Kindle, nook, or ematic?... Best choice for 200 bucks?

Been thinking about getting an ereader... Darn friends on facebook got me thinking about them a few weeks back, so I started doing some reading...

So far, the ones that look most interesting (most bang for the buck) are the Kindle, Nook, and Ematic Eglide.

http://www.amazon.com/Kindle-Wireless-Reader-Wifi-Graphite/dp/B002Y27P3M
http://www.barnesandnoble.com/nook/index.asp
http://www.walmart.com/ip/Ematic-eGlide-7-Touchscreen-Tablet-PC/15608825

Weighed pros and cons, and Kindle seems best at the moment in my opinon (opinion is subject to change at any time, as it has nearly every day for the last couple of weeks, lol)

Advantages of Kindle
- Battery life of a month
- Read To Me feature might be nice for listening in the car, at work while doing something else, etc.
- 3G version = free internet everywhere (at least in the US)
- More stable support, etc. since Amazon has been doing this stuff a few years...

Disadvantages of Kindle
- Not color (but the color gizmos all have shorter battery lifes because of the color/backlight)
- No sd or micro sd card slot, so storage is limited somewhat when it comes to books/blogs/feeds with illustrations
- Not "android" so getting more apps might be a problem?
- no support for epub (but that is ok since there are converters out there)

Advantages of ematic
- Andoid Market is right there by default
- sd card slot and usb thumbdrive slot

Disadvantages of Nook Color and Ematic
- Battery Life is measured in hours so it would require charging nightly, which seems like it'd be a hassle
- wifi only.. (black and white nook does have 3g option, but not the color one)
- no "read to me" feature, unless maybe there is some android app that can be installed to do that??!?

What's your choice and why?

Also, if anyone has a Kindle, what is the battery life if the "read to me" is used a lot?

Not interested in ipad since there's a monthly fee involved... and it's a heck of a lot more expensive. Spending that amount of money doesn't seem smart to me unless you wait a couple of years to let the technology get better/cheaper/more durable (fumble fingers).

Also, saw a refurbished zune on walmart's site that has 80 gigs, but don't really need another mp3 player... and it does not do 3g, just wifi?

I don't know anything about e-readers, but this one def. looks the coolest: http://www.thecoolist.com/skiff-reader-the-ultimate-e-reader/ (full 11.5 inch touchscreen, thin, bendable, etc)

Nighthawk said:

I don't know anything about e-readers, but this one def. looks the coolest: http://www.thecoolist.com/skiff-reader-the-ultimate-e-reader/ (full 11.5 inch touchscreen, thin, bendable, etc)

Click to expand...

Interesting... looks like that's going to be tied to Sprint... Wonder if there will be a no monthly cost version, or what the price on that thing will be?

http://www.engadget.com/2010/01/04/skiff-reader-is-largest-reader-yet-will-be-hitting-a-sprint-sto/

I'm also wonder... since Neverdie is going to that convention this weekend to do some big announcement -- will Sprint be there doing an announcement too?!?

Samsung tablet.

if you don't want that it has to be the kindle

Hope WolfGang said:

Samsung tablet.

if you don't want that it has to be the kindle

Click to expand...

Looks neat... but lots of hidden charges if you are not careful?
http://www.zdnet.com/blog/mobile-ga...-the-samsung-tab-with-pricing-and-policy/4153

I received the Kindle Deluxe (the larger size) from Moonie a year ago Christmas as a gift, and I absolutely love it. I can download up to 3,500 books, certainly much larger than my home library, and the battery life is awesome if you don't leave the "wireless" feature on, but that's easily turned on and off. I purchased a leather case to protect it, and I love the portability, not to mention all the features it comes with.

There's a new Kindle out in a smaller size for about $139 USD, but I'm not sure what the extent of the features are. I haven't used one of the others you mentioned, but the color factor doesn't matter to me. I guess it all boils down to what your needs are, and what features you want available.

What I also love, is the fact that there are many books through Amazon.com that you can download for free (the site the Kindle is connected to and where books are downloaded from), and ... I like that many of the top selling books listed in the New York Times are available for $9.99 USD, or at great discounts. I think the price of the books you can get with the Kindle through the Amazon.com link is what surprised me the most. Not sure what the pricing is with the others, and ... the download is quite quick.

Good luck with your decision!

I've got one a Kindle Gen 3 WIFI $139 (didn't bother with the 3g as i have wireless network at home). brilliant piece of kit. Light, easy to read and battery lasts ages if you tun off the wireless unless you are actively using it. leather case is beautiful and is you get the $50 one, it comes with a little led light you can pull out and use to read in the dark.

The read to me feature is ok but, as is typical for text to speech, a lot of things are not pronounced properly so it can get very frustrating. Also the speech doesn't seem to recognise the correct pause time for punctuation.

You can read PDF's on the Kindle, though you'll find yourself zooming in and out a lot, or you can send your PDF's to Amazon and they will convert them to Kindle format for you. Alternatively there is a program called Calibre that can do this and much more formats too available on the net.

Play MP3's and webbrowsing is available but experimental (especially the browsing function).

The one thing i do find irritating (and this isn't a failing of the equipment, more the service) is that not all books are available everywhere around the world, due to copy-write limitations. For instance, i wanted to get the books Red, Green and Blue Mars, but i cannot get them for my Kindle as the copy-write for the Kindle book version doesn't extend to Australia. There is a way around this apparently.

All in all, i highly recommend them, especially if you are in Europe of the US as you'll have access to a massive range of books, magazines and newspapers

In my opinion they are a waste. You can get a netbook that can do more for only marginally more.

Kindle 3G.
Dont buy a LCD device as e-reader.
Also, dont buy the large version, its too big to carry it around.

However, if you will mostly browse net and read color stuff or things which require high resolution (like technical literature) you will find that kindle display is too small. It is suited for books.