding to take several hours.

The results are very good, more than acceptable as far as the video is concerned. The picture has snap and is for the most part motion is smooth. Dark scenes with continuous variations in tone tend to get blotchy, but not as bad as I've had trancoding DVDs to MPEG-4 for my iPod. If there is a lot of busy action in a dark scene you lose some detail. The aspect ratio doesn't match the Nook screen, and for some reason the video does not quite scale to the full width of the screen, although that hardly matters.

The audio is OK out of the speakers (considering) but sounds distorted through headphones -- at least a good pair. This is probably the fault of the experimental aac codec on Ubuntu 10.10 64-bit. You could try encoding to MP3 with LAME instead; I think that should work and should sound good enough for most mortal ears. Alternatively you could go to 256K AAC audio encoding with "-ac 256" and see if the sound's a bit cleaner. I haven't got around to messing with that, but if I can get the audio just right I'd be delighted with the Nook for playing transcoded DVDs.

In any case, I figured this out just out of cussedness. If playing video is really important to you, perhaps you should get a real, more expensive tablet. The main reason I rooted my Nook was to get access to my Kindle library. I found that computer books on the Kindle sucked. This is largely a matter of sloppy conversion, but source code and tables are often provided as images rather than text, and even where provided as text source code is often unreadable on the Kindle. Ironically, I found the iPhone app to be better for reading Kindle computer books than the Kindle. The Nook's screen is a little more fatiguing for long reading sessions than the Kindle, but it's much easier to see diagrams, especially color, but not *just* color. Text tables are a lot easier to make out.

One fault of the Nook reader app is that you can't zoom in on images (although they're more usable than on the Kindle even though you *can* zoom in on that). But if you read your *Kindle* books on the Nook, the Kindle reader for Android allows you to zoom in. So again, Kindle books that rely on illustrations are more usable in the Kindle app running on a rooted Nook than they are either on the Kindle itself or in the Nook reader, which is too bad. I'm trying to support B&N by buying books through the Nook store.

The only other minor issue with using a rooted Nook as a tablet is that unless the method you choose installs a custom tablet UI, you're going to deal with the fact that the Nook lacks the hardware buttons Android 2.x expects a phone to have (search,menu,home, back). The hack I used installed a small on-screen button that brings up a soft menu version of these. It works, but it is not elegant.

My summary: I wouldn't buy the Nook color with the intention of rooting it and using it as a tablet. In a tablet I'd bluetooth and some kind of provision for A/V out. However it's a darn good eReader, and if you have it you might as well root it and be able to use it as a tablet and a Kindle reader too.

Re:Time

[Anonymous Coward]

An hour? Took me 5 minutes. Video playback is fine. Using a 1ghz kernal.

Posted from my rooted nook color.

Re:Time

[gknoy]

And the Nook Color, as ThatsMyNick mentioned above, has only the LCD screen -- no e-ink. It's bad for battery life while reading, but great if you want to make it a tablet.

Re:Time

[basotl]

Well as said there are lots of options but that is beyond the basic root. I tend to point people to this wiki and just say use the autonooter for your version: http://nookdevs.com/NookColor_Rooting Step by step. If a person can't follow that... then they should pay the couple hundred more and get something else.

BTDT

[Nexus7]

Overat Slatedroid.com, they've been turning the Pandigital Novel Reader into a full Android tablet for over a year now. During this past holiday season, discounts brought the price to around $70 - for this 7" color tablet.

Re:BTDT

[basotl]

I went with the Nook Color. I found the apps I like to have going constantly make use of the ram the NC has. Though I have noted many that the Pandigital is sufficient for them. It really depends on what you plan to do with it.

Re:BTDT

[Lumpy]

And it sucks. Really it does. Only the latest release fixes the sleep problem. And the tablet is slow as hell, the wireless weak as hell and slow as molasses...

I have one here all hacked and the hacked market installed... I dont like waiting for everything to load and reading large PDF's on it is a exercise in pain....

Hacking these is great, but they are low end hardware packages. Android needs 1.2ghz or higher and a lot more ram than these things come with.

More likely to signal a change in Nook design

[perpenso]

Could this signal a change in how mainstream users see devices like this?

Its more likely to signal an upcoming change in Nook design and/or software.

Could rooting Android devices like the Nook ever become mainstream?"

Perhaps after the Linux desktop becomes mainstream.

Re:More likely to signal a change in Nook design

[fermion]

I don't see how this is bad for B&N. Unless the hack destroys the DRM of the books, anything that will increase sales of the nook will keep B&N one extra step from bankruptcy.

As far as who will hack it, it may be more than we think. People who have no clue how o install an OS are hacking the iPhone. Of course, a many average users are incapable of following simple instructions, or conceptualizing how a computer works, so they will not be hacking.

Re:More likely to signal a change in Nook design

[pscottdv]

I don't see how this is bad for B&N. Unless the hack destroys the DRM of the books, anything that will increase sales of the nook will keep B&N one extra step from bankruptcy.

You can install the Kindle app on a rooted Nook Color.

Re:More likely to signal a change in Nook design

[hedwards]

That's really not that big of a deal. B&N opted to go with what was intended to be the standard for ebooks, as in epub, they knew that people would be buying from other stores. It's mostly Amazon's short sightedness that this isn't already possible.

OTOH, rooting Nook and removing the links to their store would hurt B&N, but I doubt that it's going to be common enough for them to worry about.

Re:More likely to signal a change in Nook design

[peragrin]

even if you replace the full OS, you can always then install the B&N android app on you now android tablet from the android marketplace.

Re:More likely to signal a change in Nook design

[node 3]

I don't see how this is bad for B&N. Unless the hack destroys the DRM of the books, anything that will increase sales of the nook will keep B&N one extra step from bankruptcy.

If they sell them at a loss, however... If the Nook is a reasonable tablet for $250, why aren't other companies selling them at similar prices?

As far as who will hack it, it may be more than we think. People who have no clue how o install an OS are hacking the iPhone. Of course, a many average users are incapable of following simple instructions, or conceptualizing how a computer works, so they will not be hacking.

The only numbers I could find are from 2009. Less than 7% of iPod touches and iPhones were jailbroken then. It's worth noting that this was before multitasking was brought to iOS, and also before WiFi hotspot sharing, both of which were major reasons people gave for jailbreaking. Also, these are earlier adopters than those buying iOS devices today, so of the 100 million or so new customers, it's less likely they will be as technically proficient as those people from early 2009.

Jailbreaking/rooting/custom firmware flashing will never become mainstream.

Re:More likely to signal a change in Nook design

[geminidomino]

If you like the Nook as a reader, unfortunately, that's hardly comparable, if for no greater reason than none of the decent reader apps, Nook reader app included, seems capable of reading the nook's /media partition (they all seem trapped in /sdcard which is annoying as hell).

Re:More likely to signal a change in Nook design

[Anonymous Coward]

The way I see it, unless devices become more like appliances, mainstream is a pipe dream. This is nerdstream (not a bad thing, it's great people like us are always looking to make ordinary things do the extraordinary), mainstream is something like a printer your digital camera attaches to wirelessly, an On-The-Go storage device for the images you don't want to print and a media player that connects directly to a media shop, all without a computer in the middle. This is why Apple is doing so well in its market, even their software is more appliance-like and creates a modal experience for each function the user adds to a device, at least iOS devices, anyway. (The Mac is becoming like a bastard son of Doze and iOS, looking at Lion's direction)-:

Re:More likely to signal a change in Nook design

[Anonymous Coward]

they still make profit on the hardware.
and they can use it as a hook to get kindle users to leave amazon for B&N
I fail to see the problem.

No, this isn't going to become mainstream

[DavidinAla]

You can also find books and websites about how to build your own car, but hardly anybody does that, statistically speaking. The fact that something CAN be done doesn't necessarily mean that most people want to do it. For a small minority, it's vaguely interesting that it's possible, but the majority just want a product that works. The actual percentage of people who actually turn a Nook into a cheap tablet would be astonishingly small, IMO.

Re:No, this isn't going to become mainstream

[hedwards]

That's essentially illegal in most of the world. There's all sorts of bureaucratic stuff you have to go through if you want to drive on public roads. Not to mention the hassle of getting the thing licensed and probably emission tested as well.

Re:No, this isn't going to become mainstream

[Troll-Under-D'Bridge]

You can also find books and websites about how to build your own car, but hardly anybody does that, statistically speaking.

Well, there's a big price difference between a car and a Nook, so I won't be surprised that fewer people are into car building vs. Nook modding. In the First World, that is.

In the developing world, all sorts of "car-like" vehicles get "built" out of used car parts imported or sneaked in through a country's ports. A good example would be the "jeepney" of the Philippines or the songthaew of Thailand. There are also variants of three-wheeled vehicles (tricycles) that adapt the motorcycle into the equivalent of a taxicab or, incredible as that might seem to Westerners, a mini-bus!

In those countries, assembling a vehicle might just be a bit more expensive than buying then modding an eBook reader but way more profitable since the product can be used for business and not just to stoke the hardware hacker's ego.

Re:No, this isn't going to become mainstream

[Troll-Under-D'Bridge]

That's essentially illegal in most of the world. There's all sorts of bureaucratic stuff you have to go through if you want to drive on public roads. Not to mention the hassle of getting the thing licensed and probably emission tested as well.

Sadly, in most of the (3rd) world, most manufacturers only pay lip service (or a small bribe) to get the environmental license or whatnot they need to get their product out into the street.

I love my Nook Color

[Anonymous Coward]

I currently own a nook color that I rooted with Eclair (2.1). For me I wanted something in between a phone and a full laptop for when I am sitting around in waiting rooms. It serves this purpose perfectly. I would not give this tablet to anyone who tech illiterate though, as it is still rough around the corners. Given that the hack is only a few months old, I am extremely impressed with its current abilities, especially with its low price tag, and am eager to see how it continues to progress. Some of the cons are that it is not 3G, does not have a camera, and its sensors may be lacking or the hack making them available seems to be lacking. Though the hack does bring some entirely new functionality to the Nook. It was found that the WiFi chip also includes Bluetooth which is turned off in software. It is now available in some of the ROM's and now provides the ability for Bluetooth keyboards and SIP calling.

Overall, I could not be happier with a $200 tablet. It really does everything I need it to do and then some. It has decent battery life and retains all of the standard Nook functionality in addition to the features provided by rooting it. I consider it a great value when compared to the Galaxy tab as I find it difficult rationalizing the missing features are worth an additional $400. Moreover, so far it seems that B&N have been amenable to people rooting their Nook. As they should, since I buy books from B&N that I wouldn't have previously, and am encouraging others to buy their hardware and books because of their attitude towards the hacking community and the versatility of their hardware.

It really seems like one of those rare situations where everyone is winning. Fortunately, B&N doesn't seem to be in a hurry to shoot themselves in the foot with both barrels, a la, Sony, etc.

Re:I love my Nook Color

[Anonymous Coward]

If rooting devices like the Nook ever becomes mainstream, be prepared for a price jump. It's great that B&N aren't suing people, but they're mostly ignoring it because only a small percentage of people are rooting their Nooks. They sell the hardware at a loss to make it up in eBook purchases, which is why they lock it down in the first place, so that it's still primarily a platform for books first. If the mainstream ever starts buying them to root for real tablet functionality and their book sales drop off, they will jack up the price so they don't lose money overall.

Re:I love my Nook Color

[basotl]

Booksellers in Barnes and Noble often seem to point out that it can be rooted to any "geeky" individuals they notice browsing the device.

Re:I love my Nook Color

[ChunderDownunder]

i think we're overestimating the Slashdot effect here. B&N plans to sell hundreds of thousands of these things. The geek community who actually buy these things explicitly to root them might rank in a few thousand.
Do they ship to australia? :-) they might even attract a few extra buyers - i'll be needing a small computer for travelling later in the year. The lack of 3G isn't really an issue because roaming is expensive and at least in Argentina they wouldn't sell me 3G on a prepaid SIM. (Wifi in bars and hostels) And even if they 'sell at a loss' i wouldn't hesitate at buying a few ebooks to read on vacation.

Re:I love my Nook Color

[Hashi Lebwohl]

I'm in Aus, and no, they don't sell them here, I checked. Also, you can't buy one direct from America without resorting to tricks (HopShopGo or some such). So, I bought mine, brand new, in box etc from eBay. I expect it to arrive today, and by tomorrow it will be rooted. I paid $220 + $30 shipping. I have read on some forum or other that devs have actually got Honeycomb running on it, but I think I'll wait a bit to go that far.

Re:I love my Nook Color

[Anonymous Coward]

Maybe if it didn't have such rough corners you wouldn't have to spend so much of your time in waiting rooms.

Re:I love my Nook Color

[rayd75]

Agreed. Awesome hardware and functionality for the price. My only gripe is that I've been so spoiled by the responsiveness of my Apple products that I can't fully enjoy my Nook Color for its comfortable to hold size and elegant package. At 800MHz w/ 512MB RAM it's plenty snappy when actually executing stuff. It's doing exotic things like scrolling a web page that make it feel like watching a hand-cranked silent film. Seriously, Google, give up on your software rendering fetish already. I know you're trying to support a wide range of hardware and hardware classes, but rendering a browser page to a layer on even the cheapest mobile GPU would eliminate this user experience train wreck completely. A nice bonus is that the main CPU might then have enough free cycles to respond to the user's screen touches in a timely manner, further increasing perceived performance.

Re:I love my Nook Color

[Svartalf]

There's probably only about $100 worth of "loss" there since it's similar in nature to the Viewsonic G and they're selling for $350 right at the moment. I think you might be right on a jump overall- but it's not as major as people seem to think it is. And I think most are putting the Nook app onto it when it's been rooted or booted with Froyo or Honeycomb. I know it was the first app I pushed to my SD card boot image. :-D

Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[bmsleight]

Rather than a nook, I thinking of buying one of the cheap Android tablets on ebay. VIA 8650 7" Google Android 2.2 etc. Vairous names such as epad-e2. They apparently play flash, youtube etc vidoes. And cost £130. Anyone brought/used/seen one ?

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[David Gerard]

I believe these mostly have resistive touch screens rather than capacitative ones. If you're fine with a stylus ...

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[Samantha Wright]

The standard disclaimer here is that you're getting what you pay for, with those: people usually point to some non-standard store that they've included, and the quality of the hardware itself frequently leaves a lot to be desired. Find a review on a tablet site.

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[cstec]

Actually resistive touch screens work fine with a finger, no stylus necessary. Case in point a Palm Treo, which was designed to be dialed with a finger tip. The stylus gives much finer control so apps were written to leverage that, but that wasn't a requirement and any number of Palm apps were 'finger friendly. For a more recent example, the HTC Sense UI is entirely finger oriented and runs perfectly on WinMo devices like a Touch Pro 2.

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[bmsleight]

Could live with a stylus .. may be worth a punt.

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[Anonymous Coward]

I did this, and I sold it back for 50 euros (having bought it at 90) because I couldn'd stant to look at the thing, and I was ashamed for having bought it in the first place:
- RAM was listed as 256MB, but it was actually 128MB
- Android was listed as 2.2 but it was actually 1.6
- CPU was listed as 1 GHz but it was about 350 MHz
- Market was some Chinese rip-off, the original was not working
The problem was not (or wasn't only) in the eBay listing: for all of these the firmware was hacked to report false informations

I installed a rooted firmware I found and it got better; I'm saying this just to praise the effort of the guy who put together the ROM, but the device actually went up from unuseable to just painful:

- slow. No, seriously, slow as in "you click and for the next minute wonder: did it crash?"
- horrible video (blocky, jerky, pick your choice of visual defect) and audio (volume at max, you couldn't still hear a thing)
- scrolling wasn't exactly smooth
- battery life of two hours at most (just an estimate based on the meter going down, not that I could stand to use it for more than 30 minutes)
- becomes really hot, since it is probably factory-overclocked
- did I say slow?

And just in case you have some money to throw away and want to install a ROM pack, as I did, beware of the fact that there are dozens of variations of these e-pads, mostly incompatible, and you' re going to waste a day finding the right one.

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[sensei moreh]

I've got one of the older versions, which runs Android 1.6. It's definitely not fast. I prefer using a stylus with the on-screen keyboard, but otherwise a finger works well. As an added bonus, It also runs Debian (off the micro SD card). Battery life sucks - maybe an hour with wifi on, about 2.5 hrs with wifi off. Bottom line - it works as expected.

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[bmsleight]

Ok - now I am sold. Debian! I know Google is my friend, but any details of which version of debian etc and limitation would be great. Also is the install (of debian) easy ?

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[sensei moreh]

Basically, you copy the image to the microSD card and then boot off that card. I found it to be too slow to be worth using - when I want Linux on the go, I'll just carry my netbook. However, for all the details:http://www.slatedroid.com/index.php?/topic/5837-rom-debian-v03-for-flytouch-sd-bootable/page__hl__debian/

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[Anonymous Coward]

I have several, pretty good. with some reservations. My favourite is the Telepad 10.1 (aka badpad) available from MP4Nation for just under $200 (I think dealextreme has it down to $180). This one uses the Telechips TCC8902 chipset, runs 2.1, and decodes 1080p without breaking a sweat, runs at a reasonable speed and has a pretty responsive two point touch resistive screen. The battery life blows, but this is great for home use. The remarkable thing is that this tablet is incredibly thin and light.

Keep in mind that the Viewsonic G Tablet is down to $300 for an incredibly well spec'ed unit (Tegra 2 tablet w/ capacitive 1024x600 screen) . Once reflashed this is an incredible tablet.

I also have a Nook Color which is my default tablet, incredibly good for all my needs.

The fun part is that all 3 tablets together cost less than a midrange iPad2.
 

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[bmsleight]

Thanks for the feedback.

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[Nerdfest]

Some resistive touch screens work nicely with finger pressure but the cheap Chinese tablet screens do not. The one I have requires either the tablet or your finger nail ... it takes a huge amount of finger pressure to make it work. Maybe they used too thick a coating or something, i don't know, but they're really bad. It's too bad too, because other than that and the battery life being a little unpredictable at times it's great.

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[Anonymous Coward]

Yes, using resistive touch screens with fingers is fine.
They even work with gloves on your hand.

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[bmsleight]

Does the Telepad play Youtube videos (flash videos). (BBC iPlayer for the UK) ? I tempted to buy one.

Re:Ask Slashdot: Ebay Chinise Tablet "EPAD"

[Svartalf]

1) Resistive screen. While it's "okay", it doesn't do multitouch well (if at all) and it's not as responsive as the capacitive ones. Upshot of the resistive screen is that you don't need special gloves or a stylus when it's cold, etc.

2) It's an ARM-9 SoC. The Nook uses an OMAP3 (Cortex-A8...). This means it's ssssslllllooooowww compared to the A8 based stuff- and we won't get into the story with the A9 tablets just beginning to show up.

3) It doesn't do 3D like the Nook does. It doesn't have DSP support for video decode.

For ~$100 less than the Nook, you will have a tablet, yes...but don't kid yourself that you're doing better than you'd do getting a Nook or nabbing a Viewsonic tablet for ~$250-350.

Re:This generations' I-Opener

[Anonymous Coward]

I had a VW beetle that was faster than any car you owned, and ran perfectly.. Hell I beat corvettes easily in it. 298HP in that light car with 19" wide rear tires utterly decimated snotty kids in their chargers and corvettes easily. It's amazing what you can do with a super-beetle engine, a turbo, and knowledge on hot to modify it. I ran a 12psi boost on a superbeetle engine for 2 years before I blew the transmission up, the wide tires were stressing it hard as they would not slip on take-off. Wheelies in a bug were fun as hell.. I was getting a 9.89 quarter mile times out of it, spent less than $3000 back in the late 80's to build it. Great high-school kid project, but then I have been racing cars since 12, bike since 8.

Aluminum rims on a beetle are better, far lower unsprung weight.

Seen it.

[Octopuscabbage]

This has been on instructables for a really long time...

Slashdot != NPR

[SolarCanine]

> We ran a story about this in December, and I haven't seen a flood of hacked readers anywhere so I doubt that tablet makers have anything to worry about. Because, you know, Slashdot is easily as mainstream as NPR. Just sayin'.

Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

It is also one of the best tablets. Currently, outside of the xoom, the only one in the wild that runs Honeycomb.

Most of the development takes place in slatedroid.com and xda-developers.com.

The sad state of Android tablets, is that community firmwares are light-years ahead of factory defaults.

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[Americano]

The sad state of Android tablets, is that community firmwares are light-years ahead of factory defaults.

Right, because Motorola and Samsung don't give a shit what happens with the software on your device after you pay for it. There's no revenue for them in providing updates to the latest-and-greatest software, so you can expect them (as a rule) to refuse to provide any upgrades except bare-minimum security support.

When you decouple the software from the hardware maker (like Android), you automatically create incentives for the manufacturer to NOT spend any time improving the software:
1) Any of my hard work upgrading the software and fixing bugs in any of the free software on the device means my competitors can take those changes and include them in their hardware for minimal cost;
2) I care about selling the device - after it's been sold, it becomes a support drain on me, so the focus is to get the software "good enough to make the sale," and then focus on new versions of the hardware.

How many phones out there have been abandoned by the manufacturers, in terms of software upgrades to new Android versions after the sale? It seems like upgrades are the vast exception to the rule, rather than the rule. This same sad scene is likely to play out in the tablet space, as well.

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[GNUALMAFUERTE]

I don't agree with your statement that there is no revenue in providing updates.

If somebody offered a very high quality phone, with great hardware (better than the iphone), with upgradeable memory and processor, user-replaceable battery, and some sort of slot to add 3G, and in the future replace that card with 4G/5G etc. and offered 10 years of software upgrades, then that company would have a great selling point, and it would be able to outsell even Apple. Create a phone that you can upgrade, allow us to upgrade or replace screen, battery, processor, memory, eventually the whole motherboard. Bring the clone concept to mobiles, and guarantee future software upgrades.

Also, guaranteeing future software upgrades is INCREDIBLY simple and should cost ZERO DOLLARS to the company. Just release EVERY SINGLE DRIVER under the GPL and push google to commit them to the android kernel. That's it. Do you see computer manufacturers going crazy over supporting future software? No, they just release drivers and software devs take care of the rest.

The problem is that this companies refuse to release source for their drivers, therefore it's impossible to port newer software into their devices.

I have several tablets, and I have managed to run newer Android versions on them. I have a tablet that originally came with 1.5 running Froyo, but it's unusable because we don't have source code for their video acceleration hardware.

Nobody is willing to do the right thing, and because of that they are loosing profits, customers hate them, and apple keeps winning by doing things still marginally right.

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[kqs]

When you decouple the software from the hardware maker (like Android), you automatically create incentives for the manufacturer to NOT spend any time improving the software:

It's not like hardware makers spent any time improving their software before Android. Palm released a few desultory updates in the past for various devices, and I've had a few firmware updates to fix major bugs, but that's it. Amost nobody (except for Apple) releases software updates for devices which add new functionality.

In an ideal world people would consider the upgradeability of hardware when they buy it, but they don't. Until they do, there's no incentive to improve the software.

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[Americano]

then that company would have a great selling point, and it would be able to outsell even Apple

No, they wouldn't have a great selling point, because the device they were offering to sell would cost orders of magnitude more than it does today, and very few people would be willing to buy it. This is the reason they still haven't built a car that will run for 500,000 miles with virtually no maintenance and get 100 miles to the gallon.

Also, guaranteeing future software upgrades is INCREDIBLY simple and should cost ZERO DOLLARS to the company. [...] Do you see computer manufacturers going crazy over supporting future software?

Of course not - because they are decoupled. Dell makes the hardware, Microsoft makes the software. Microsoft doesn't exactly have a sterling track record with providing updates and high-quality software, and Dell doesn't exactly have a sterling track record with providing an amazingly well-built piece of hardware. Dell cares about selling hardware. Microsoft cares about selling software. This means that they are both aiming for the lowest common denominator - something that works "well enough" to sell the product. Each has plausible deniability: "Your device isn't working? Must be the other guy's fault. Go talk to them."

Your solution of "releasing everything under the GPL" just dumps the mess back in the lap of the consumer: "You want upgrades? Go get them yourself."

The net result of this is exactly what we've seen: hardware manufacturers who only care about selling hardware, and abandon their software except for bare-minimum security upgrades. Commoditization of the hardware and the software is a good way to drive down consumer prices, but it's an AWFUL way to guarantee that you'll get well-designed, high-quality devices with long lifespans.

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[Americano]

Certainly, and my comment should not be taken as a statement that Android was the one to invent this model. I'm simply pointing out that you can expect the "community updates" to be light years ahead of the "manufacturer defaults" as a result of this model, pretty much forever. Android tablets absolutely haven't invented this model, and given the state of Android phone support from manufacturers, you can expect the tablets to follow the same model.

No manufacturer is going to spend a bit more time than they are absolutely legally required to on updating software - there's simply no margin in it. Every developer they have to put on staff to port new versions of software to is that much less profit they make. It's a race to the bottom, and this is why computer manufacturers have (generally) quite thin margins. Unless the device manufacturer controls the end-to-end functionality of the device (hardware and software) it's a hard spot to be in.

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[Anonymous Coward]

In an ideal world people would consider the upgradeability of hardware when they buy it, but they don't. Until they do, there's no incentive to improve the software.

People do pay more for hardware from companies with a track record of providing high quality, long lasting support.

And then assholes on slashdot call them suckers, and complain about the "apple tax".

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[queazocotal]

Modularity has costs.

You want to replace the CPU?
Ok - you need a ~400 pin socket, a clip to hold the CPU down, an adaptor to hold that CPU, as it's not designed to be socketed.
This adds weight, unreliability, and volume.

You want to add a hole for upgradable wireless - it gets even more complex.
You have to pick ahead of time the volume for this hole - which will mean wasting space, as you need to leave some spare.
You need an internal lining for this hole. You need a hole in the structure, which weakens it and adds weight and bulk to keep the stiffness up.
You need a covering for the 3G add-on, you need a couple of fine-pitch connectors, which raise their own unreliability issues as well as adding weight and volume.
You need more decoupling capacitors, as the power supply is now the far side of a high impedence connector.
Then you run into the issue that the antenna you have will not be tuned properly.

Sure, this can all be done. However a fully modular phone will cost at least twice, weigh around twice, and be much less reliable.

Miniature connectors are _hellishly_ unreliable.
Miniature multiple-hundred-pin ones even more so.
I

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[tm2b]

This is the reason they still haven't built a car that will run for 500,000 miles with virtually no maintenance and get 100 miles to the gallon.

That actually has more to do with the laws of thermodynamics.

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[Anonymous Coward]

Really, what thermodynamic laws are violated by that?

Is this the little known 4th law, which informs us that no vehicle may ever travel more than 37 miles without consuming a gallon of fuel?

Or the fifth law, which states that regular maintenance is required on every vehicle after it travels 3000 miles?

Re:Not only is the nook color a tablet ...

[yurtinus]

Actually, that last one is the jiffy lube law. Decent oil and filter should easily get you 5k or more between changes. OP is correct, we certainly have the technology to implement such a thing, but there is no way to make it cost effective.

Nook Color could satiate desire for iPads

[schwnj]

I had been thinking about getting an iPad for a long time. Eventually, decided to hold out for the iPad 2. But one day I was walking through Barnes and Noble, and took a good look at the Nook Color. After reading up on the rooting instructions, I bought the NC for $250, rooted it, and, after a month, my desire for the iPad is gone. I suppose that there will always be people like me who want an iPad but will actually be just as happy with something else. (And the 50% discount from the iPad helps too.) I should also reiterate the fact that there are three flavors of the Nook Color, but not all will suffice as a tablet:

STOCK: Right now, the stock NC has a browser and could serve as a basic tablet for someone. But B&N is soon going to be updating the NC with Froyo and the app market, which will make it much more like a tablet.

ROOTED STOCK: This is the best option as of today. Rooting took me only about 20 minutes, and the process is non-technical/noob friendly. Rooting will get you the market, google apps, push gmail, a new launcher (which will make it look like a true tablet), and softkeys (to replace the missing navigation keys that are on all android phones).

CUSTOM ROM: This has the most promise, but it is not quite ready. Cyanogenmod has nightly builds of CM7 for the NC. As others said above, this will be awesome. I run CM7 on my phone, and I love it. Once it is fully ported to the NC, it will truly be a full-function tablet that can directly compete with the iPad. There are also some custom builds that you can install to a bootable microSD card that run both Froyo and Honeycomb.

Re:Nook Color could satiate desire for iPads

[Svartalf]

Past the minor border discrepancies in some things that depend on orientation, and the occasional lag on the accelerometer info, the Honeycomb image works pretty well, all things considered (It's such that I question them holding back the full release of the typically FOSS portions of the distribution for 3.0...seriously...). No, it's not for John Q. Public- but if you're rooting the thing, you're already more technically advanced and can manage with the "pre-release" version on the thing.

The rooting process takes less than 5 minutes

[cabbiebot]

This is assuming everything is set up. If you hand me a nookcolor out of the box, 5 minutes later I will hand you back an android tablet. One powers down the device, inserts the autonooter'd micro-sd card, plug the device into a power source, and it will automatically boot, go through the process of establishing ADB root access and place superuser (among other things like market, youtube, etc) into /system/app. It will then reboot after about 5 minutes once it's done its magic and voila. Where people get hung up on is burning the autonooter image to the SD card, and its a bit harder to do on Windows since you need to download the free app 'WinImage' to do so, whereas on linux and Mac you simply do the dd command from the terminal. So the actual rooting is extremely fast, its reading up on how to burn the image and then then subsequent steps to establish market access that can take some time. It's stupid simple and laid out very clearly on the nookcolor wiki, though, and the #nookcolor channel on freenode is available for troubleshooting. I have talked with thousands of customers face to face and less than 1% have any idea of what rooting is, and for them the nookcolor is already more than enough tablet for them. Web browser, video playback, pandora, books, magazines, newspapers. But for the few who do mention it and I've vetted as savvy enough to get it, popping out my own NC with CM7, with live wallpapers, market access, all sorts of apps...thats a sale I'm certain to make. Since such a small number of people, respectively, unlock the device, I do not believe B&N will revise the hardware to change the boot order (NC is hardwired to boot off SD, which is why all this is possible). The vast majority of people love the NC just how it is, locked down yet very functional and rave to their friends about it. Couple that with how the dev community is keeping the NC in the press constantly (ie. getting the Cyanogen blessing, bluetooth enabled, overclocked, each of these has gotten it into the blogs), it's a win-win. The only real drawback for B&N would be if people chose to install the Kindle app and not the Nook app. However, after talking with many rooted users, they all seem to understand that they should reward B&N with their business for digital content whenever possible. The last thing anyone wants is for them to regret putting the most open, hackable android device ever out on the market.

You don't need to root it to use as a tablet

[kimgkimg]

The Nook Color will always boot from the microSD card first, so you just need to insert a boot ROM image burned onto a card and it'll just work from that. There's nothing else that needs to be done. This is the easiest route and takes no longer than 10 minutes (most of that time probably waiting for the ISO download and imaging it to the SD card.)

Read that too fast

[Junior J. Junior III]

Thought the headline said "Turning your E-Reader into a Cheap Toilet" at first. LOLed.

Re:Read that too fast

[vux984]

~doubletake~

Wow! That's what I saw too. I'm actually surprised to discover it wasn't just me.

Mainstream in the same way iPhone unlocking is

[Digicrat]

Rooting Android devices (Nook or otherwise) will never become truly mainstream. The more it's mentioned in the news though, the more this will become mainstream in the iPhone-unlocking sense of the word. The average user knows that it's possible and has a friend, or a friend-of-a-friend that can root it for them, but has neither the inclination or knowledge to root it themselves. The ultimate effect is the same though.

Is it sold at a loss?

[Anonymous Coward]

They sell the hardware at a loss to make it up in eBook purchases

I've been wondering if this is the case. Do you have any citations?

Re:This generations' I-Opener

[Anonymous Coward]

What to take away from this:

"I drove trash, but it was faster than your trash."

Slashdot =/= NPR

[Joe Helfrich]

"We ran a story about this in December, and I haven't seen a flood of hacked readers anywhere so I doubt that tablet makers have anything to worry about." Slashdot readers are much more likely to either already have a tablet, already dismissed the need for one, or already hacked the one they have. I'm not saying that NPR is going to cause B&N to run out of stock, but they did just expose the idea to a new segment of people, who might just be interested enough to try. It also represents the idea of rooting a device starting to drift out of nerd circles, which is interesting and probably a good thing.

Re:Slashdot =/= NPR

[node 3]

I'm not saying that NPR is going to cause B&N to run out of stock, but they did just expose the idea to a new segment of people, who might just be interested enough to try. It also represents the idea of rooting a device starting to drift out of nerd circles, which is interesting and probably a good thing.

While it will likely result in some number of additional rooted Nooks, it will primarily only be done by geeks who heard this story and finally decided to give it a try.

Rooting will never go mainstream. If the idea does "drift out of nerd circles" it will not be a good thing, it'll be a very bad thing. You think you are bothered too much as it is right now fixing people's computers? Now imagine those people rooting their tablets. That can't end well.

Fortunately, it's not going to happen in any significant numbers anyway.

Not just at B&N

[Anonymous Coward]

I've noticed that the B&N Nook readers (black and white as well as color) are available from Wal-Mart...in the same display case underneath the iPads (interesting placement)

Rooting Aluratek and Kobo?

[Doc Ruby]

Where are instructions for rooting the Kobo or Aluratek ereaders?

Re:Rooting Aluratek and Kobo?

[Svartalf]

Little use in rooting a Kobo, I'm suspecting. Limited button space and unless you can talk to it via the WiFi or the USB jack, you're not getting much use past what's already there. The Aluratek's pretty close to the same issues, I suspect (I looked at both, own a Kobo for just reading e-novels, etc...).

It's ok, Microsoft into the breach...

[Nefarious Wheel]

Barnes and Noble aren't suing, but predictably Microsoft is. They don't like Nook+Android for some reason. PJ over at Groklaw thinks it's "SCO II" Ref: http://www.groklaw.net/article.php?story=20110321172008657

Nope.

[node 3]

"Could this signal a change in how mainstream users see devices like this? Could rooting Android devices like the Nook ever become mainstream?"

No, it can't signal *anything* with regards to being mainstream. Geeks will do this, perhaps many thousands, but it's completely impossible for something like this to become mainstream. You guys know how you are always complaining about "idiots" who can't run their computer, and how you often install Firefox on their computers, give it a blue 'e' icon and name it "Internet"?

Well, guess what: that's the mainstream.

These people aren't actually stupid, they just aren't geeks. They are nowhere near as motivated as you are. Why would someone go through the hassle of rooting a Nook Color when for twice the price they can buy an iPad that actually works properly as sold, and provides them with a significantly superior user experience?

Never any interest in an Ipad

[rogerdugans]

I have had no interest in tablets in general, largely since a 10" device borders on laptop territory as does the $500 USD and up price.

However, for half the money, a 7" Nook Color seemed the ideal size for an ultra-portable device, and while I have no NEED for a tablet (have an excellent netbook running linux) I was given one for Christmas.
Within 24 hours of receiving the gift it was rooted and doing far more than the stock software was capable of.

The Android Development community has turned me from an "anti-tablet" person to a fan.
My Nook Color is now used as my car navigation device (7" screen is much better than my phone!) thanks to tethering of wifi and gps.
A bluetooth keyboard means it has replaced my netbook for longer, comfortable sessions when away from home- great since the NC didn't have Bluetooth enabled originally!
Since the NC runs at 1.1Ghz now (Thanks again to the community!) it really loses nothing on the speed or power fronts when compared to current devices.
The lack of 3g (or better) means nothing- how many of us are without our cell phones when away from home? Wireless tether gets data connectivity WITHOUT yet another contract.

A rom'd Nook Color is unquestionably (to me) the best available tablet right now, even WITH the few problems remaining:
Froyo runs well but is limited.
Honeycomb IS running but it is a pretty hacked and compromised version still thanks to the source not being released to the wild yet.
CM7 is for many the best option,and very actively worked on but still not actually released- yet works wonderfully even with the few glitches:
* Video drivers are causing problems resulting in less than perfect video playing (choppy, stuttering at times)
* Turning Bluetooth on often only works when done soon after a reboot. More than a few minutes and it may NOT come on.
* Some users report WiFi cycling problems

Those CM7 issues are being worked on as are customization options that will bring many Tablet-Friendly options to the mix:Bottom notification bar with "soft-buttons" that are ALWAYS on screen; and more.....

Which brings me to the point of the article: no, I really don't think rooting an NC and turning it into a tablet will become mainstream. I don't think it likely that rooted Nook Color Tablets will ever outnumber Ipads (or Mac-C-Pads, or whatever they call the new one....)

But I think there ARE a lot of Nook Colors being sold that would not have been if not for the developer community, and that a large number are modified...

Back in the day overclocking and water cooled computers were "fringe" activities too, and while they are still not mainstream, both are multi-million dollar industries today.

God, I'm glad I RTFA

[Anonymous Coward]

In Australia, rooting a nook means something different...

thanks! rooted my nook and works good with bonus

[Anonymous Coward]

This is sweet, thanks for the post

I rooted my nook and it also lets you install pirated software you can download off demonoid and sync it over.

awesome!

Instead of giving my nook to my brother, I think I'll keep it and put it to good use now hehe

Re:This generations' I-Opener

[lysdexia]

If the game was "impress the easily impressed" AC #1 lost. If the game was "deflate the douchebags" ...

Why bother? Other android tablets out there

[evilviper]

I started looking at the nook color, but decided against it. Why bother with a device you have to jump though hoops to make a capable device, when there are decent full fledged android tablets out there for the same price? The Archos 70 is fairly popular, has similar specs, is slightly cheaper, and EVERYTHING WORKS, you don't have to wait for hacks to get peripherals working...

I give Archos credit for their 250gb hdd model, as even apple doesn't seem to have figured out multimedia is a killer app for the tablet, like the ipod before it...

I never did buy a 70... Can't seem to find a case with bluetooth keyboard that fits perfectly, and the fact it won't charge from microusb is a major annoyance. The slow cpu and lack of gps also discouraged me. Any happy or angry owners are welcome to chime in with their pov...

The big question: why not root initially?

[dbIII]

It seems that these vendors of android systems get the point of linux and open software. You may as well buy something closed from Apple instead of a closed linux system.
There should be more systems following the lead of the Nokia N900 which you do not have to "jailbreak" because you have full access to start with.

Re:The big question: why not root initially?

[Svartalf]

If memory serves, it's "locked down", it's just that you can put it into full developer mode without any real jailbreaking on the N900, much like the N8x0 and N770 before it (I've got a Red Pill mode N800 lying around somewhere...).

Re:The big question: why not root initially?

[dbIII]

You can even tell it to boot off the miniSD card into a different OS without any "jailbreaking". Also getting a root prompt can be done just by downloading a package.
I'm hoping a few other vendors go that way and I'm very disappointed that an open system like Android has been locked down so much.

Unless you can also reduce the core voltage

[pipedwho]

Most of those embedded systems don't have a programatically (or automatically) controllable core voltage rail. In that case (given a constant voltage), the speed increase is linearly proportional to F, so you're better off just getting your stuff over and done with and then going into idle.

If the core voltage is configurable, then underclocking becomes significantly more useful as power consumed is proportional to V squared. Since decreasing the operational voltage generally also requires the clock rate to be reduced, the term underclocking generally assumes both conditions are being met to maximise the benefits.

Re:Unless you can also reduce the core voltage

[ajlitt]

It does have a programmable core voltage, and it can dynamically scale alongside frequency

Half Hour?

[Svartalf]

Heh... It took all of about 10-15 minutes tops. I've been running Honeycomb on it for a bit now and I must say that while the build's got rough edges, it's good enough to allow me to properly target the games I want to make to the upcoming tablets as well as to phones.

I love my warranty.

[Anonymous Coward]

More than that there's a book being sold by B&N as well as on the Nookcolor kiosk explaining how to root. Of course all that voids the warranty. Also I don't think the NC lives up to it's full E-reader potential.

Can 100 rooted Nooks become a Beowulf Cluster?

[knorthern knight]

This is Slashdot, after all.

Mainstream? I can't say I'd think so...

[Crasoose]

One of my coworkers brought in her daughter's Nook Color to root, the process couldn't of been more simple. The whole rooting process is pretty much imaging a SD card with the ISO they give you and rebooting the Nook. It's really that easy, but I imagine the imaging a SD card will leave people dumbfounded.

good tablet

[fuckamonkey]

A rooted nook color makes a good e-reader with tablet functionality. Of course, there is no camera or 3G/4G. You do get wifi and angry birds though. I think that makes the $200 admission price quite attractive. Mine has 100,000 pdf books loaded on the SD card. You'll want to get a fast SD card if you're running the root from the card. Naturally, if you're a real man you'll root the device itself.

Re:Why bother? Other android tablets out there

[rogerdugans]

There are plenty of other Android tablets around, but none of the ones priced under $500 approach the quality of the Nook Color, never mind equaling it.
I have been looking at the Archos devices for years and messed with a couple. Never bought one.

Re:Why bother? Other android tablets out there

[lars_boegild_thomsen]

Similar specs - except the screen resolution - the Archos 70 is 800 × 480 whereas the Nook Color is 1024 x 600.

Hmmm

[Scozza]

Sounds suspiciously like what we were all doing an eon ago, epods, 3com audrey etc. Device, card, root. woot.