Recently my father asked me, knowing full well that I ran this website about the Nook Vs. Kindle, which is best between the Nook vs. Kindle vs. Kobo vs. Sony Reader? That’s a fair question. All 4 of these ebook readers are similarly priced and have similar features. So I set off to find the answer for him. It’s not good enough for my dad to present my mom with an ebook reader, he needs to give the reasons why he chose it, right? Here’s what I found, and which ebook reader I think is best and why.
How the Nook Differs From the Kindle, Kobo and Sony Touch
The Nook is a quality ebook reader with some unique features that make it appealing.
- Color touch navigation screen- Obviously a little color is interesting.
- Lending Feature- You can lend books to others for up to 2 weeks with the Nook. (note- lender cannot use the book at that time also)
- Free Games- It comes with Sudoku and Chess for free.
- In Store Reading- You can visit a local Barnes and Noble store with your Nook and browse any title in the store for up to one hour for free.
- Expandable Memory- Add an SD card in the slot for more memory. (Expandable memory on the Kobo also)
Nook Downers…
The color touch screen is great, in the way that it is color and touch, but quite frankly it is more awkward to use than the Kindle 3′s simple touch keyboard or the all touch navigation of the Sony Touch Pocket Edition. It’s a hybrid between the touch that is a little confusing and slow to use. Just give it a spin at a local Barnes and Noble store and you’ll understand immediately. It’s not a deal breaker by any means…I mean you could get used to the navigation pretty easily, but in my opinion the Kindle 3 navigation is better.
Another downer is the battery life is only 10 days with the wireless off. That’s actually an impressive number of days considering you could never do that with a phone! But compared to other ereaders, it’s a low battery life time.
How the Kindle Differs From the Nook, Kobo, and Sony Touch
The Kindle has a few features that are completely unique compared to the other ebook readers in question.
- More standard memory- The Nook and Kobo are expandable memories, but the Kindle 3 comes with the ability to add 3,500 books standard, which is more than double than any of the other devices.
- E-Ink contrast- The reading screen is hands-down the best quality for an E-Ink reading screen available. The contrast between the light background and darker text is noticeably sharper on the Kindle 3 compared to other devices.
- Battery Life Galore- With the wireless turned off, the Kindle 3 lasts for up to 30 days. This is double the Kobo and Sony Touch, and triple the Nook battery life.
- Text-To-Speech- This is a feature that converts a book or PDF into speech and reads it to you. You can choose between a male and female voice and it sounds surprisingly human…as human as an electronic voice coming out of an ebook reader can be.
- International Use- The 3G coverage is available all over the globe in over 100 different countries. This is unique to the Kindle only.
Kindle Downers…
Lending books isn’t available yet on the Kindle. However, according to Amazon…”Later this year, we will be introducing lending for Kindle, a new feature that lets you loan your Kindle books to other Kindle or Kindle app users. Each book can be lent once, for a period of 14 days. Not all books will be available to lend – the publisher or rights holder determines which titles are enabled for lending.” I assume they mean later in 2011.
How the Kobo Differs From the Kindle, Nook, and Sony Touch Pocket Edition
The Kobo is Borders device competing for a smaller portion of the market, for no reason other than it was late to the party and a little lacking in some respects. Nevertheless, there are some unique aspects of the device.
- 4-way directional button for navigation. Instead of page turn buttons on each side of the device, the Kobo has a 4-directional button on the lower right hand front of the device.
- Comes with a “quilted” backing. The device is available in 3 different color schemes, white with silver back, white with lavender back, and black with black back.
Kobo Downers…
And it’s a big one…There is no AC adapter included with the device. So you can count on your computer being your charger, as it comes with USB connection cable.
-
Sony Reader Pocket Edition Unique Features
The Sony Reader Pocket Edition is comparable in price to the rest of these devices, but otherwise it is completely different in many ways.
Sony Reader Pocket Touch Edition
- Pocket Size- There’s a reason it’s called the Pocket Edition! This is a smaller device than the other ereaders mentioned here. The reading screen is 5″ diagonally vs 6″ with the Nook, Kindle and Kobo.
- Touch E-Ink Screen- The Pocket Edition has a touch activated E-Ink screen. You can change pages by swiping the finger or touching on the side. Navigation is by touching the screen as well as a few strategically placed push buttons.
- Comes in two colors, pink and silver.
- 1 GB of memory allows up to 1,200 titles of storage.
- Battery life is 2 weeks
Sony Reader Pocket Edition Downers…
A big first downer for me on this device is the no WiFi. What? Okay, how about add on the no AC Adaptor! Now add on the fact that it is more expensive than the Kindle, Nook, or Kobo, and the reading screen is perhaps too small, and I cannot see how Sony expects this device to compete in the ereader market. I guess if you like a small screen that is touch, then this is the product for you. As you can guess, I didn’t recommend this to my dad.
Which eReader Did I Recommend?
It comes down to the Nook vs. Kindle 3 in my opinion. And furthermore, I think that the new Kindle 3 is a better deal, despite the recent release of the Nook 1.5 software, which doesn’t really do much except allow for a different way to categorize the books on the Nook device.
The newest Kindle 3rd edition (or Kindle 3) has a smaller and lighter body than the Nook, yet the same reading screen size. It has a much longer battery life than any other device on the market, allows for international usage, has the best E-Ink display available, most standard memory, and to top it off the price is the cheapest on the market.
Accessories Advantage- A thing I like about the Kindle 3 also is the fact that it is sold on Amazon, which makes for a much larger variety of accessories. Think about it, if you buy any of these other devices, there is going to be a small variety of accessories that you can buy, because Sony and Barnes and Noble and Borders aren’t going to spend more money than necessary providing accessories that may or may not sell!
Amazon, however, is an environment where the best product wins. So you have a lot of competition for really cool looking accessories for the Kindle.
The Kindle 3 is tough to beat. Period. And that’s why the Kindle is the most popular ebook reader on the market.
December 1, 2010
8 Comments