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Amazon releases the rumoured large-screen Kindle

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Re: Amazon releases the rumoured large-screen Kindle

#101

Post by mattmcknight »

chris11 wrote: post #75
mikebo wrote: post #23

This looks like it will be a great product, especially for all the technical pdfs I've built up over the years. Still not wild about the DRM though -- I made the mistake of buying DRMed music that I can't listen to anymore. I'm not going to do the same with books. Anyone else trying to justify a $500 pdf reader? :)

Yes, I am. I'm salivating over the idea of replacing all of my textbooks with pdfs. But unfortunately I doubt I could get all of my textbooks on the kindle right now. And price is an issue. Checking on Amazon, there is not a large price difference between kindle textbooks, and real textbooks. So the only reason I would get a dx is if the textbook and the kindle pdf were bundled together for a reasonable price. But I…

To make the price difference worse- your physical textbooks have a resale value, while the digital files do not.

Re: Amazon releases the rumoured large-screen Kindle

#102

Post by andreyf »

seldo wrote: post #92
Herring wrote: post #86

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Noone else will say it, but I'm sure the piracy will pick up if it gets popular enough.

It sort of seems like it's massively in Amazon's interest if it does, right? They want eBooks to catch on like MP3s did, and the way to do that, it turns out, is a decade of massive piracy before the publishers finally give in.

I don't know if it's in Amazon's interest or not, but at least from my experience at Rutgers, it's more than true. Internal file sharing networks had PDF versions of nearly every textbook used in the CS and Math departments...

Re: Amazon releases the rumoured large-screen Kindle

#103

Post by andreyf »

chris11 wrote: post #75
mikebo wrote: post #23

This looks like it will be a great product, especially for all the technical pdfs I've built up over the years. Still not wild about the DRM though -- I made the mistake of buying DRMed music that I can't listen to anymore. I'm not going to do the same with books. Anyone else trying to justify a $500 pdf reader? :)

Yes, I am. I'm salivating over the idea of replacing all of my textbooks with pdfs. But unfortunately I doubt I could get all of my textbooks on the kindle right now. And price is an issue. Checking on Amazon, there is not a large price difference between kindle textbooks, and real textbooks. So the only reason I would get a dx is if the textbook and the kindle pdf were bundled together for a reasonable price. But I…

I'm not sure if it's obvious or not, but PDF's of many popular textbooks are widely available either free as in beer:

http://infolab.stanford.edu/~ullman/focs.html http://www.cs.berkeley.edu/~vazirani/algorithms.html

Or free as in money from a bank robbery:

http://thepiratebay.org/browse/601/0/7

Re: Amazon releases the rumoured large-screen Kindle

#104

Post by andreyf »

Xichekolas wrote: post #70
jm4 wrote: post #48

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I haven't seen the big Kindle, but I own the Kindle 2. Page turns are faster on a Kindle than they are with a paper book, although it's not as convenient for flipping ahead a few pages when you're quickly scanning for specific information. You notice page turns no more than you would with a paper book when reading novels, but it could be irritating for reference materials or text books.

I thought they all had a search feature to make looking for specific info faster. Is that not the case?

Yes, but it's a pain to use - the keyboard isn't all that good for typing, and the on-screen response time of any interaction is pretty slow (maybe 0.5s)... still, great device for front-to-back reading.

Re: Amazon releases the rumoured large-screen Kindle

#105

Post by boundlessdreamz »

jrockway wrote: post #90
juliend2 wrote: post #36

Earlier quoted context omitted.

can it read protected PDFs also? I suppose that i can enter my password with the keyboard.

You can always just strip the DRM off on your computer.

How do you do that for simple password protected PDF's ?

Re: Amazon releases the rumoured large-screen Kindle

#106

Post by there »

sketerpot wrote: post #97
adamc wrote: post #95

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Much less attractive.

The USB drag-and-drop still works, right? That's not quite as trivial, but still not particularly difficult.

the kindle 2 supports downloading files that you navigate to via the kindle's web browser. i would imagine the new one still lets you do this.

Re: Amazon releases the rumoured large-screen Kindle

#107

Post by there »

dschobel wrote: post #37
jonknee wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not having a keyboard would make it a pain in the ass to search for content. Amazon is highly vested in making it easy for you to get more content. Yadda yadda, the keyboard aint going anywhere.

they could always go with a virtual keyboard now that the refresh times of the screen are getting better.

and you would push keys on that with what? it's not a touch screen.

Re: Amazon releases the rumoured large-screen Kindle

#110

Post by jgrahamc »

Goodnews. When is this going to be available in the UK?

I'm there if I can read PDFs on it (check), subscribe to Le Monde (check), the New York Times (check), The Economist and The Guardian. I can see a device like this making me spend more on subscriptions than I currently do because of the convenience and lack of paper to recycle.

I guess I might buy the occasional book, although I really like paper books.

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