Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

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nisiprius
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by nisiprius »

Independent George wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 10:49 pm...If you plan to download & watch movies on a flight? Get a tablet. If you plan to read for hours, including outdoors by the pool? Get a Kindle. If you're going to do both? Then get either a tablet, or both...
I think the main advice I want to give, because I didn't realize it for a long time, is that if you have a tablet and you want to just settle down and really read the way you'd read a book--without a lot of unbalanced weight in one hand, without any issues of subtle eyestrain, and without having to scramble for the window seat with the outlet on the Amtrak train or generally charge at every opportunity... yeah, if you can afford it is well worth the extra money to have an e-Ink Kindle too. The general characteristics of an e-Ink Kindle are very different from that of a smartphone, tablet, or laptop, and much better suited to the specialized job of "ludic" (enjoyable, immersive) reading of books.

For years I kept thinking it was a waste of money to buy an (e-Ink) Kindle when my spiffy and well-liked $600 Samsung tablet could do the same job. It wasn't.

Here's another way to phrase it. Although the e-Ink Kindles contain foreign-language dictionaries, their Translate feature--Bing Translate--is so much worse than Google Translate that it's a bad joke. So I read all my Spanish learning material on my tablet, because I can use Google Translate. But I never use it to read anything else.
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Big Mig
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Big Mig »

brennok wrote: Thu Sep 23, 2021 9:35 pm
Big Mig wrote: Tue Sep 21, 2021 10:08 pm
brennok wrote: Sat Sep 18, 2021 11:13 pm …and browsing Amazon is also painful on the Kindle.
But this is a feature not a bug, right? Browse on a browser, read—and only read—on a kindle.

I pretty much live on my iPad, except to read books almost exclusively on an older paperwhite. Though I’m starting to wonder if my reading skills are poorly developed. I’m not sure how to use all this speed. Mostly I just turn the page; sometimes I adjust the brightness up or down; once a day or so I might visit my library and choose another book. Occasionally I look up a word. I’m sure I could do all this a little faster on my iPad but I don’t often feel like the kindle is slowing me down, and it’s never yet interrupted me with a notification about an unimportant email or text or lost dog on next door.
Not when you have Kindle Unlimited like I mentioned. When I finish a KU book, I return it and look for the next book I want to read. Using the Kindle means once I finish reading the book, I set down the Kindle and then grab my iPad or phone or go to a computer. Then I return the book and look for my next title. If I don't select the Kindle to push the newly checked out title when I go back to Kindle I then have to search to find the book to read. Depending on the day I may read 2 or 3 books and I never know until I read a book if I am going to want to go to the next in the series or another book.

I also constantly have issues even with the newest Paperwhite lagging when it comes to page turns. It won't respond and then suddenly it jumps 3-4 pages.
I actually have KU too. Maybe it’s just the idiosyncrasies of our reading styles, but KU lets you have 10 books “out” at a time so I usually have my 4 or 5 most likely next books already on my Kindle. Yes, I use my iPad to add new KU books, but I’m using the iPad often enough that it’s no big deal. And I don’t bother pushing the new book to my device, I just add it to the library and let my device sync new items in the library.

I agree that lagging/skipping page turns would be annoying. I don’t have that problem. Mine is not remotely the latest paperwhite; it looks like I registered it on July 11, 2015.
Last edited by Big Mig on Sat Sep 25, 2021 2:13 pm, edited 1 time in total.
Pluto9th
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Pluto9th »

kramer wrote: Tue Sep 21, 2021 5:15 pm
Pluto9th wrote: Sun Sep 19, 2021 3:31 pm For simple undemanding reading the Paperwhite is fine, but if extensive annotation/multilingual dictionaries are involved, I much prefer the Kindle app on iPad/iPhone.
Could you elaborate on this? I thought one could only do foreign dictionary lookup when the Kindle app was running on a Kindle and not when it is running on anything else? On my kindle, I just press the foreign language word with my finger and the English/foreign dictionary meaning pops up. I did have to purchase the electronic dictionary from Amazon.

It is one of the reasons I read foreign language books on the Kindle.

I have an ancient Kindle Paperwhite and so I will either be upgrading to the Paperwhite announced today or else I could put the money into an Ipad and skip the Paperwhite. But looking up foreign language words while reading in the Kindle app is an important feature to me.
I haven't placed a Kindle and an iOS device's Kindle app side-by-side before ... Ok, doing it now. If you want to look up a word in a dictionary, the iOS Kindle app's dictionary window (with the word definition) has a "Go to dictionary" tab, click on that and the dictionary opens at that word, and you can freely roam in the dictionary. If the definition contains unfamiliar words whose meanings in turn you'd like to look up, it's very easy to do so in the app, but I don't think it's do-able in a "hardware" Kindle (at least not in my 7th gen Paperwhite). Actually you can temporarily leave an English book to roam in the app's English dictionary as well. This is admittedly a distraction from the book-reading itself, but I happen to like poking around dictionaries. Oh, I see the app's dictionary window has a speaker icon providing pronunciation for the word! My Paperwhite doesn't have that feature, maybe newer Kindles do.

Also, you can copy text into the app's annotation window ('sticky note'), e.g. a relevant URL, but my Kindle does not have a way to do that (though I found out the URLs copied over cannot be opened from the app). I was going to say that you can easily write with accent marks in the app, but not in the hardware Kindle - but that's not true, just looked into the Kindle's set up and it does have the option of setting up multilingual keyboard, good to know!

As nisiprius said, if 99% of your user interaction is "turn the page" the hardware Kindle is fine. If you often need to write more than e.g. "I have a marvelous solution, but this margin is too narrow" in the annotation, then the app is preferable.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Watty »

nisiprius wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 6:17 pm ... yeah, if you can afford it is well worth the extra money to have an e-Ink Kindle too. The general characteristics of an e-Ink Kindle are very different from that of a smartphone, tablet, or laptop, and much better suited to the specialized job of "ludic" (enjoyable, immersive) reading of books.

For years I kept thinking it was a waste of money to buy an (e-Ink) Kindle when my spiffy and well-liked $600 Samsung tablet could do the same job. It wasn't.
I do not know what other peoples experiences have been but in my experience the e-Ink Kindle lasted a long time which can make the cost per year of having two devices more reasonable.

My 10+ year old Kindle keyboard was still working fine but I am replacing it with the new Paperwhite that just came out. I am using their trade-in program to get a 20% discount on a new Kindle along with a $5 trade-in credit.

That means for me that the cost per year for having a Kindle has been very low.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Independent George »

Watty wrote: Sat Sep 25, 2021 7:11 am I do not know what other peoples experiences have been but in my experience the e-Ink Kindle lasted a long time which can make the cost per year of having two devices more reasonable.

My 10+ year old Kindle keyboard was still working fine but I am replacing it with the new Paperwhite that just came out. I am using their trade-in program to get a 20% discount on a new Kindle along with a $5 trade-in credit.

That means for me that the cost per year for having a Kindle has been very low.
The device itself is fine, but the Li-Ion batteries do eventually wear out. My 2019 paperwhite barely held a charge anymore, so I purchased an aftermarket battery for $50 and replaced it. It probably would have been more economical to trade it in with Amazon, but I'm kind of sick of the disposable electronics trend. The battery replacement was an absolute pain (why, oh why, do you need to glue a battery in when the case itself will resist being pried up with a spudger?), but I do like that I didn't have to re-download all my content.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by JoeRetire »

brennok wrote: Sun Sep 19, 2021 10:45 pm
JoeRetire wrote: Sun Sep 19, 2021 6:21 am
brennok wrote: Sat Sep 18, 2021 11:13 pm I have a Kindle I only use as a backup when my iPad runs out of battery or I am traveling. The majority of my reading is done on the iPad and I average around 250 books a year. I find the Kindle way too slow and sluggish.
I'm guessing you are using a Kindle Fire, rather than a Kindle Papwerwhite?
Nope latest Kindle Paperwhite.
Interesting. I don't know anyone who considers a Paperwhite "too slow and sluggish" for simple reading. I know I don't. Seems no more sluggish than turning a paper page to me.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Freefun »

I use a little of everything - phone, paperwhite, oasis and iPad. Im using my new iPad mini the most. It’s the right size and annotation and saving notes is much faster. I also download movies and other stuff. Of course the kindle can do all this but iPad is much faster (but much more expensive).
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Vanarayana »

Hi!

Some other suggestions in addition to those already made. Much like an audio system depends on the type of music you intend to listen to, the choice of a reading device depends on whether you read in an illuminated room, or in the dark and the size and type of document. The batteries on E-readers last longer than 24 hours and you can load many books on them.

For larger well formatted documents and .pdf files I use a Sony DPT reader.

For reading text on websites like this one and newspapers using their apps from the Android app, I use the BOOX Nova2 from Onyx. Their US site is shop.boox.com

You can also load the Libby App from Google Play and then borrow e-books from the public library using your library card.

There are color e-ink devices and if you want to read comics or take notes there are other devices.
https://goodereader.com/blog/ has a description of many devices.

Happy reading.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Valuethinker »

Barefootgirl wrote: Fri Sep 17, 2021 7:50 am Which do you prefer for reading e-books or magazine subscriptions and why do you prefer one over the other?

Thanks
The matt screens on Kindles are the dealbreaker (in favour of). It makes them usable in far more situations, with less eyestrain.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Independent George »

JoeRetire wrote: Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:25 pm Interesting. I don't know anyone who considers a Paperwhite "too slow and sluggish" for simple reading. I know I don't. Seems no more sluggish than turning a paper page to me.
Same; I actually actually find it much faster than turning a physical page, because I can do it with one hand. The only times I find it slow are when I take it outside with me in the Chicago winter, and the e-ink literally freezes.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by HomerJ »

Independent George wrote: Mon Oct 04, 2021 12:01 pm
JoeRetire wrote: Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:25 pm Interesting. I don't know anyone who considers a Paperwhite "too slow and sluggish" for simple reading. I know I don't. Seems no more sluggish than turning a paper page to me.
Same; I actually actually find it much faster than turning a physical page, because I can do it with one hand. The only times I find it slow are when I take it outside with me in the Chicago winter, and the e-ink literally freezes.
One of my favorite parts of the book "The Martian" is when he takes a laptop out of the habitat and is reminded that the L in LED stands for "liquid" and the entire display freezes... :)
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by hand »

Jazztonight wrote: Fri Sep 17, 2021 11:24 pm
That said, I read the entire Talmud in English over a 7 1/2 year period on my iPhone 7+, and survived. And...my wife reads ebooks on her iPad mini all the day long and never complains.
There's a TV series in this comment somewhere... perhaps "iRabbi" where after 7 years of iPhone reading, the protagonist interacts with a constantly changing cast of Millennial misfits and other digital natives applying the wisdom of the ancients to technology problems of today.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by kramer »

Pluto9th wrote: Sat Sep 25, 2021 5:04 am
kramer wrote: Tue Sep 21, 2021 5:15 pm
Pluto9th wrote: Sun Sep 19, 2021 3:31 pm For simple undemanding reading the Paperwhite is fine, but if extensive annotation/multilingual dictionaries are involved, I much prefer the Kindle app on iPad/iPhone.
Could you elaborate on this? I thought one could only do foreign dictionary lookup when the Kindle app was running on a Kindle and not when it is running on anything else? On my kindle, I just press the foreign language word with my finger and the English/foreign dictionary meaning pops up. I did have to purchase the electronic dictionary from Amazon.

It is one of the reasons I read foreign language books on the Kindle.

I have an ancient Kindle Paperwhite and so I will either be upgrading to the Paperwhite announced today or else I could put the money into an Ipad and skip the Paperwhite. But looking up foreign language words while reading in the Kindle app is an important feature to me.
I haven't placed a Kindle and an iOS device's Kindle app side-by-side before ... Ok, doing it now. If you want to look up a word in a dictionary, the iOS Kindle app's dictionary window (with the word definition) has a "Go to dictionary" tab, click on that and the dictionary opens at that word, and you can freely roam in the dictionary. If the definition contains unfamiliar words whose meanings in turn you'd like to look up, it's very easy to do so in the app, but I don't think it's do-able in a "hardware" Kindle (at least not in my 7th gen Paperwhite). Actually you can temporarily leave an English book to roam in the app's English dictionary as well. This is admittedly a distraction from the book-reading itself, but I happen to like poking around dictionaries. Oh, I see the app's dictionary window has a speaker icon providing pronunciation for the word! My Paperwhite doesn't have that feature, maybe newer Kindles do.
With the hardware Kindle, you can install the foreign language dictionary, and when you are reading a foreign language book in that language, you press a word with your finger, and a small window appears overlaying part of the page you are reading with the word definition and another finger press makes it go away. So it doesn't go into the dictionary app, per se, it just overlays the definition (and if the definition is long there are arrow keys to page through it in that window). It's quite useful. I don't think this is possible in any of the Kindle app versions unless things have changed. It even works for different verb forms, female form of adjective, etc.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Jazztonight »

hand wrote: Mon Oct 04, 2021 1:23 pm
Jazztonight wrote: Fri Sep 17, 2021 11:24 pm
That said, I read the entire Talmud in English over a 7 1/2 year period on my iPhone 7+, and survived. And...my wife reads ebooks on her iPad mini all the day long and never complains.
There's a TV series in this comment somewhere... perhaps "iRabbi" where after 7 years of iPhone reading, the protagonist interacts with a constantly changing cast of Millennial misfits and other digital natives applying the wisdom of the ancients to technology problems of today.
I think you're onto a terrific plot idea, and you should run with it!

Me, I've already written a novel about a rabbi: https://smile.amazon.com/Rabbi-Finds-He ... 226&sr=8-1
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by brennok »

JoeRetire wrote: Sun Oct 03, 2021 2:25 pm
brennok wrote: Sun Sep 19, 2021 10:45 pm
JoeRetire wrote: Sun Sep 19, 2021 6:21 am
brennok wrote: Sat Sep 18, 2021 11:13 pm I have a Kindle I only use as a backup when my iPad runs out of battery or I am traveling. The majority of my reading is done on the iPad and I average around 250 books a year. I find the Kindle way too slow and sluggish.
I'm guessing you are using a Kindle Fire, rather than a Kindle Papwerwhite?
Nope latest Kindle Paperwhite.
Interesting. I don't know anyone who considers a Paperwhite "too slow and sluggish" for simple reading. I know I don't. Seems no more sluggish than turning a paper page to me.
I find all too often the Kindle freezes and has to think before turning pages sometimes resulting in multiple page jumps since I can’t tell if it is thinking or detected the page change. It is a lot slower than my old iPad Air. Search Kindle Paperwhite slow page turns and you will see tons of results. Most recommendations involve completely resetting the Kindle.

I also constantly had the issue where it didn’t show the latest book I checked out with Kindle Unlimited which then took forever to find the book on Amazon to read now. This resulted in me regularly putting it down to use the iPad until I finally just started using the iPad to read.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by JoeRetire »

brennok wrote: Tue Oct 05, 2021 10:05 pm I find all too often the Kindle freezes and has to think before turning pages sometimes resulting in multiple page jumps since I can’t tell if it is thinking or detected the page change.
(shrug)

I've never personally seen that happen in over 11 years of usage, nor have I heard of it happening to my wife's Kindle.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Seasonal »

Do kindles still flash a black screen when turning pages? I'd find this annoying.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by OnceARunner »

Seasonal wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 7:43 am Do kindles still flash a black screen when turning pages? I'd find this annoying.
No
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by dukeblue219 »

dumbmoney wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 5:42 pm I like both. e-ink readers are better for standard "reflowable" books (e.g. epub); full size (>9") tablets are better for PDFs and comics. Mini tablets are useless.
To each his own, I get it. But... I will never understand the appeal of the 11 and 12 inch iPads compared to my mini. I'm not even an Apple user other than the 3 minis I've owned over the years. It's the perfect device for travel, fits well on a tray table, can hold it with one hand for hours to read a book, has a big enough screen to do anything I don't need a laptop for, battery lasts forever, and on and on.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by dbr »

dukeblue219 wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 8:22 am
dumbmoney wrote: Fri Sep 24, 2021 5:42 pm I like both. e-ink readers are better for standard "reflowable" books (e.g. epub); full size (>9") tablets are better for PDFs and comics. Mini tablets are useless.
To each his own, I get it. But... I will never understand the appeal of the 11 and 12 inch iPads compared to my mini. I'm not even an Apple user other than the 3 minis I've owned over the years. It's the perfect device for travel, fits well on a tray table, can hold it with one hand for hours to read a book, has a big enough screen to do anything I don't need a laptop for, battery lasts forever, and on and on.
Yep, I made that same move, but still find the Kindle much better for just reading a book. I do like the Paperwhite but also have an older unlighted Kindle that works fine. The iPAD mini is still a tad too heavy (299g vs 182g). An iPHone 13 MAX weighs about 260g, which is nuts.

Strangely enough my second choice for reading Kindle library is in the Kindle app on my desktop.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by dukeblue219 »

dbr wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 8:31 am Yep, I made that same move, but still find the Kindle much better for just reading a book.
No argument there whatsoever. It's clearly superior to any LCD or OLED for reading, but naturally has tradeoffs elsewhere, some of which are significant.

Pixel 5, iPad mini 4, and a Windows 11 i7 laptop makes a pretty good setup for me. Each has strengths, there is minimal overlap in capabilities, but yet all can serve as backups for the others.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Independent George »

All of the (non-smartphone) mobile devices have tradeoffs, and the optimal mix depends on your use case. In broad terms, I think the continuum goes as follows:

<more portable>
Ebook Reader
Mini Tablet
Standard Tablet
Chromebook
Ultrabook (thin & light laptop, typically under 14")
Chonky Laptop
<more functional>

I go with a Kindle paperwhite + Ultrabook (Framework 13.5" laptop). I read - a lot, and in different environments - and therefore having a unitasker like the paperwhite suits me extremely well. The main question for me was tablet/mini tablet versus laptop. Once the I saw the early reviews & specs of the Framework laptop, I concluded that suited my needs much better than a tablet would.

The more devices you have, the more you can specialize in function, but at that point you lose the portability advantage. The fewer devices you have, the more compromises you need to make for specific use cases.
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Re: Kindle Paperwhite vs. iPad/Similar Tablets?

Post by Seasonal »

OnceARunner wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 7:45 am
Seasonal wrote: Wed Oct 06, 2021 7:43 am Do kindles still flash a black screen when turning pages? I'd find this annoying.
No
When did they change that? It was flashing black on page transitions a few years ago. This says you can turn that off https://blog.the-ebook-reader.com/2018/ ... n-and-off/ but others said only once every three pages https://www.quora.com/How-do-I-turn-off ... n-a-Kindle
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