Review: Kindle DX - Amazon's bastard
" For the manufacture of one shoe, it is required seven lk two meters long each " - says wikipedia . I don’t know how many lyk Jeff Bezos used as CEO of Amazon, but when making the Kindle DX, he definitely got the best bast in both size and quality. Read a review of the Kindle DX ebook reader. There are a lot of letters and photos under the cut.
')
Those who regularly read my twitter a few days ago found out that I got the Amazon Kindle DX. This is no accident. The fact is that I am in every possible way looking for ways to expand the range of my store and I try to get some interesting reader into my hands for testing. Well, if such a reader is good enough, then it will soon go straight to my e-book blog . The same book turned out to be so good that I decided to write a special review for Habr's readers. Enough entry, start the inspection on the spot.
The first thing that inspired me was the packaging, of course. Even from the usual yellow cardboard, the Yankees are able to make a brand. Pay attention to the instructions and boxes with cables in the photo. For safe transportation inside the box, the device is placed in a special monolithic form so that it does not touch the walls anywhere. The kit is minimalist: reader, manual, mini-USB, adapter-power with a European plug and characteristics. Separately was purchased cover and lights.
So, we will pull for a cardboard tab with the word “Pull” and in our hands we will have a snow-white device. Case Kindle DX is a thin monoblock weighing half a kilo, you no cogs or hints on the cover. Only on the back side there is a rubberized part. I gently tried to move it, but she did not give in.
On the end of the right there is one long volume button, the bottom mini-USB port for charging and data transfer, as well as an LED. At the end of the top is the power button and headphone input. On the front of the device: E-INK screen in 9.7 inches, 5 buttons and a joystick on the right, QWERTY-keyboard below. The buttons on the keyboard are interesting, and you will not understand by touch, either plastic or rubber. Something mean. The joystick is very small, but it is convenient to control it, as it has excellent sensitivity, and it is from the same material as the buttons.
It should be noted that the experts in the field of User Experience apparently worked on the device. Everything is simple and intuitive, unlike many multi-button designs.
But it is time to move from the aesthetics of form to the aesthetics of the soul. Turning on the device I was immediately politely asked to register at Amazon. Ok, no problem ... After entering the login and password, the Kindle suggested turning on Wireless, and then surprisingly quickly, without problems, and most importantly, for free (I live in Ukraine) I connected to Amazon. The device has been registered. Along the way, the system reported that an email of the type mylogin@kindle.com was registered for me, and documents can be sent to it for conversion to my device.
I went to the main page. To my surprise, the interface was quite ascetic. No icons and widgets. The main page is a simple list of books, resembling in content and form the content that we used to see in paper books.
In the center of the list is the name of the book, on the left in small letters the format, for example, pdf. Right some metadata, apparently about the author. Under the title in the form of barely noticeable points progress indicator reading this book.
My whole interface is not associated with anything else as with the good old hypertext in its simplest form.
Amazon Kindle DX out of the box is known to support the following book formats: AZW (DRM protected), Mobi, PRC, TXT, PDF. Three of the five formats belong to Amazon itself, and to read HTML, DOC, RTF, you will need to convert them using a magic email box. But I have not tried. Of course, no one bothers you to use any desktop converters.
Let's put some good books for testing. I chose two books in PDF, because it is the most complex, but very popular format for electronic readers. I just copied both books via mini-USB. The first one was just a text with small tables, and the second was a complex markup with pictures.
As you can see Kindle DX with both files coped with a bang. The text is quite readable. The screen advantage of 9.7 "makes itself felt. But of course, even on this device, just text formats work much better.
You can adjust the font size, the density of words in a line, follow the links, and even your notes can be tweeted (!) Or otherwise shared. For texts in English there is a function "Text-to-Speach".
Speaking of the Amazon network. To enter it absolutely nothing to configure is not necessary. You simply turn on and off Wireless, then when you see fit. As soon as you enter Whispernet, this is the name of the Amazon network, synchronization is automatically activated, bookmarks, notes and books that you downloaded from Amazon are saved. All personal content that you copied from your PC to Whispernet does not fit.
Directly from the reader you can buy new books from the Amazon store, provided that you are free to read in English. The store page and content are specially adapted for viewing from the reader. Conversely, from your personal web page you can control what and in what order to upload to the reader.
The last item on my test was the built-in experimental browser. He is wonderful and quite smartly walks on the mobile version of wikipedia, but, unfortunately, is clearly limited and selective in the choice of other sites. For example, I could not visit the mobile version of Habr, which is a pity.
Of the shortcomings of the device, you can also note the weight in a half a kilogram, and with a cover probably all 800 grams and large sizes.
I came to the conclusion that Amazon Kindle DX is perfect for those who are tired of reading PDF files in their electronic library, as well as anyone who reads, writes, or even thinks in English and wants access. to the Amazon bookshelves. Now this storehouse of literature numbers about 600,000 paid books with copyrights and more than a million free or almost free books for which the copyright has already expired.
I wanted to thank Roman Vilavina (chesszone [at] ya.ru), who was not afraid of falling victim to an expensive experiment. That he is now the happy owner of the Kindle DX, but unfortunately he does not yet have an account on Habré.
PS Kindle is already somewhere on the way to Sri Lanka, but according to fresh memory I can answer the questions, so ask, dear habro-readers.
')
Those who regularly read my twitter a few days ago found out that I got the Amazon Kindle DX. This is no accident. The fact is that I am in every possible way looking for ways to expand the range of my store and I try to get some interesting reader into my hands for testing. Well, if such a reader is good enough, then it will soon go straight to my e-book blog . The same book turned out to be so good that I decided to write a special review for Habr's readers. Enough entry, start the inspection on the spot.
Packaging
The first thing that inspired me was the packaging, of course. Even from the usual yellow cardboard, the Yankees are able to make a brand. Pay attention to the instructions and boxes with cables in the photo. For safe transportation inside the box, the device is placed in a special monolithic form so that it does not touch the walls anywhere. The kit is minimalist: reader, manual, mini-USB, adapter-power with a European plug and characteristics. Separately was purchased cover and lights.
Appearance
So, we will pull for a cardboard tab with the word “Pull” and in our hands we will have a snow-white device. Case Kindle DX is a thin monoblock weighing half a kilo, you no cogs or hints on the cover. Only on the back side there is a rubberized part. I gently tried to move it, but she did not give in.
On the end of the right there is one long volume button, the bottom mini-USB port for charging and data transfer, as well as an LED. At the end of the top is the power button and headphone input. On the front of the device: E-INK screen in 9.7 inches, 5 buttons and a joystick on the right, QWERTY-keyboard below. The buttons on the keyboard are interesting, and you will not understand by touch, either plastic or rubber. Something mean. The joystick is very small, but it is convenient to control it, as it has excellent sensitivity, and it is from the same material as the buttons.
It should be noted that the experts in the field of User Experience apparently worked on the device. Everything is simple and intuitive, unlike many multi-button designs.
Interface
But it is time to move from the aesthetics of form to the aesthetics of the soul. Turning on the device I was immediately politely asked to register at Amazon. Ok, no problem ... After entering the login and password, the Kindle suggested turning on Wireless, and then surprisingly quickly, without problems, and most importantly, for free (I live in Ukraine) I connected to Amazon. The device has been registered. Along the way, the system reported that an email of the type mylogin@kindle.com was registered for me, and documents can be sent to it for conversion to my device.
I went to the main page. To my surprise, the interface was quite ascetic. No icons and widgets. The main page is a simple list of books, resembling in content and form the content that we used to see in paper books.
In the center of the list is the name of the book, on the left in small letters the format, for example, pdf. Right some metadata, apparently about the author. Under the title in the form of barely noticeable points progress indicator reading this book.
My whole interface is not associated with anything else as with the good old hypertext in its simplest form.
Amazon Kindle DX out of the box is known to support the following book formats: AZW (DRM protected), Mobi, PRC, TXT, PDF. Three of the five formats belong to Amazon itself, and to read HTML, DOC, RTF, you will need to convert them using a magic email box. But I have not tried. Of course, no one bothers you to use any desktop converters.
Reading
Let's put some good books for testing. I chose two books in PDF, because it is the most complex, but very popular format for electronic readers. I just copied both books via mini-USB. The first one was just a text with small tables, and the second was a complex markup with pictures.
As you can see Kindle DX with both files coped with a bang. The text is quite readable. The screen advantage of 9.7 "makes itself felt. But of course, even on this device, just text formats work much better.
You can adjust the font size, the density of words in a line, follow the links, and even your notes can be tweeted (!) Or otherwise shared. For texts in English there is a function "Text-to-Speach".
Network
Speaking of the Amazon network. To enter it absolutely nothing to configure is not necessary. You simply turn on and off Wireless, then when you see fit. As soon as you enter Whispernet, this is the name of the Amazon network, synchronization is automatically activated, bookmarks, notes and books that you downloaded from Amazon are saved. All personal content that you copied from your PC to Whispernet does not fit.
Directly from the reader you can buy new books from the Amazon store, provided that you are free to read in English. The store page and content are specially adapted for viewing from the reader. Conversely, from your personal web page you can control what and in what order to upload to the reader.
Browser
The last item on my test was the built-in experimental browser. He is wonderful and quite smartly walks on the mobile version of wikipedia, but, unfortunately, is clearly limited and selective in the choice of other sites. For example, I could not visit the mobile version of Habr, which is a pity.
findings
Of the shortcomings of the device, you can also note the weight in a half a kilogram, and with a cover probably all 800 grams and large sizes.
I came to the conclusion that Amazon Kindle DX is perfect for those who are tired of reading PDF files in their electronic library, as well as anyone who reads, writes, or even thinks in English and wants access. to the Amazon bookshelves. Now this storehouse of literature numbers about 600,000 paid books with copyrights and more than a million free or almost free books for which the copyright has already expired.
Acknowledgments
I wanted to thank Roman Vilavina (chesszone [at] ya.ru), who was not afraid of falling victim to an expensive experiment. That he is now the happy owner of the Kindle DX, but unfortunately he does not yet have an account on Habré.
PS Kindle is already somewhere on the way to Sri Lanka, but according to fresh memory I can answer the questions, so ask, dear habro-readers.
Source: https://habr.com/ru/post/100927/
All Articles