Barnes & Noble Nook review

When we first caught wind of Barnes & Noble's Nook -- a device clearly positioned to give the Amazon Kindle and Sony's options a run for their money -- we were understandably interested. As voracious readers and lovers of fresh gadgetry, pretty much anyone on the staff at Engadget would tell you that a new contender on the e-reader scene is more than welcome. When we discovered that Barnes & Noble's offering would not only feature a full color touchscreen component, but would run Google's Android OS as well... let's just say we were pretty much in gadget-hog-heaven. We weren't without our reservations, mind you; the appearance of this device made for some pretty heated conversations amongst the staff over whether or not we were seeing the dawn of a truly commercially viable e-reader. Of course, for us the proof is always in the pudding, and since B&N is about to launch a full assault against the current offerings, it's our duty to turn over a report. Is the Nook the answer to our e-reader prayers, or just a stepping stone to greener pastures? We've taken a long, hard look at the device -- so read on for the official Engadget review.

Barnes & Noble Nook review

Hardware

If you're a Kindle user, the industrial design of the Nook will come as no surprise to you. Barnes & Noble is certainly not breaking an enormous amount of ground with the device, though the company has made some significant design decisions that set this unit apart from its competitors.

The Nook is smaller in surface size -- though thicker and slightly heavier -- than the Kindle. Its size is akin to a typical trade paperback, measuring 7.7-inches by 4.9-inches, half an inch thick, and weighing in at 11.2 ounces. It's certainly not big or bulky by any measure, but it feels solid and substantial in your hands. The daintier folks out there may find it slightly heavy when being held for long periods, but hey, that's why you've got a lap. The front of the device is comprised of essentially three parts; a 6-inch, 16-shade grayscale E Ink screen, a 3.5-inch capacitive color touchscreen below it, and a plastic border with back / forward buttons on either side, intersected by a black strip. On that strip is a lone "home" button -- a touch-sensitive version of the Nook's signature lowercase n. On top of the reader is a long, thin on / off button (or sleep / wake, as with the iPhone), and on the bottom is a MicroUSB slot, dual speakers, and 3.5mm a headphone jack. Around back the device's battery, SIM, and microSD access is concealed by a soft, rubberized cover (interchangeable with a number of trendy color variations). In all, the look and feel of the Nook is exactly where it needs to be, striking the perfect middle ground between cozy reading partner and lust-worthy gadget. You want to show it off to your friends as much as you want to curl up with it on a rainy day. We think Barnes & Noble has overcome a lot of the technical harshness of the Kindle by removing many, but not all, of its physical buttons... though that comes with other tradeoffs (more on that later).

Barnes & Noble isn't saying what kind of CPU beats inside of the Nook, though we're going to go ahead and guess it's not anything monstrous. Besides that, the device ships with 2GB of storage onboard, and has that microSD slot for expansion up to 16GB (we assume, it's SDHC). The Nook has WiFi (802.11b/g) and AT&T 3G radios, but RAM and ROM numbers are a mystery to us. We're sure that iFixit will change that shortly.

Display

The main display on the Nook is exactly what you'd expect... and we do mean exactly. There is little-to-no difference between the contrast and clarity on this screen versus its competitors, likely because it's the same screen made by the same company. The E Ink display does a perfect, though predictable job of generating easy to see and easy to read text and images on the screen. In our tests -- and this may just be due to the Kindle we were using -- we felt it very slightly outperformed Amazon's option in contrast, though the Kindle has a considerably faster refresh rate when turning pages. In fact, the Nook's refresh speed was sometimes a little annoying, with us actually having moments in between page turns of waiting for more content -- not a feeling you want to encounter if you're trying to mimic the book-reading experience. Still, as we said, there is nothing dramatically bad about the display, but there aren't many improvements either. Photos and various font sizes looked clean and clear, and we had no trouble finding the right configuration for flipping through both periodicals and longer-form material.

What really sets the Nook apart, however, is that thin color display that sits just below the main reader area. That display -- a color, capacitive, touchscreen -- is the way in which almost all interactions with the Nook and its online store are handled. Besides being the primary method of interacting with lists and reading selections, at various times it becomes your notation navigator, your search box (with keyboard), music player, and a Cover Flow-style book browser, amongst other functions. The general concept behind the screen is ingenious and very much in the vein of the iPhone -- a one-size-fits-all portal that can be whatever you need it to be. This works perfectly with some functions of the reader, and comes up short in others. In particular, one of the ways in which this navigation is hampered is by the color screen's need to interact directly with the E Ink display. Waiting for the refresh when you're moving around on the faster color screen can be annoying, though like many aspects of navigation on the Nook, it's all about learning the pace of the reader. See, it's not exactly that fast of a device anywhere, color screen or otherwise, so you have to get used to all kinds of little pauses and punctuation in the experience. That said, we still found it a little trying to wait for that upper display to refresh, but right now that's the nature of E Ink displays -- the technology is really in its infancy, and learning to live at a slower pace is the name of the game if you're serious about using an e-reader. Software aside (we're getting to that), the color display was reasonably responsive, though we did have some nagging issues with scrolling through lists; we often had trouble getting the screen to recognize downward swipes. It seems possible that the cause was the extremely narrow height of the screen, but it's also possible contact just wasn't being registered correctly. Still, the display looked good even at low contrast (we kept it down -- high contrast against the backlight-free E Ink looked a little intense), and being able to actually see what book covers looked like when we were shopping, tap out searches on the generous keyboard, or just shuffle our music while reading was very welcome.

Software

Ultimately, where the Nook is made or broken is its software. As we've already established, the general hardware experience is not wildly dissimilar from its main competitor. The real proving ground with a platform and store as new as the ones offered here is in the day-to-day use of the device.

At first blush, the Nook's user interface and navigation is a bit overwhelming. If you're coming off of any traditional reader, even one as complex as the Kindle, what Barnes & Noble offers seems far more daunting. Aside from having to learn a completely new way of getting around, adding that dual screen interaction to the mix is rather confusing when you first flip the switch. The foundations of the UI aren't hard to understand, but if you walk into the device without knowing your way around, you'll end up feeling pretty lost at first.

As we mention above, there is the issue of waiting from the E Ink to play catchup to the color screen. That aside, navigation on the color screen requires some basic understanding of how B&N wants you to get around. To activate the bottom screen while the device is on, you have to press on the "n" in the center of that black strip; our short presses didn't seem to take, so we quickly learned to tap and hold. Once you wake up that lower display, you're given options relative to the

Once you get the hang of the system it starts to make some sense, but it's nothing we'd describe as intuitive, and your rhythm is thrown off by one major factor: the extremely sluggish response of the device.

section of the device you're in (it's different for every area), and pressing the n again takes you back to your homescreen. At the homescreen, you have five basic options for navigation: "the daily" (where periodicals, notifications, and notes from the mothership arrive), "my library" (you guessed it, your books), "shop," "reading now," and finally "settings." This is clear enough, but it's the sub-menus that cause some confusion. Within each of those sections you're presented with scrollable list of options like "search," "view my documents," or "show covers" (those are all from the "my library" section by the way, but it's different everywhere). You're able to tab into those sections where you'll find yet another set of navigation, also different depending on what you've chosen. While you're jumping around through those menus, your screen up top is updating and changing in accord with your picks. You're able to scroll and make selections in the upper screen in most menus using an up and down arrow on that lower screen along with an "enter" (or engage) button represented by a small circle. Wait, we forgot to mention that you can also use the tactile back and forward buttons to flip some pages on the upper screen in select pages too. Got it yet?

You should be confused -- we know we were. The thing is, once you get the hang of the system it starts to make some sense, but it's nothing we'd describe as intuitive, and your rhythm is thrown off by one major factor: the extremely sluggish response of the device. That's right, you're not zipping and zooming through any of these menus, you're patiently waiting for the device to do its thing. That laggy scrolling we saw in the demo the day this was launched? Not really much better in the release version. Now that's not necessarily a deal breaker here -- after all, the Kindle and Sony readers aren't exactly speed demons, and you're not buying this thing to work on spreadsheets or play Doom. Still, the navigation combos are confusing at first (even after hours of use, we still found ourselves gazing blankly at the Nook, trying to remember what exactly we were supposed to press to get where we wanted to be), and the performance feels stuck in the mud.

While the UI is different (not necessarily a bad thing in our eyes), there are also places where it is plain bad (necessarily a bad thing in our eyes). There's instability to spare in the review unit we used. More than once we saw the familiar Android force close / wait message when trying to load a piece of the software up, and we encountered a lot of unexpected pauses and lag when trying to get through menus, causing a number of incorrect selections and general annoyance. There are also UI decisions that don't make a lot of sense to us, like requiring you to open a secondary menu to pop up the music player, or the fact that when you want to read one of your items, you have to essentially select it twice to open it. It wasn't a total mess, but there were certainly more errors than we've ever seen on our Kindle, and that's not great for Barnes & Noble coming out of the box. There were other problems too, like the fact that the reader doesn't always organize books correctly by taking "the" or "a" out of a title -- it's hit or miss -- making for a bit of a mess when you're dealing with a large list.

Still, there are things the company is doing with the Nook that are worthy of praise. Once you learn the pacing and menus of the reader, the experience gets a lot more enjoyable. We also think B&N's store options and book browsing are far better than what Amazon offers. When it comes to looking for a title, being able to actually see the covers of books is a tremendous help (especially if you know what you're looking for). Additionally, having both the lower and upper screen for content and navigation is a big boon. The Nook also functions as a decent PDF viewer and surprisingly solid music player, though we were bothered by the fact that every time it switches a song, the lower screen lights back up -- that's not good for battery life or for reading.

The question one has to weigh is whether or not the software is more of an aid or impediment to what the device was designed to do (book reading, remember?), and in our judgment, it's the latter. It's just downright unpleasant to use sometimes. Many of the problems seem like they could be fixed with firmware tweaks, and Barnes & Noble reps we spoke with seemed to indicate that they would be coming OTA in the near future. Let's hope that's the case, because using the Nook right now is a very uneven experience.

Services

Besides the hardware itself, Barnes & Noble is launching a handful of new services with the Nook. Most obvious is that the device will offer free AT&T-based 3G service for shopping and downloading content, along with built-in WiFi. That WiFi is notable as well, since the company will be enabling free access for the reader at its retail locations come Q1 2010, and along with that access will come some pretty handy features, like the ability to browse an entire book while on the store's network (for a total of an hour's browsing per book per 24 hour period), and B&N says it will offer special content to those using the reader in-store.

Additionally, the Nook sports a book lending feature called LendMe, which allows you to hand a piece of content over to friend with the reader or Barnes & Noble's e-reader software for up to 14 days. Just like someone borrowing a real book, it's removed from your library for the duration of the loan. Of course, not every publisher is on board with the service, and only about half of the retail selections will allow for lending come launch. Besides just allowing you to trade between friends with the Nook, you'll also be able to swap your stuff down to someone with an app on their iPhone or iPod touch, PC, Mac, BlackBerry, and eventually Android devices.

B&N is also touting the inclusion of Google Books titles as one of the major features of the Nook, allowing you to freely download half a million selections from the big Gs library of public domain reprints. It's a nice feature, but it can also make finding something you're looking for in the store a bit of a hassle, as you end up with myriad versions of a particular book. Still, the added ease of access to the collection is definitely nice, and we're not about to knock it.

Ultimately, the best addition here isn't Google Books or the free WiFi; it's the Barnes & Noble book buying experience. If there's one thing the company knows how to do, it's sell books, and that's clear when using the Nook to browse or purchase titles. The on-device experience shines, and knocks the nearest competition around handily. All this other stuff? Just icing on the cake.

Wrap-up

Going into this review, we'd spent a lot of time thinking about what this device meant for ebook readers. We had debates; pointed arguments about whether the Nook is the kind of front-and-center, mass market device that could bring the electronic book concept to a much larger audience. That might be the case, but after spending some time with it, our concern is what that experience will ultimately be like for those users. Throughout our testing with the Nook we vacillated between being completely charmed by the aesthetics of the reader, and completely frustrated by the way it actually works. In many ways the Nook has a leg up on the competition -- not just by its presence in Barnes & Noble stores (though that helps), but by providing an attractive package and feature set, offering personalization (via add ons and accessories), a huge selection of books, perks like the LendMe feature, that color screen, and the excellent buying experience. On the other hand, when it came to day to day use, we felt let down in a big way, and can only imagine how magnified that feeling would be if we'd gone and shelled out nearly $300 for the device.

In the end, the Nook is an intriguing product launched by a powerful force in the world of booksellers, but the initial offering feels long on promises and short on delivery. With the right software revisions, the Nook could be a tsunami, but as it stands right now, it's only a mild swell.

[ZeroCorpse Posted Jul 26th 2010 1:21PM]

@aririn

Glad you asked!

If you use Calibre to convert CBR files to ePub files for use on the nook, they look pretty good (although rendered in greyscale, of course).

The down-side is that the screen is a bit smaller than a standard comic book page, and as such lettering (in word balloons) is sometimes quite small. Your eyes might not appreciate straining to read such tiny letters on a page! It all depends on the letterer, but in my experience, converting The Walking Dead to view on my Nook wasn't entirely satisfying. While the artwork looked beautiful (The Walking Dead is a B&W comic, so no loss of color!) the text was sometimes too light or small to read.

I imagine that converting smaller-paged manga to the Nook would be just about perfect. I'm not a manga fan, but since the typical manga page is about the same size as the Nook's e-ink panel, you'd probably be pretty happy with it.

The only question is the comic's original format. If it's PDF, you're in good shape: The Nook handles PDF like a pro (unless it's a HUGE technical manual you're trying to view). If it's CBR, then you'll need to use Calibre (free/donationware program) to convert to ePub.

I think manga fans would be very pleased with Nook. Western comic fans might be a little disappointed, simply because they're cramming a bigger image onto a smaller screen.

[lcastro Posted Dec 8th 2009 9:43PM]

Quem consegue focar na leitura com tantas funcionalidades em mãos?

[gadlaw Posted Dec 9th 2009 11:03AM]

Like many others I have been waiting for a 'good' ebook reader to come out. When the Nook was announced I took one look at it and said this is the best one so far. I ordered it and you know, I'll find out shortly how good it is. I want it to be good, I want it to rock and one of the things most important to me was the ability to use formats other than the DRM filled ones that you would get with Kindle. Well, it uses ePub and so I'm happy to give it a try. Like my iPod's it allows me to use formats and files I already have. That's the way to do it Kindle - I'd have had one of those by now if it wasn't so tied down. Good review.

[docpark Posted Dec 10th 2009 1:03PM]

Despite its ugliness, the Kindle just works and works well. I read New Yorker and PC magazine as well as keep about thirty books on it. When I don't have kindle, I go to my iphone app.

Barnes and Noble, unfortunately, just does not understand this medium and the idea of having a device that competes with its primary business, the brick and mortars stores is ridiculous.

It gives me visions of technologically ignorant committee getting all excited about a drawing of an eBook reader without thinking out the implications. It's like hearing a tone deaf person trying to sing an aria.

I like reading Kindle in natural light -it doesn't fatigue my eyes. When I read in bed with lights out on iphone, my eyes are severely irritated by the time I go to sleep.

[Jomolungma Posted Dec 10th 2009 3:46PM]

I finally got a chance to use one of these things today at my local B&N and I wasn't impressed. I don't own a Kindle, but I've used both the first and second editions. I like both better than the Nook, and really don't see how you could rightfully consider a Nook over a 2d gen Kindle right now.

First off, the Nook feels cheap to me. You can definitely feel the difference in thickness, and even though it's narrower than the current Kindle, it was harder to hold in one hand. Pressing the back and forward page buttons felt flimsy to me, like I was going to crack the casing if I pushed too hard. I couldn't flex the device (I didn't really try), but it sure felt like I could.

Second, since I had the opportunity to read a lot of reviews on it before handling one, the bottom-pane navigation wasn't that unfamiliar, yet I still found it awkward to use. It seemed like there were far too many steps to complete even the simplest of tasks, responsiveness was really slow, and overall I found it's existence pointless. It was also awkward to be navigating the top pane while having to focus on where I was touching on the bottom pane. A lack of tactile feedback caused me to constantly look back and forth, which is really annoying. I would have rather had more reading real estate so maybe a page on the Nook could equal a page in an actual book. I hope the next iteration of these reading devices adopts some sort of dual-use bottom screen that can show reading text when no navigation is needed, but then has a pop-in navigation package when you want to get around, a la the Kindle app (and others) on the iPhone.

Third, I hope it's just a software issue, but the e-ink screen takes forever to turn pages and has a clunky artifacting effect as it transitions that I found disturbing. Also, the fact that the device needs to Format Text almost every time I open a book is disappointing too. It also might just have been the particular device or the lighting, but I found it harder to read than the Kindle.

Finally, there are the "future" features that just don't seem that appealing or useful. First, I couldn't navigate the B&N Nook store through the device due to an error, but the device did appear to be connected to in-store wi-fi. That's nice, but who cares? The thing doesn't have any functionality other than reading books and buying books (MP3 player aside). Am I going to go to a B&N brick & mortar just to use their free wi-fi to do this? Am I going to "miss it" when I'm away from wi-fi? We're not talking about a very data-intensive process here. The built-in 3G should be more than enough bandwidth to complete a task that I might do once a day, if that. I mean, let's think this process through for a second - I want a book. I'm on the road, away from free wi-fi (at least wi-fi that doesn't require I go to a web page first), and I want to read a book. So what do I do? Well, I could get off my lazy ass, find an actual bookstore, browse the shelves, buy the book, go read. This might take 15-60 minutes, depending. Or, I could go online with my free 3G, surf online, download a book and begin reading in a process that might take 15 minutes tops. How much time could that possibly take on 3G vs. wi-fi? Am I saving that much time on wi-fi, while also killing my battery? Wi-fi seems pointless to me on this thing.

As for the book-lending feature, it's nice in theory, but horrible in practice. First, not every book can take advantage of the feature. Second, when I loan it out, I can't read it. I realize that's how it works in "real" life, but then why do I have this reader in the first place? That's right, to do things "better" than I can in real life. Third, you can only loan it once, and for 14 days. Ok, that's fine if I want to loan it to my wife. She reads like lightning and she'd be the only one to read it. But what about office book clubs, where they pool their money, buy a few books, and pass them around to read? Or something similar. Not happening on the Nook. It makes the feature a completely pointless exercise right now.

Things like replaceable battery and expandable storage are nice, but if I'm using this thing as a reader - how much space do I need? And if I need a new battery any time soon, something would be really fishy to me.

The only three features I find mildly attractive are the EPUB compatibility, Android, and that it can work with some libraries out there, like the Sony reader is supposed to. However, I expect Amazon to move to close these gaps in some fashion, particularly the library issue. And the Android thing is an unknown - I think there could be some interesting apps, but the battery life is already subpar and how many apps can really be crafted for a digital reader. I have an iPhone - that's enough apps for me, thanks.

So, while the Nook might get better with a software update, I find it's hardware to be subpar. By the time they iterate on the hardware, other competitors should be continuing to innovate and close the features gap. There's a price I'd pay for convenience - but it isn't $259 every 12 months to save a few bucks on books each year. I want to spend that money and trust my device will remain competitive and useful for the long-term. I don't see Nook 1.0 being that device, nor do I see Kindle 2.0 being that device either, so I'll continue to remain on the sidelines and read my print books and magazines until something far more compelling comes out.

[twiningstea Posted Dec 10th 2009 5:24PM]

@Jomolungma This completely baffles me. I don't mean to contradict your findings, as I'm sure you aren't making things up, but the nook I used wasn't sluggish or slow at all. The page turns were as fast as I've seen any e-ink display perform and the touch screen was perfect for an e-book reader. If it were on a phone I would be aggravated as the sensitivity wasn't on par with an iphone or the likes, but for what it is I really liked it. I didn't even notice the interface and found myself navigating through the menus naturally. Apparently there are shortcuts as well, for example to skip the pre-screen when selecting a book you simply touch the name and hold for a second. I haven't used a kindle for an extended period of time, and have comparably large hand, but i thought the feel was great. I could definitely see myself reading for hours with it. It seems impossible that the one I tried would have a different software version already, but somethings gotta be up because the what I've read and watched isn't in agreement with what I used.

Just my experience, thought someone might find it helpful.

[ZeroCorpse Posted Jul 26th 2010 1:12PM]

@Jomolungma

This comment was based on either out-and-out lies, or someone's less-than-five-minutes with a store display that was already a little beat up, because my experience with the Nook is entirely different.

I've reviewed it (earlier in the comments), but as an addendum to that review, let me note that for me it was pretty natural to navigate the menus and OS on the Nook right out of the box. Maybe it's because I'm a gadget freak and it's intuitive for me, but I had no challenges with the Nook's menu system. It's pretty straightforward.

Messing around with it in the store for a few minutes just can't give you a real sense of how it is to use the Nook at home or on the go. I've had both Kindle and Nook, and for me, the Nook is a better experience.

I also speak as someone who has managed a Borders store, as well as several smaller mom & pop bookstores. I like my "old-fashioned" paper books, but for a person like me, the Nook makes it much more convenient to read on the go.

[Randman80 Posted Dec 10th 2009 4:08PM]

Well I finally received my Nook, but it failed to handle my large PDFs, making it un-usable for me. When I called to return it, it took over 1.5hs on the phone before I got and RMA. Then they charged a 10% restocking fee. They even said the the PDF issue would most likely NOT be address in the near future. I'm thinking they should stick to books...Did I mention it was sloooow. It was pretty enough, but the review on this page pretty much sums it up. Best wait until Version 2 is released...

[ECVOICE Posted Dec 10th 2009 10:55PM]

@Randman80 Just eBay it. Instead of having to pay a restocking fee, you'll make a profit!

[twiningstea Posted Dec 10th 2009 4:44PM]

I just visited my local Barned & Noble to try out the nook and I gotta say, it was completely different than I excpected. Having seen this video, I was expecting sluggish navigation and slow page turns, but found neither. The formatting took only 2-3 seconds and page turns were as fast or faster than the kindle 2 I tried a time ago. I was thinking perhaps this is a different software version or something, because I've seen all the videos online and have no explanation for the difference.

I really like the curve of the back as well, and the touch screen and page turn buttons worked great. There was a slight lag between screens at times, but nothing more than a page turn. Moving up and down on the e-ink screen from the touch screen was instant. I wasn't able to try all of the stuff I really wanted to as it was the store model, but it all seems very promising to me.

I know this likely reads as an extremely biased account, but if it wasn't such a sharp contrast with the videos I wouldn't have bothered to comment. I just think that people should go give it a try before passing it off as inferior.

[Prasand J Posted Dec 12th 2009 10:37AM]

@twiningstea

after reading other experiences with people who also read the poor reviews, I think the reviewers were being a bit critical. Perhaps, because their expectations were too high. Which in turn, causes the readers to lower their expectations, and be pleasantly surprised when they see it's actually better than critiqued.

It works out in the end, for those that will try it themselves. So in a sense I see the benefit of the poor reviews, but at the same time, it can't be a good thing for B&N itself. *shrugs*

http://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/t5/eBooks-Help-Board/Did-I-make-the-wrong-decision/m-p/426064#U426064

[willwillywilson Posted Dec 10th 2009 6:12PM]

I still want one.

[(Unverified) Posted Dec 11th 2009 2:32PM]

doesn't anyone else think;

whatever apple tablet comes out will destroy everything?

[Dshark Posted Dec 12th 2009 3:34AM]

@(Unverified)

Assuming they do it right. While yes, Steve is at the helm, Apple has failed before.

[ZeroCorpse Posted Jul 26th 2010 1:14PM]

@(Unverified)
You can't read an LCD screen outside in the daytime. So any non e-ink tablet is a failure as an eReader.

[qzhwang Posted Dec 12th 2009 3:59AM]

It is too darn slow for me to use it.

[Prasand J Posted Dec 12th 2009 10:33AM]

http://bookclubs.barnesandnoble.com/t5/eBooks-Help-Board/Did-I-make-the-wrong-decision/m-p/426064#U426064

[thumbtack Posted Dec 12th 2009 8:00PM]

I used one of these today. I can't say I got much out of using it, mainly because the apps had a tendency to crash.

[tolmsted Posted Dec 30th 2009 1:42PM]

I finally was able to experience a Nook first hand in a B&N store - and I have to say that this review is dead on. After 15 minutes of trying to figure out the UI and faced with incredibly slow load times, I was ready to throw the thing against a wall (luckily, it was tethered to the store counter top, which makes me wonder if they anticipated that kind of reaction). I commented to the sales person about my frustrations, and he flat out said it was slower than the Kindle (which having a Kindle 1 I already knew), but that B&N was constantly updating their software to catch up.
My biggest hope was that book shopping/browsing while on the Nook would be better than it is with Amazon, which sadly was not the case. I was surprised by how much slower it was than my first gen Kindle - and while the color interface was nifty - it really wasn't that easy to use nor did it make up for the other deficiencies.
Overall, too many flaws for me.

[cal82 Posted Aug 9th 2010 12:55AM]

By the way, I've just gotten around to doing some in-depth testing of the Nook and the B&N reader on my iPhone. I was shocked...shocked to discover the books don't sync (Amazon calls it "Whispersync") between devices. I wanted to like this device, but it is now headed to the gadget graveyard.

I just ordered one of the new Kindle WiFi's, because Whispersync is essential. What I like about eBooks is that I can read them on the dedicated reader (Nook, Kindle, whatever), then read a bit on your iPhone when you're standing in line or something, then read a bit on your Mac/PC when you're tired of answering emails.

Without sync-ability, an ereader is a glorified etch-a-sketch.