Kindle vs Real Books which do you prefer, as I'm thinking of buying myself a Kindle and wondered what you thought
Take care
Andy
I have a Kindle and will kill anyone who tries to take it off me. It is great for travelling (as it will read books to me whilst I am driving) and convenient for my jet-setting lifestyle.
However, I won't use the Kindle for important books - that is books with maps, pictures or tables of data. For these paper is the only way to go.
With the Kindle you can also access the internet, use "apps" and buy books really, really easily.
Hi Andy
Wot FSN wrote!
Cheers Paul
A Kindle as a book reader is fairly handy as you can get an awful lot of reading material for free or for a smaill fee..
Minimal storage space required, handy when on holiday.
As s bonus you can pick up your email, browse the internet or review your photograph collection.
I also find it particularly handy to amuse my grandson with a YouTube cartoon.
Books for me and only books. I love the feel, weight, smell and the fact I can just pick one up at random, open at any page and start reading. Sheer bliss!
Wot Steve said,
tried a kindle, detested the soulless thing.
A Kindle for me as I can have the letters in a big font size
if i need maps then I lopen the book on my pc and scrap the image
Pretty even so far
I also have an awful lot of PDF books which if I did get a Kindle I would want to upload is speech to text available on these also
Take care
Andy
Adele loves her Kindle and has a huge amount of books in it. I can't get to grips with them though, I don't feel like I'm reading a book with these electronic devices and prefer proper paper.
I can't watch TV on phones and tablets either, it just doesn't feel right to me. We spent years getting bigger TV screens, better colours, HD, Super HD, more features and then suddenly everyone wants to watch their favourite shows on a 3" screen with an iffy internet connection.
With all your collective experience what particular model of Kindle would you suggest.
Should I start at the bottom in case I don't get on with it or get a good one to start with
Take care
Andy
Quote from: Leon on 08 October 2018, 03:32:18 PM
Adele loves her Kindle and has a huge amount of books in it. I can't get to grips with them though, I don't feel like I'm reading a book with these electronic devices and prefer proper paper.
I can't watch TV on phones and tablets either, it just doesn't feel right to me. We spent years getting bigger TV screens, better colours, HD, Super HD, more features and then suddenly everyone wants to watch their favourite shows on a 3" screen with an iffy internet connection.
Totally agree about watching TV on small screens not for me
Take care Andy
Quote from: Womble67 on 08 October 2018, 03:55:46 PM
With all your collective experience what particular model of Kindle would you suggest.
Should I start at the bottom in case I don't get on with it or get a good one to start with
I've had a kindle since 2011.
Personally I prefer the original ones with the buttons on the side
I don't like the new ones where you have to swipe the page - too much effort involved
So when they give up the ghost it's off to ebay to get another one
If I were going to buy a new one then I'd probably look at the Kindle Oasis
alan
Never bothered with a Kindle reader, just use the Kindle app on my PC.
If I'm out and about I'm either enjoying my surroundings, startling strangers with random conversation or dozing in my bus or train seat.
I have a kindle and a kindle fire, and mostly use the latter these days since I can check t'interwebs too with it. I have a shitload (metric, not imperial) of pdfs and books on there, including a load of wargames rulesbooks, so when I go out wargaming I don't need to carry around heavy books as well as my armies etc.
Having been laid up in hospital and then at home lately, the kindle has been a godsend. Read through lots of books and pdfs, all in a small and light reader. So much easier than real books, and if there's something I come across while reading, I can buy it and start reading immediately rather than have to order it online to be delivered, go to the bookstore or whatever. Much more convenient. Going on holiday is a snap too, just the kindle and I can read whatever I want, which cuts down on baggage weight and volume considerably.
Plus, as well as all the free e-books out there, ones you buy tend to be cheaper than in dead tree format, and take up less space in the house (which is already filled with books).
If anything happened to my current kindle(s), I'd get another one on amazon prime with same day delivery. For the price, it's possibly the best thing I've ever bought in terms of utility and pleasure.
Kindle app on phone while i wait for daughter to fall asleep in her dark room . Paper for everything else.
I have around 130 books on the kindle, most of them military related. I am glad they are not on my bookshelf!
but in truth, I find the kindle better for a straight page turning read, such as fiction.
For military and colour plate, I find I prefer using the kindle app on my iPad to access my library.
I strongly dislike rule books on any digital device, all that flipping back and forth is much better in a 'real' rulebook.
The thing I like most about the Kindle, is it can be midnight and you are researching you latest favourite project, you are stuck, go to the Kindle store (amazon), a massive selection, pick the book you think will best serve you and buy / download .... instant research material.
As Nick said, superb for hospital.
I don't have a physical Kindle, but have used the kindle app on my iPad for a good number of years. The advantages are what have already been mentioned.
Ease of carrying and storing lots of books. The storing thing is becoming more important as we have so many paper books that storage is an issue. Also for novels I much prefer electronic as they tend to be cheaper and I feel less guilty about storage of something I might only read once.
For reference books I do like real books, especially if they have lots of pictures. But I do prefer the iPad for reading as big books can be really heavy and awkward (I do most of my reading in bed). Again the iPad is good here as it is self lit, and less of a disturbance to my wife.
Rule books - I do like to have both physical and digital. Physical is so much better when first learning a game, but once you have the hang of the rules digital is great for quickly looking up something, or for reference away from a game.
The great strength of ebooks is that you can read them on multiple devices. So if I'm reading a book on my iPad as the main device. But then have 10mins waiting somewhere I can pickup on my phone.
Real books only for me please. As Steve J said I like the feel of the book in hand, plus I am always doing research of some sort and find it easier to just pick up the book and thumb through it for what I'm looking for. As Leon said, I cannot get into reading well electronically or watching TV anywhere except on the TV. I even prefer YouTube on the TV. So don't own any kind of electronic device, except an ollllld basic phone that stays in my car for emergency calls. Have no idea if can do anything additional, and really don't care.
REAL BOOKS RULE!!!!
Terry
Have 7-year old kindle with 100+ titles on it, plus the app on my ipad.
Great for travelling and holidays - we no longer need an extra suitcase just for books and as people have said you can very easily buy and download stuff; useful if you're reading series of novels, for exapmle.
Downside for me is the serious stuff. Bought a nice book about Belisarius and have not been able to read it due to faffing with maps and illustrations which never seem to line up with the text and by the time you've found the map you've forgottern why you were looking for it!
I think in short it's simply horses for courses which for me means fiction for kindle and non-fiction for the bookshelves.
Quote from: Malbork on 09 October 2018, 03:34:50 PM
I think in short it's simply horses for courses which for me means fiction for kindle and non-fiction for the bookshelves.
Wot he said.
I'd also go for a Fire. Aside from a plain ebook it has many useful functions. I downloaded a podcast player onto mine and so listen to many, many podcasts via the Kindle,
I've had a dedicated Kindle e-book reader since about 2011. It's great for reading novels, stories, etc. on. I went on holiday recently with the choice of reading any of approx. 400 titles. It remembers where you've got to in each book. I can pick up reading a book after 18 months, and it remembers exactly where I'd got to.
I wouldn't use it for a rulebook, or a reference book, or anything else that requires a lot of flicking back and forth.
It's no good for anything that uses images. It's not good at converting PDF files to the Kindle format - you really need the source to be a dedicated Kindle file.
Looking at the current Kindles available they look a lot worse than the version I've got, so if mine dies I doubt one of the current offerings.
Plenty of public domain titles are available - try Feedbooks (http://www.feedbooks.com/authors/top) (for example).
Cheers, M.
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I would just like to thank everybody for contributing to the discussion. I picked up a basic model last night for £20 so over the next couple of days I'll give it a go and see what I think
Take care
Andy
My not being a tech heavy, I have an honest question fr those with electronic books. What happens if your device crashes or gets corrupted? Do you lose everything or is it stored as some kind of account? This would be one of my fears if I had one.
Thanks,
Terry
Amazon have a "cloud", so no you wont lose it all.
Additional benefit of a Kindle. If you are reading "War and Peace" in bed, and fall asleep, you won't end up with a broken nose.
Quote from: Terry37 on 10 October 2018, 03:05:18 PM
What happens if your device crashes or gets corrupted? Do you lose everything or is it stored as some kind of account?
I connect mine to the PC with a USB cable, and just copy the contents to a backup folder.
I know I do have an Amazon account with it, but I can't remember the last time I logged into it.
Cheers, M.
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I have a black and white text kindle that is brilliant for holidays, but not so good if you want to read siting on the edge of the pool with your feel dangling in the water.
It no good for anything with pictures or maps. It is also a pain when you have a cast of characters in th front of the book and you want to check who a particular character is.
I have not got the kindle fire as they can be tricky to read in direct sunlight unlike my black and white one. It is also the earlier one that has a button to turn the pages. Not a swipe
Kindle for fiction, real books for non-fiction... A Librarian speaks...
Ook!
Both the above correct....
Ok an update after spending a couple of nights with my new Kindle I can honestly say I think it's brilliant so I might even save a bit of space by buying digital books from now on
Take care
Andy
Good to hear its working out well for you Andy
I've found a Kindle Fire very useful. Works well as a reader for anything without detailed maps and also as a basic tablet for email etc. I wouldn't want one as my only tablet as I'd miss some of the android functions not available such as the GPS and the excellent OS map app.
It would work very well for say the text volumes of the British official histories used alongside the physical map volumes. I'm currently reading David Glantz's account of Smolensk 1941 on the Fire, together with the separate paper map volume.
One useful feature of the amazon account is it will remember your place in books across devices (phone, kindle and laptop) in much the same way as it does for Prime content for TV and films.
I wouldn't want to spend a long time reading the Kindle app on the phone but it is handy to be able to access your library if only to check what you already have.