$149 WiFi-only Nook confirmed, 3G price dropped to $199 (update: official)
By Vlad Savov 
posted June 21st 2010 7:44AM
posted June 21st 2010 7:44AM
[Thanks, Paul]
Update: Barnes and Noble has now gone fully official with its new $149 Nook. The 3G version has taken a price drop to $199 as well, matching the pricing indicated by Best Buy. B&N is today also outing its firmware version 1.4, which allows the free use of AT&T wireless hotspots everywhere.
06/21/2010
Barnes & Noble Introduces NOOK™ Wi-Fi® and Lowers NOOK 3G Price,
Giving Book Lovers Greater Choice and Even Greater Value
At Only $149, Wi-Fi-Only Addition to NOOK Family is the Most Full-Featured, Low-Cost eBook Reader on the Market, Now Available Online at www.nook.com
Bestseller NOOK 3G is First Dedicated eBook Reader with
Free 3G Wireless and Wi-Fi Connectivity Available at $199
Latest Software Update to Both NOOK Models Offers NOOK Customers
Complimentary Access at All AT&T Wi-Fi Hot Spots and Improved Reading Features
New York, New York – June 21, 2010 – Barnes & Noble, Inc. (NYSE: BKS), the world's largest bookseller, is giving book lovers more choice and greater value in dedicated eBook Reading devices with the addition of NOOK Wi-Fi to the NOOK by Barnes & Noble family for just $149, and a new lower price for its award-winning NOOK 3G at $199. The new NOOK Wi-Fi offers all the great features of NOOK 3G – a color touchscreen for navigation and best-in-class E-Ink® display for a great reading experience – plus Wi-Fi connectivity. NOOK Wi-Fi is now available to order online at www.nook.com and www.bestbuy.com.
Barnes & Noble's new price for NOOK 3G marks the market's first under-$200 dedicated full-featured eBook reader that offers both free 3G wireless and Wi-Fi connectivity. And Barnes & Noble continues to enhance the eReading experience for all NOOK 3G and NOOK Wi-Fi owners through its latest 1.4 software update, now offering even more places to connect to Wi-Fi for free and faster access to the content they want to read.
NOOK Wi-Fi eBook Reader marries innovative technology and sleek minimalist design with Wi-Fi connectivity. This latest addition to the NOOK family gives customers the opportunity to take advantage of the proliferation of both in-home and public Wi-Fi hotspots, where they can browse the Web and shop the Barnes & Noble eBookstore of more than one million eBooks, periodicals and other digital content. With its latest software update for all NOOK devices (now available at www.nook.com/update), Barnes & Noble is offering all NOOK customers complimentary access to AT&T's entire nationwide Wi-Fi network, including Barnes & Noble bookstores which have previously been available to NOOK customers.
As part of the NOOK eBook Reader family, NOOK Wi-Fi features Barnes & Noble's breakthrough LendMe™ technology, enabling customers to share eBooks with friends for up to 14 days. NOOK Wi-Fi also offers the same great in-store features like Read In Store™ to browse complete eBooks in Barnes & Noble stores at no cost, and More In Store™, offering free, exclusive content and special promotions.
"People who love to read will find tremendous value with the new NOOK Wi-Fi, the most full-featured, low-cost eReading device on the market, and our bestselling NOOK 3G now at an even lower price," said Tony Astarita, Vice President, Digital Products, Barnes & Noble.com. "This expanded choice offers best-in-class, best-priced dedicated eBook Readers featuring eBook sharing, access to our vast eBookstore, great free and exclusive content and much more. And with expansion of fast and free Wi-Fi access beyond Barnes & Noble stores to thousands of AT&T Wi-Fi Hot Spots, we're bringing additional freedom and flexibility to all NOOK 3G and NOOK Wi-Fi customers."
Just like NOOK 3G, NOOK Wi-Fi features:
* Enriched eReading: Enjoy an immersive reading experience with color book covers to browse in your library or while shopping, fast page turns, multiple font choices and sizes and more.
* Dual displays: A fun, easy-to-use reading experience on the familiar paper-like 6" E Ink display which offers great contrast with no backlight or glare even in bright sunlight, and 3.5" LCD lower color touchscreen for navigation.
* Vast catalog of content: Shop the Barnes & Noble eBookstore for everything from classics to current bestsellers and download your content wirelessly in seconds. There are more than one million eBooks, magazines and newspapers available and free eBook samples.
* Lend to friends: Share a wide range of eBooks with friends for 14 days using exclusive LendMe™ technology.
* In-store experience: Access fast and free Wi-Fi connectivity in Barnes & Noble stores and enjoy the beta Read In Store feature to browse many complete eBooks for free, and the More In Store program, which offers free, exclusive content and special promotions.
* Games, music and Web: Play Chess or Sudoku, listen to your favorite songs or browse the Web to check news and email.
* Light and portable library: About the size and weight of a paperback, the 2GB device carries approximately 1,500 eBooks and offers virtually endless shelf space with expandable memory.
* Your B&N personal library: With Barnes & Noble's Lifetime Library™, Barnes & Noble digital purchases will be accessible on BN.com and can be enjoyed on the widest variety of devices. Your eBook library goes wherever you go, giving instant access to your existing Barnes & Noble digital library on your NOOK device, partners' third-party eBook readers and hundreds of computing and mobile devices enabled with free BN eReader software including iPad™, iPhone®, iPod touch®, BlackBerry®, HTC HD2™, PC and Mac®.
* Read for days: Long battery life means you won't need to worry about recharging. With Wi-Fi turned off, enjoy reading for up to 10 days on a single battery charge.
* Personalize with style: Customize NOOK Wi-Fi with one of the many stylish designer accessories available for all NOOK devices. Customers can choose from a range of classic and colorful accessories designed exclusively for NOOK devices by renowned designers kate spade new york, Jack Spade, Jonathan Adler, Tahari and others.
NOOK Wi-Fi follows NOOK 3G's stylish design and dimensions and is lightweight (just 11.6 ounces), making it easy to carry in a handbag, briefcase, backpack or suit jacket pocket, just like NOOK 3G. NOOK Wi-Fi also comes with a removable white back cover – NOOK's is grey – and you can personalize your device from a selection of four additional great back cover colors.
All NOOK 3G and NOOK Wi-Fi customers can also use the included USB cable to connect their device to a PC or Mac to transfer their personal files in ePub, PDF and PDB formats to their NOOK. Based on Barnes & Noble's open platform and Adobe technology partnership, customers can transfer and read personal files that utilize Adobe's latest digital rights management or are rights-free. Barnes & Noble's use of Adobe technology and ePub format also allows customers to read their digital content across a growing universe of devices.
NOOK Wi-Fi Available for Order Today
Just in time for summer reading, NOOK Wi-Fi is now available for purchase online at www.nook.com for $149 and will begin shipping this week. A bookseller at a Barnes & Noble store can also help customers place an order. NOOK Wi-Fi can also be ordered at www.bestbuy.com. Barnes & Noble expects NOOK Wi-Fi will be in-stock in select Barnes & Noble and Best Buy stores for immediate purchase later this month and rolling out to all stores later this summer.
NOOK 3G continues to offer both free 3G wireless and Wi-Fi connectivity to give customers more ways to shop on-the-go. NOOK 3G is in stock at Barnes & Noble stores and at www.nook.com with its new price of $199. NOOK 3G is also available at Best Buy and www.bestbuy.com.
Visit the NOOK counter at any Barnes & Noble store to see, hold and touch NOOK and learn more about eBooks and eReading from a knowledgeable Barnes & Noble bookseller who can help determine which NOOK eBook Reader best fits a customer's needs. Barnes & Noble offers the best opportunity to try before you buy in both Barnes & Noble and Best Buy stores.
NOOK v1.4 Update: Complimentary AT&T Wi-Fi Access and More
Barnes & Noble also announced that its latest NOOK v1.4 software gives all NOOK 3G and NOOK Wi-Fi customers complimentary high-speed access to AT&T's entire nationwide Wi-Fi network, including restaurants, hotels and additional locations across the country which can be found at www.att.com/go. So now, in addition to Barnes & Noble stores, all NOOK customers can enjoy free-high-speed access to browse the Barnes & Noble eBookstore and the Web on their NOOKs in thousands more places.
The latest NOOK software also offers a Go To Page feature, one of the most frequent enhancements requested by NOOK users, which allows customers to jump to a specific page number in an open eBook, an extra extra large font and performance enhancements to open eBooks even faster.
NOOK v1.4 software is now available via manual download at www.nook.com/update with additional information and easy-to-follow directions. NOOKs connected to Wi-Fi will receive an automatic NOOK v1.4 update upon syncing over the next week.
I have been of the thought that given the right size/weight/battery a $99 an e-book reader can survive as a dedicated device. I think 149 is a good step in that direction and since it's available today it's better than waiting the 4-12 months for the $99 versions if your into reading but have been holding off.
Agree/disagree?
@juanvaldez Agree completely ...
@juanvaldez
if the promotion for the $50 gift card lasts until the $149 comes out, for all intents and purposes, it is $99
@sinai I'd agree with that, however I couldn't find it after reading. Though, assuming you're correct, I agree. I'm not in the US so it's hard for me to keep up with the marketing, but a nice marketing push would never hurt...
@sinai Though there might be a slight problem with people not having that same deal available for a birthday/special day/impulse buy in 2-4 months time. Permanent price would be the way that the product market has a large chance to attain steady growth.
@juanvaldez
well reports are saying the nook is outselling the kindle. i think steady growth has already been achieved. ideally you want to hit the sweet spot where the number of units provides good marginal profit. purely selling more units doesn't really do too much for the business model.
though, since bn does sell their own books, an argument could be made that it can.
@sinai Most accounts says that the Kindle is more profitable per unit sold, neither company states that it's their objective to make a profit on their device. They want to mass produce these to get their economies of scale and get devices into more hands, then sell the books which is where the profit is. It's like razors and razor blades, but without having a "loss-leader" just something that is discounted more heavily than 3rd parties can really compete with.
@juanvaldez
Since this device has an extra lcd and a processor fast enough for android, it's not inconceivable that without these two things and with just the reader part intact, that a $100 e-reader could be made today.
@bigcow05
Man thank god this is now official, because before I was like "Man i dont think im gonna get this, since its not official"
@sinai As someone who just bought a nook. I'm assuming the 50 dollar gift card is going to disappear when the lower price point comes out. Anyone (like myself) complaining they just bought one with in the past month will be told you got a gift card shut up.
@cwalters74
Hey guys I just stumbled upon this too. They released update 1.4 which gives free AT&T Wifi hotspot access and claim a 20% battery increase!
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/nook/support/
Take out wi-fi to get down to $99.
usb to computer to get your content.
@juanvaldez I don't understand the 50 dollar price drop for removing 3g. The 3g is only there to sell you books from B&N; it's not good for *anything* else. So what they're telling people who buy the 3g option (or already have) is thanks for paying 50 bucks to subsidize our sales channel?
@tad604: The 3G provides "anywhere" access to new books and the user's library and costs B&N more as they're paying the mobile company for the bandwidth. That's the reason for the extra cost.
@juanvaldez
This is good news. I don't have an e ink reader but I will buy one to supplement my iPad when they get cheap enough. I predict e-ink displays will eventually be commodity items that you pick up for 50 to 100 dollars to bring with you to the beach, the pool or the gym when you don;t want to carry your more expensive tablet and you need a reflective display in bright sunlight. They will be like the cheap mp3 players you get to bring to the gym, an alternative to more expensive readers good for very specific use cases.
@tad604
The 3G is useful for the web browser, too. If you're stuck somewhere without WiFi, having the option to use 3G is handy if you need to check something online. And with the Nook's color touch screen and Android OS, the web browser works a heck of a lot better than the one on the Kindle. You can actually view the page on the color screen and touch links or scroll around.
I've had both devices. The Kindle's browser stinks compared to the Nook's. No, you're not going to watch YouTube videos on it, but for basic stuff it's a good browser.
And if you hack the Nook, I'm told you can put Pandora on it, which means the 3G is letting you get your tunes, too (although I imagine B&N and AT&T won't let people hog much bandwidth by doing that for long).
@ZeroCorpse
Wait. I'm wrong. You currently CAN'T use the 3G for web browsing.
So I kind of feel dumb for exchanging my WiFi model to get the 3G / WiFi model. I probably won't need the 3G after all.
We can hope they add more functions for the 3G... Otherwise, I can't see any reason why anyone should get the 3G version when the WiFi only version is so much less expensive.
Let see how Amazon will react... I predict an E-reader less than $100 this year
@Deloren Not by Amazon or B&N ... $129 the lowest. But I definitely see the Kindle at $199 or less & the DX (hopefully) at a "reasonable" $299.
@Deloren Any e-reader? You might be right? 2010 & Amazon?...
I predict that without a guarantee of a a few books, let's say a 5 books within the first 6 months ownership or 8 books within the first 12 months, that they wont meet the $99 price point before Xmas with the exception of maybe a holiday sale (such as a lightning deal, which I would expect).
A 2010 $99 price is possible, but I think they'd be sacrificing too much on their quality, not impossible, but it's not the direction they've been moving. Things that can make it happen:
Wi-fi only
smaller screen
smaller battery
etc
I would be content to see that happen, and I think they'd be able to get a larger market share which is their main goal. I'm just not sure we'll see it in the next 6 months.
@juanvaldez Kobo ereader from Chapters Indigo in Canada goes for $149.00 Canadian and come preloaded with 100 books. No frills USB version device only, no wifi or 3g just download books and sync to reader. Can even load up kindle and barnes and noble books onto the device. Thin and light and comfortable, basic and seems to work great thus far. www.chapters.indigo.ca
@pingu324
For the Kobo reader it may be too late. I as well as many of my friends were interested in no frills ereader, but if the nook wifi has a better screen, wifi and android for the same price as the kobo, then how can it compete?
@Tuan X Hey I was right!! http://www.engadget.com/2010/06/21/amazons-kindle-conveniently-falls-to-189-nook-looks-stunned-a/ ... I should be getting paid to predict sh*t that may or may not happen with little need for complete accuracy. Any analyst jobs open Engadget??
@tjrchka Your points in regards to the quality of the Nook are spot on. Mind you my wife just ordered the wifi nook today, although she was looking into the Kobo yesterday. The thing the Kobo has over it is that you get 100 books included on the Kobo. To buy 100 books, whether you will read all the selections they provide you, would cost about $10/book meaning you get almost an extra $1000.00 of value out of the Kobo reader if you can live with the basics which should suffice as it serves to act as a electronic reader without any games or colour etc.
@pingu324
I'm pretty sure those books are public domain, you should be able to easily find them for free online.
*Looks at E-Reader*
-Laughs-
*Looks at iPad*
- Loves
*Look at comment*
-Downranks-
@Pickaxe
Lol that was a good one :P
The iPad is great and all, but it's hard to justify that price tag if all you really need is an e-reader (i.e. you already have a laptop, etc.).
The whole iPad vs. dedicated e-readers discussion is kind of moot, really.
@Smart People Play Tuba
Would it be harder to justify if they were the same price?
People just need to work a bit harder if they want the best tech.
@Smart People Play Tuba
Sorry, but E-ink really is the way to go when you want to rest your eyes after starring at a computer monitor all day at work. So e-readers still trump the iPad when it comes to reading for extended periods.
@pukerocket
the best tech? e-ink is the best tech for reading. can you get that through your head? i guess you can't since it appears you're an idiot apple fanboy. my mistake.
checking the best buy site shows that the most expensive, $25 shipping option has a delivery date of June 30th. I'm assuming that BN may be getting a one week exclusivity with this before handing it over to best buy, so 23rd looks about spot on.
Why don't publishers bundle ebooks with their physical books? A la Blueray/DVD/digital bundles. Charge a slight premium and artificially boost ebook sales numbers. I mean really, ebooks are pure profit. No resources used (other than whatever thingy they use to allow access to the ebook). Gotta be cheaper than a real book.
@Sp4rky Makes too much sense and the book publishers see how well the music guys are doing getting people to double dip for a physical and electronic format
Can you buy books internationally like you can with a Kindle? I'm in the UK and the cheapest e-book readers are 2-3 year old Sony ones at about £150. This would work out to be about £100 and I have a sister coming for a visit so no shipping costs.
@Tes
Never mind...a quick attempt to purchase a Pratchett book got me
"These items ship to U.S. addresses only"
And a refusal to recognise a credit card not registered in the US.
@Tes If you create an Amazon US account you can use gift cards to pay.
Source:http://www.wired.com/gadgetlab/2009/12/enable-web-browsing-and-full-catalog-access-on-international-kindle/
@Tes crap, i was about to ask my girlfriend to send one over. Thanks for saving me from my own stupidity!
@Tes
if the nook can display epub can't books just be downloaded from the kobo store?
@Tes
I have PDFs of most of the Discworld books. That's because I have them in dead tree format first.
Damn...thats gonna sell alot of eReaders. This should be interesting to see what Amazon will do if they want to stay king of the hill....
@NeoXY
What makes you think Amazon are king of the hill?
Most press coverage certainly, but column inches do not equate to sales.Which nobody has revealed. And they only got outside America last year. Where other readers have been selling from multiple outlets for years.
I'm still not going to pay $10 for most books.
I think that I'm "sooo" in on this. See, waiting does pay off.
So, how hackable is a Nook ?
@ranos
Pretty hackable I believe It's built on Android 1.6. Check out nookDevs (http://nookdevs.com) for the current list of hacks and alternate Android builds. Might be some info over at Slatedroid as well.
This price point has definitely piqued my interest. A bit lower and I may splurge on impulse.
A question for those who've actually used a nook: how well does it work for reading ebooks in PDF format? What happens with large charts & illustrations? Can you zoom? Does the text reflow? In short, is it anything like reading in Acrobat Reader?
@Zhuzhu
The PDF on the nook is pretty sucky. No pan or zoom. Maybe it will get updated soon.