Xmas shopping help

[MARIS61]

My wife wants a kindle. She's a serious reader, a book a week at least. I want the best model for reading, easy on the eyes, don't care about other uses like movies etc. Suggestions?

 

[BrianFromWA]

I've had every model except the new paperwhite, and the Fire is the best for reading everything except in bright sunshine. Does books, magazines, documents. Only about $150 right now. I don't use it for movies/music/web/etc, but you could. Pure reading.

 

[3RA1N1AC]

Suggestions?

Buy her something made in the USA? Seems like supporting overseas sweatshop labor and its profiteers in a communist country, enabled by the tax cheats at amazon, is the last thing a REAL american would even consider. You should be ashamed of yourself

 

[Denny Crane]

Get her a snow shovel.

Why get her a kindle if she wants a kindle?

 

[PapaG]

Nook

 

[MARIS61]

Buy her something made in the USA? Seems like supporting overseas sweatshop labor and its profiteers in a communist country, enabled by the tax cheats at amazon, is the last thing a REAL american would even consider. You should be ashamed of yourself

Good points. Who makes a comparable in the US?

 

[MARIS61]

Get her a snow shovel.

Why get her a kindle if she wants a kindle?

You are a hopeless romantic, aaren't you?

 

[3RA1N1AC]

Good points. Who makes a comparable in the US?

here

 

[EL PRESIDENTE]

Appe ipad

 

[THE HCP]

^Ding Ding Ding

 

[MARIS61]

Appe ipad

Apple is the richest company "in" America, but has basically paid zero taxes throughout it's existence due to a complex scheme of offshore accounts and overseas business registries. As slimy as they come. The taxes they dodge are taxes our children will have to pay to China.

 

[jlprk]

Any tablet doubles as a book if you turn it 90 degrees. This Blackberry has a little book icon in the corner--now I'm seeing each post in black and white, no graphics, as if it's a page in a book.

You get a lot more computer functions and you don't pay much more. So I'd look at Brainiac's search results.

 

[Mediocre Man]

I am not a fan of apple, but the i pad air is a pretty amazing tablet. Incredible resolution, great for reading and would be a great CHRISTmas gift

 

[BLAZER PROPHET]

The reason my wife prefers the Kindle (not the Fire) is because there is no backlight like a computer or tablet has. As a result, there is no screen washout or reflection in bright light (even sun at the beach- the screen looks terrific). The down side is because there is no internal backlight it cannot be read in the dark without a small light. All the other readers cannot be used in the sun and even in the house there's a lot of screen reflection.

Also, there are several websites and blogs with access to, literally, tens of thousands of free books. Most are public domain, but some are legit current authors.

 

[Paxil]

Get the Kindle Paperwhite hands down. I am getting Paperwhites for two of my kids for Christmas. You can read it in the bright sunshine, and in the dark without a light. There is a Nook version that had this first, but I prefer the Kindle because I do a lot of other stuff with Amazon and they have readers for just about any device, so if you happen to want to read something from you phone because you didn't grab the Paperwhite, you can. I also like that you can now get any book you ordered from amazon (even if you bought a hardcopy 15 years ago) for the kindle for like 99 cents.

I have various tablets and they can work OK for reading books, but in the sun they are useless.

 

[Denny Crane]

First book you should get her:

 

[EL PRESIDENTE]

Apple is the richest company "in" America, but has basically paid zero taxes throughout it's existence due to a complex scheme of offshore accounts and overseas business registries. As slimy as they come. The taxes they dodge are taxes our children will have to pay to China.

but they will make their ipads in amurrica.

 

[VanillaGorilla]

I am not a fan of apple, but the i pad air is a pretty amazing tablet. Incredible resolution, great for reading and would be a great CHRISTmas gift

Getting an iPad for just reading books is a little overkill.

 

[Mediocre Man]

Getting an iPad for just reading books is a little overkill.

True, but for $100 or so more, why not get more in value?

 

[Denny Crane]

It really boils down to who you want to be stuck buying eBooks from.

If you go Kindle, you'll be buying books through Amazon.

If you go Apple, you'll be buying books through iTunes.

There's a Kindle app for iPad, but it doesn't work as well as the Kindle. Something about how Apple charges a commission for apps sold through the app store limits what Amazon is willing to do.

 

[VanillaGorilla]

True, but for $100 or so more, why not get more in value?

There's not much more value for Maris' wife in an iPad. Definitely not more than 2x the value.

 

[Further]

It really boils down to who you want to be stuck buying eBooks from.

If you go Kindle, you'll be buying books through Amazon.

If you go Apple, you'll be buying books through iTunes.

There's a Kindle app for iPad, but it doesn't work as well as the Kindle. Something about how Apple charges a commission for apps sold through the app store limits what Amazon is willing to do.

I use my kindle app on my ipad, works great for me. But I also have a kindle and use that more often if I just want to read.

If I use my ipad to read I often end up surfing the web, checking sports scores/this site, or just pissing away my time instead of reading. On the Ipad im too ADD.

 

[Denny Crane]

I use my kindle app on my ipad, works great for me. But I also have a kindle and use that more often if I just want to read.

If I use my ipad to read I often end up surfing the web, checking sports scores/this site, or just pissing away my time instead of reading. On the Ipad im too ADD.

My wife says the kindle app is only good for reading, but not for organizing or even buying her books. She uses her old school kindle for that.

On the other hand, if you find the app sufficient, then you get the benefit of both iBooks and Amazon with the iPad, where kindle is limited to just Amazon.

I prefer a device I can use for other things.

 

[EL PRESIDENTE]

for purely reading go with the paperwhite. I get too distracted surfing the web on my fire or ipad.

 

[porkchopexpress]

If she is just using it to read, then the Kindle Paperwhite is probably an easy choice.

<$150 vs $300+ ($400+ for mini w/ retina)
7.3oz vs 9.6oz
weeks of battery vs 10 hours

plus less eye strain and easier to read in the sunlight.

Of course, if she wants a tablet, the iPad Mini (or some Android tablet) is the way to go.

 

[Further]

My wife says the kindle app is only good for reading, but not for organizing or even buying her books. She uses her old school kindle for that.

On the other hand, if you find the app sufficient, then you get the benefit of both iBooks and Amazon with the iPad, where kindle is limited to just Amazon.

I prefer a device I can use for other things.

I just use the kindle app because my father, who has a very similar taste in books and my mom who doesn't, are both big readers and buy a shit-ton of books. So I have their account on two devices (one account can have up to 5 devices). So I usually only buy a couple books a year, the rest I just read my dads books.

Right now I'm reading 1491, a book about the Americas before Columbus. Real interesting, our understanding has greatly changed over the past few decades through archaeological digs and data analysis, so what I learned in school is now extremely outdated and in some cases dead wrong. For example in school I remember learning that it was thought that there were a few million Natives before the Columbus, but that number keeps getting adjusted upward every time they find evidence of these giant cities. The best current estimate is now 60mil, but the author believes once the dust settles the final best estimate will be about 80 million Natives in the Americas. I recommend this book if you like nonfiction.

 

[Denny Crane]

FWIW, I think 60M is maybe 3x too many than there actually were.

 

[Further]

FWIW, I think 60M is maybe 3x too many than there actually were.

There have been quite a few discoveries where there was once thought to be a tribe or two, but now we have miles of hills that are all made of pottery, so much so that it's evidence of some of the largest cities the pre-industrialized world had ever seen. Mind you, I'm talking about the entirety of the Americas, not just America or North America.

 

[Denny Crane]

There have been quite a few discoveries where there was once thought to be a tribe or two, but now we have miles of hills that are all made of pottery, so much so that it's evidence of some of the largest cities the pre-industrialized world had ever seen. Mind you, I'm talking about the entirety of the Americas, not just America or North America.

I'm talking the americas, too.

The bulk of the population would be Incas and Aztecs in South America.

There are no other massively large cities that suggest population of 80M.

Seriously, the US had an 80M population in 1900. That means cities like San Francisco, LA, NY, Philly, Chicago, etc. Too big to just be lost in the jungle.

 

[Further]

I'm talking the americas, too.

The bulk of the population would be Incas and Aztecs in South America.

There are no other massively large cities that suggest population of 80M.

Seriously, the US had an 80M population in 1900. That means cities like San Francisco, LA, NY, Philly, Chicago, etc. Too big to just be lost in the jungle.

Some were actually purposefully buried. Your estimates go right along with what scholastics believed a few decades ago, but those numbers keep getting revised. The best estimates currently suggest 60M, and it's the authors contention those numbers are still climbing. I just started the book, maybe 50 pages in, I'll report back with more specifics when I learn them.

Personally, I have no idea and don't know how to judge, I'm just reporting from the book, which seems quite reputable.