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Barnes & Noble Won't Give Up On the Nook
jfruh writes "Barnes & Noble's Nook e-reader line has largerly been regarded as a botched attempt to compete with the Kindle, whose failure has contributed to the bookseller's financial woes. Well, despite earlier statements that the company was abandoning it as a hardware platform, now the B&N CEO insists that the company is committed to the product line and the new Nooks are in development."
History is filled with superior products that failed in the marketplace. I've looked at and tried both the Kindle and the Nook and if I had to choose one of the two it would be the Nook. I really have no need for a 7" tablet though so I passed. I think Amazon's marketing is simply much stronger than B&N's. Most people that buy either a Nook or Kindle tablet seem happy enough with it so I don't think there is that much to choose between the two, for me it was the SD slot that made me like the Nook better but a lot of people don't care about that.
It doesn't have a physical button for page turning, but tapping the edge of the screen will flip the page; you don't have to gesture for it.
The Nook Simple Touch does have those buttons.
If you ask me (which I guess the OP did), the Nook Simple Touch is a great little device, but the Nook Tablets are worthless. Since you can get the Nook App on just about any tablet (including Windows 8 tablets) you might as well get a tablet you actually want and then just install that, if you really want to use Nook ebooks on a tablet. There's no compelling reason to get a Nook Tablet.
The Nook Simple Touch, on the other hand, is a nice, small device that's rugged enough for me to throw in my pocket and carry around all day, if I wanted to. The display is OK. It's an e-ink display, so it works well in bright lights, and if you get the one that has the glow feature, it works in low light too. I don't like any of the fonts that the Simple Touch offers, though.
All that being said - I expect everything applies to the Kindle as well, so - no, there's really no compelling reason to choose the Nook. There's a very good reason to get a Kindle instead: Amazon has a much better selection. (Yeah, I kind of regret my Nook purchase, but not enough to replace it with a Kindle.)
You are in a maze of twisty little relative jumps, all alike.
All that being said - I expect everything applies to the Kindle as well, so - no, there's really no compelling reason to choose the Nook. There's a very good reason to get a Kindle instead: Amazon has a much better selection. (Yeah, I kind of regret my Nook purchase, but not enough to replace it with a Kindle.)
That's not much of a selling point, since you can install and run Kindle on the Nook, but you can't install Nook reader on the Kindle. So that means the Nook actually has a bigger selection.
"Somebody has to do something. It's just incredibly pathetic it has to be us."
--- Jerry Garcia
The main problem with Nook is that they're only available for sale in the US and the UK. They're better than Kindle in most ways. I've had two Nooks, one was the original and the other is Nook Simple Touch Glow. The only reason I upgraded was that I smashed the older one. Anyways, they both feature a MicroSD slot, the ability to buy ebooks from pretty much any store not ending in azon.com. And Nook had a real light before anybody else did. I've used it and the glow light works well. Even lighting across the whole screen without it straining the eyes. Also, Nook was the first reader to get the page flipping right. It has 2 sets of physical buttons so you can turn the page which ever way you hold it. But, it also has the touch screen to turn pages as well. Which works pretty well, except if you accidentally click on a citation link. But, in general the thing about Nook is that it's just solid hardware with good design. The main problem I have with it is that the book shelves are a PITA to use. You have to shelve the books on the device itself, which doesn't work out well if you have a huge number of books.
Part of the problem is that if you want to buy the books through B&N, the digital copy is generally the same price as a physical copy. They were expecting to make their money by selling ebooks, but were not willing/able to price them competitively.
I disagree, if you buy an ebook from Amazon you're pretty much stuck with Amazon devices. But, Nook uses epub with DRM from Adobe, so, my Nook can read books from just about any store that sells them. Whereas Nook requires that you get the books converted, or stick with Amazon books.
I've personally bought ebooks from Oreilly, Smashwords, B&N, Kobo and Ebooks.com, and they all work without converting them. And even the stores that sell DRM ebooks, I can load those without having to crack the DRM. Which I couldn't do with Kindle, unless I buy from Amazon.
But, more importantly, if I decide I don't like the next generation of Nook and my current one breaks, I can switch to a competing ebook reader, without having to crack my library or buy it a second time. Something that's impossible with Kindle.
I Have a Nook, and a Kindle.
The Nook Simple Touch is the best eBook reader I have ever used, and I have used pretty much every major version of every major brand that has been released.
I read a lot, several novels a week on average, and so small things make a huge impact for me.
The Nook has a very nice tactile feel. Its coated with a rubberized like surface that is much easier to hold then the standard hi-gloss body plastic on most devices. The shape of the device, particularly the back panel, is very ergonomic, and easy to hold. It has the all important page turn buttons, a huge requirement for me. It has fairly good battery life, and the GUI is easy to user and understand.
There are some flaws.
You can't delete a file from the device, you have to plug it in to a computer to do so. The home page, which is different then your library seems useless to me, but that could perhaps be for people who read magazines, and other documents on the device. The device requires you to swipe across the screen to unlock, which can cause problems because the touch screen isn't capacitive touch, it uses infrared to detect touch, so if there is any dust around the edges of the screen, touch will fail.
Overall though, I love the device.