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My ad-supported Kindle's buttons are dying, so I'm in the market for a new eBook reader. I figured the upcoming sales would be a good time to buy one. To my surprise, eBook readers seem to be regressing rather than advancing. My hard requirements are:
- e-Ink display
- Text-to-speech
- Don't need company's software to transfer books
And my preferred features include:
- Good PDF support (so a larger display with the same aspect ratio of a piece of paper). I want to read technical books on it, something I can't do with the Kindle.
- Stable software
- Doesn't spy on everything you do (Kindles track absolutely everything)
- Support for multiple voices. The same voice gets annoying after a few books.
I'm unable to find anything which fulfills all those conditions. Any recommendations? Before you say smartphone, it needs an e-Ink display. Are smartphones and tablets killing eBook readers?
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The Mind Simply Reels.
--Michael David Crawford
(Score: 4, Insightful) by VLM on Tuesday November 22 2016, @03:29PM
it needs an e-Ink display
Thinking outside the box, you might need better than a 2006 LCD but is a 2016 LCD adequate? May want to try it.
You do have to realize that you're posting on a web log (or soylent factory or whatever its called) where most of the participants think nothing of reading source code and unit test results and debug logs for an entire day at work probably on a LCD (still any CRT users out there?) and then come home and do the same thing at home for hours for fun, or gaze into video/computer games on LCD displays for hours, or just watch legacy TV (maybe streamed?) on a LCD display, or gaze into their pr0n collection on their smartphone LCD display for hours or whatever. I bet I get a minimum of 12 hours of LCD time per day most every day for decades now. Some days, other than the obvious eat, sleep, exercise, I pretty much stare at a LCD screen the entire waking day. Other days I'll have housework or hobbies or non-exercise activities (food shopping?).
I've noticed some people are really cheap and despite their livelihood depending on looking at screens and they might show off a $900 video card and $1000 CPU and a case with a minimum of 50 blue LEDS mounted inside so its not like they lack for money, but their chair will be a flipped over five gallon bucket and their room lighting will be a bare 40 watt incandescent lightbulb hanging from (moms) basement ceiling and their display is a 640x480 from 2003 that flickers and is dark because the backlight is near dead and they rightly complain their eyes hurt and there's no way for everyone's eyes not to hurt because theirs do and its just too hard to read on a screen, but a scenario of ridiculous over the top cheapness not working, does not imply spending a reasonable or even ridiculous amount wouldn't be an absolute joy to use. A tenth of a percent of my salary every decade buys me a nice executive class throne to perch upon, one percent of my salary every couple years gets high quality if not top tier (at least for the time) monitors to look into, I already have a model M keyboard and perfection cannot be improved no matter how much money is spent there...
(Score: 0) by Anonymous Coward on Tuesday November 22 2016, @04:17PM
Has there ever been a 640x480 LCD screen? I though that resolution was long obsolete at the time LCD screens started replacing CRTs.
I already had an 800x600 CRT screen in 1995. And that was definitely not high-end even back then.
(Score: 2) by TheRaven on Tuesday November 22 2016, @04:43PM
Has there ever been a 640x480 LCD screen?
Yes, I had one for a while. I got it a few years after it was new (around 2005 - local computer shop selling old stock off for next to nothing).
I though that resolution was long obsolete at the time LCD screens started replacing CRTs.
LCDs were a lot lower resolution than CRTs when they were introduced.
sudo mod me up
(Score: 2) by Pino P on Tuesday November 22 2016, @05:11PM
Has there ever been a 640x480 LCD screen?
The PowerBook 190cs [apple-history.com] (August 1995) was 640x480.
(Score: 2) by dyingtolive on Tuesday November 22 2016, @05:44PM
My first desktop LCD was about 1280x1024.
They were smaller back in the day though, but you only mostly found them on laptops, for example: Thinkpad 800 series had a 640x480. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/ThinkPad#Early_models. [wikipedia.org]
My dad had a laptop that might have just been 320x200. I want to say it was an ancient 286 or 386, maybe the T5100? Can't recall, unfortunately.
Don't blame me, I voted for moose wang!
(Score: 1) by toddestan on Wednesday November 23 2016, @04:11AM
640x480 certainly existed in early laptops. Never seen a standalone screen of that resolution. I have seen one standalone 800x600 screen. The smallest common resolution seems to be 1024x768, though that's still relatively uncommon compared to the 1280x1024 which was very popular for a few years.
(Score: 2) by vux984 on Tuesday November 22 2016, @05:30PM
I've noticed some people are really cheap and despite their livelihood depending on looking at screens and they might show off a $900 video card and $1000 CPU and a case with a minimum of 50 blue LEDS mounted inside so its not like they lack for money, but their chair will be a flipped over five gallon bucket and their room lighting will be a bare 40 watt incandescent lightbulb hanging from (moms) basement ceiling and their display is a 640x480 from 2003
LOL. Well said.
A tenth of a percent of my salary every decade buys me a nice executive class throne to perch upon, one percent of my salary every couple years gets high quality if not top tier (at least for the time) monitors to look into, I already have a model M keyboard and perfection cannot be improved no matter how much money is spent there...
I've always been a fan of good screens. And its always boggled my mind how people would skimp on them. And not just the screen itself, but the the stand for it too ... that couldn't be raised or tilted and wobbled at the impact of every keystroke. While I don't like the model M keyboard, for its noise, I do appreciate a good mechanical keyboard and am always looking for a nice one... I'm using a logitech g910 nowl. (yeah its got lights and 'gaming keys'... and yeah I practically never use them -- although the gaming G1..G5 keys are frequently actually useful) but it's nice and quiet, and it feels great to type on.
But chairs... you had my number on chairs. I had a series of costco office chairs which shortly after purchase would have collapsed cushions, the bonded leather would disintegrate, and the chair would literally fall apart. a five gallon bucket would have been more comfortable by the end of them. Finally, this year I bought a decent chair -- steelcase, leather, special order... and I literally can't believe i waited this long.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday November 22 2016, @09:31PM
Chairs are also like the boot story, where I can't afford to buy a $50 walmart chair every three months for my whole life, but I'm sitting in more than eleven year old Aeron and its still practically new... I'm due for buying a new one on the every decade plan but I just don't need one yet. It only cost like $8/month which is cheap compared to a walmart chair. Also what price are you willing to pay for no back pain, extreme comfort?
(Score: 1) by Gault.Drakkor on Tuesday November 22 2016, @06:37PM
For me biggest killer feature of digital ink.
Daylight viewable.
That is you can take it to a park, and read there. Full sunlight directly on screen, still readable. Can't do that with standard displays.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Tuesday November 22 2016, @09:21PM
Hmm yes good point. My phone looks good in the shade but as you mention direct sunlight makes it hard to read.
(Score: 1) by J_Darnley on Tuesday November 22 2016, @09:50PM
Look at Mr. Moneybags.
(Score: 2) by VLM on Saturday November 26 2016, @10:41PM
Its not that much, and every penny I make depends on no eyestrain, no butt-strain, no RSI, no carpal tunnel...