I've had my Touch for almost a year now, and it's pretty awesome. I review alot of my books I have brought from Amazon, I figured several people may be in a similar position as I was in last June, so here we go...
I'm definitely an avid reader. Actually, as I type this, I have roughly 60 books sitting on a shelve behind me. Only recently did I become intrigued with E-readers due to a lack of space in my condo for me to store my books along with my video game collection, but I never did feel like they were worth paying $199 or more to get; however, when I saw the Kindle Touch I thought they had released the right E-Reader for me at the right price
I watched video reviews, "hands-on" videos, read numerous reviews, etc. I was pretty sure that I wanted a Kindle Touch,as I thought about it, I was convinced that the Kindle Touch really provided me with access to thousands of low priced books without sales taxes, along with not having to find a place to store any new books that I might buy in the future.
SOO...I decided that the Kindle Touch really justified the money since all I was looking for was standard E-reader and nothing more and it came with these features.
Touch:
- Kindle Touch is full-on touchscreen, and based on video reviews, it looked easy to use
- Kindle Touch will not drive me nuts with fingerprints/smudges
- Kindle Touch is like my smartphone with touchscreen technology
- Kindle Touch doesn't have physical buttons for page turns, which was no problem
- The 3G sold for $99 verus the 3G which sold for $149, so I would save money
- Highlighting and note-taking seems like it would be easy on a touch screen
- Looking up words will probably be easier
- Kindle Touch holds 3,000 books
- Kindle Touch has audio text-to-speech
- Battery lasts two months
After considering all of this, I went to Best Buy absolutely intending on buying a Kindle Touch. I got there and they had demo models of the touch and the nook touch. I played with both for half an hour. I read books, made notes, made highlights, looked up words, went to the menu, back to a book, back to the menu. I went forward through a few pages. I went back through the same pages. I did everything I thought I would normally do while reading. My decision was that the Kindle Touch was the better buy due to the following.
USE - As far as the reading experience, I really like the touch because it reminded me of my cell phone. At first I was worried that I would constantly be turning the page from accidentally touching the screen, but this didn't become much of an issue. The screen is broken up into mapped sections, so if you touch the far left side that covers about 1" of the left of the screen, it goes to the previous page. If you touch anywhere on the other 80% of the screen beside that, it goes forward. Touch the top 1" margin, and it will bring up the menu. There is also a physical button on the bottom of the touch that serves as the Home button and will take you straight to the Home menu. The area where I found the touch most useful is the dictionary. Previously, if I wanted to look up the definition of a word, I had to use the clunky joystick to navigate through the text. If a word was at the very bottom at the end of the sentence, sometimes I'd usually just ignore it rather than go through the trouble of pressing that joystick 15 times. With the Touch, I can simply touch the word and hold it down for about 1.5 seconds (so it knows I'm not trying to turn the page) to access the dictionary, which is incredibly useful and time-saving. Underlining phrases and highlighting works almost the same way. You hold down the first word in the sentence, then after two-three seconds it will recognize what you are doing, and then you drag your finger across the rest. I dont use this a lot but I know it can be useful for school textbooks.
Real Page Numbers - The Kindle Touch displays the actual page number, regardless of what zoom setting you have it on. This is a big improvement for me, because it allows me to see how far I have read in my book.
Display - The Kindle loads up the next page, This makes the Touch feel a lot more like a real book. It delivers very crisp black and white images, and renders photos and images very well. I prefer the Kindle Touch due to E-Ink, which I think looks much better than backlit text, especially since I like to read for 4-5 hours at a time. Reading in the sunlight with E-Ink compared to a backlit screen is no contest. It is the difference between night and day (pun intended). If your main purpose of buying a Kindle is to read I highly recommend the Kindle Touch.
Storage - Same 4gb storage as on the K3, which will hold roughly 3,000 books. The average 500 page book is around 500kb. Considering this device also comes with access to Amazon's cloud storage for saving backups, I think it's very unlikely anyone would ever need to store more than 3,000 books. If your device is getting full, just back up your old books to the cloud, and they're there if you ever want them again. 3,000 books on your Kindle makes things rather difficult to manage unless you have everything sorted into separate folders.
Text-to-Speech - The Text-to-Speech option on the kindle is rather ok in my opinion. It is fairly ok to listen to the automated (mostly) monotone voice reading your novels this might be problematic for most people but I find it useful for days/nights when my eyes are tired though.
Overall, I preferred the Touch over the Nook. I asked the best buy rep which one did he think was better and he said that the Touch is the better E-Reader and the book selection on the Touch is actually better than the Nook`s. With that in mind I brought my Touch and have not looked back.
So far, I love my Touch more so now that I have a case with a light on it that enables me to read in the dark. It will definitely be more convenient than carrying my normal 3-4 books around in my backpack.
If havent brought a touch yet do so before Amazon runs out of them otherwise you will have to buy the new version with the light built in but with reduced book holding capaicty.
After 3 years, I still love it!
I've waited a long time to write this review, I really wanted to put it to the test for the long haul. So now that I'm looking to upgrade my kindle, I thought I'd write a review on the one that got me hooked. I was reluctant to even make the switch from paper books to E books, but I'm so glad I did! My husband got me my kindle 3 years ago, and it has been in use daily ever since! (I'll add a pic at the end to show how it held up) It was very simple to figure out, and it made reading a real joy. I honestly found great reads thanks to the ad wallpapers. I thought that might get annoying, but it doesn't bother me in the least. They're just wallpapers. As long as I'm not disturbed while reading (which it never did), I don't care one way or the other. My first thought upon getting it were 1. Protection, and 2. A light. I read in bed often while my husband sleeps, so a light was nessesary. Conveniently, there are cases and covers galore to choose from, and I chose an M-Edge zippered case that lasted me the whole time I've owned my kindle. I also found a pretty skin for it. As far as a light, I went with an M-Edge flexible light that fit right in a slot in the back of the case. They wear out after a year or so, so they end up needing replaced, but they do the job. The kindle itself has never had any problems. I just have to update it every now and again. I currently have over 400 books on mine, and you can make your own categories to sort them into, or there's a handy search button if you have a ton to look through. I've accidentally dropped things on the face of my kindle through the years, my fault completely. Something heavy will cause a small spot to appear on the screen, much like the old magnetic drawing boards they make for kids, that won't go away. The two or three spots on mine don't really affect its readability at all. I have to give them credit, I tend to be really clumsy, and mine still works great, just those little spots, and that's my doing. Overall, it's a great product, and it will revolutionize how you read. Having this many books at my fingertips is like heaven, without the added bulk of hundreds of books on shelves throughout the house! I still have my favorite hard copies, but this makes it so much easier! My only complaint is that cats' little toe beans work on the screen too. If you're like me, you usually have a cat laying with you while you read, and in a bid for attention, my cat will inadvertently turn my pages getting me completely lost! Hope you buy this kindle, and love it as much as I've loved mine!
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- Reviewed in the United States on April 6, 2013
