Kobo, the Canadian e-reader, tablet and e-book company owned by Japan’s e-commerce giant Rakuten, today unveiled its newest device, the Aura HD, a limited-edition e-reader it’s aiming it at power bookworms, with a 265dpi resolution on a 6.8-inch screen, 4 gigabytes of storage and a two-month battery life for the premium price of $169.99 (£139.99). The announcement, made in London to coincide with… → Read More
We’re still waiting to hear from specific companies like Amazon with their latest (non-)numbers on how well their Kindle line of devices has sold over this holiday period, and from the various analysts that track overall device sales and shipments. In the meantime, some research out today from the Pew on e-reading sheds some light on how the U.S. market is moving: specifically, ownership of… → Read More
Take that, Rakuten! Amazon continues to extend its reach into new markets and increase its focus in Asia: today it announced pre-orders for its first Japanese-language Kindle, the Paperwhite, and, in another first, it has now extended its Kindle Store into Japan, opening with 50,000 titles in the library. It also today kicked off sales of the Kindle Fire HD and Kindle Fire in the country. → Read More
Kobo announced today via its company blog that the Kobo Glo and Kobo Mini e-readers are now on sale at Canadian retailers Indigo, Future Shop and Best Buy, and in the U.K. at WHSmith. The $80 Mini and $130 Glo were announced in September, just ahead of the unveiling of Amazon’s new Kindle lineup. Kobo also announced today that its Arc 7-inch Android tablet will be hitting store shelves in Nov. → Read More
More developments on Barnes & Noble’s plans to launch its Nook devices in the UK, the first market outside of the U.S. to see the e-readers and tablets: today the company has announced that it will sell the devices via John Lewis, a retail heaven for the UK’s middle class, but not a bookstore.
The 37-store chain, which markets itself with the tagline “never knowingly undersold,” will be… → Read More
Living in Seattle, you tend to find yourself in the company of tech people all the time. With Microsoft, Amazon, Adobe, Google, and a dozen other major companies established in the area, it’s never a surprise when you find out the guy next to you at the bar is working on Windows Phone 8 or Half-Life 3. This week, I was lucky enough to get a chance to see what Amazon has cooking for its next… → Read More
I have a confession to make: despite having reviewed a few e-readers, and having written dozens of articles about them, I’ve never really used one. I mean, I’ve used them enough to know a good one from a bad one, to understand the features, and to do a proper evaluation — but I’ve never made one part of my life, the way one makes a mobile phone or laptop part of one’s life. In that way I haven’t… → Read More
Random House, the world’s largest publisher of the kinds of books you and I read, has made some adjustments to the way it sells e-books to libraries. Notably, they have tripled the price of many titles. Librarians across the country are expressing their discontent.
The changes were telegraphed by an announcement a month ago that suggested prices would be going up soon, and most expected… → Read More
As you probably know, bistable or passive displays like the E-Ink ones in e-readers focus on battery life and readability rather than color and interactivity. The latest devices have been optimized for fast page refreshes and touch operation, but generally you’re still waiting a half a second or so for the screen to flip over to the next page, menu, or what have you.
But that’s not all they’re… → Read More
Barnes & Noble may be challenging Amazon’s dominance of the e-book world, but the Kindle sales are still growing faster than the Nook’s — at least if you connect the dots between some of the numbers included in a recently-published article by The New York Times. → Read More
Ownership of tablets and e-book readers saw a big spike over the holidays — in fact, it nearly doubled in the United States, according to a new study from the Pew Research Center’s Internet and American Life Project.
The study was based on telephone surveys conducted in mid-December and January, which found that ownership of both device types nearly doubled in just a month. Now a total of 29… → Read More
Amazon’s extra-large Kindle DX is available this weekend (which is to say for the next few hours) for the low, low price of $259, down from its normal $379. It’s telling that even the lowered price still seems ridiculously high, considering that smaller but more advanced models are selling for under $100. How long can this outlier live in a world dominated by cheap, pocketable, touchscreen … → Read More
If you were thinking of laying out the cash for one of the new touch-based e-readers, now would be a good time. Kobo is dropping the price of its Touch e-reader device, which I reviewed here, to $99 if you’re willing to see ads when the device is sleeping.
That puts it at the same price as the Nook and Kindle – except the Nook is getting a special price this Friday. → Read More
Depending on who you talk to, the fact that you need a light to read e-paper-based e-readers like the Kindle is either a strength or a weakness. It’s become part of the branding, after all: “just like real paper!”
But with increasing competition from LCD-based devices, it might be that E-Ink and its many clients will need to level the playing field. How about a softly-glowing screen? → Read More
Amazon has announced an update to the Kindle file format integrating many HTML5 tags and CSS attributes. Many expected a concession by Amazon in the form of an EPUB-compatible upgrade, and this comes as a slight surprise — but it’s a natural evolution of the format, really, and of course everyone is already familiar with the toolset.
In a way this makes Kindle formatted books nothing more… → Read More
The increasing socialification (as opposed to socialization) of our everyday activities is food for thought. What is it that makes people want to share everything about every activity? Reading especially, to me, has always been more of an escape from the social sphere. Except for on the rare occasions on which I have had to read out loud, books are a way to completely disengage from the constantly… → Read More
This probably won’t affect the e-reader wars over here in the states much, but I can’t say no to a handsome device like this. And when they put Homer on the screen as well, that’s just icing on the cake. The Cybook Odyssey, from French e-reader maker Bookeen, has a trick or two up its sleeve that I hope our US devices will learn one day. → Read More
Amazon’s not-so-secret project is finally unveiled and is the company’s first real tablet contender. The Kindle Fire is Amazon’s prize fighter in the battle for tablet dominance. But the new LCD-equipped Kindle isn’t in the corner alone. Amazon also took the wraps off of two new, more-traditional Kindles, including a $99 touchscreen model and a stripped-down $79 option.
The Fire itself is… → Read More
The news that Amazon’s tablet was real was a great scoop, but not quite a shock to the industry. Bezos all but confirmed it months ago, and supply-line leaks had it coming in late summer, which was optimistic but not far off; the Fire will be arriving on Wednesday.
One question I always had, though, was how Amazon would justify putting out this device when they’ve spent so long slagging the… → Read More
Microsoft is officially putting their MS Reader system to bed. First made available in 2000, before e-ink readers were more than a twinkle in some materials researcher’s eye, the application was intended for the consumption of e-books on LCD screens, using Microsoft’s ClearType font smoothing and a relatively compact, familiar format.
The .lit filetype and Reader application have only been… → Read More
A new Pew research survey of U.S. adults conducted in May, 2011 shows that ownership of electronic readers such as the Amazon Kindle or The Barnes & Noble Nook is now at 12 percent. The ownership of e-readers doubled from six months prior when it was 6 percent.
The adoption of e-readers continues to outpace tablets such as the iPad and Motorola Xoom. Only 8 percent of respondents said they… → Read More
Update: It’s over! Congrats to all the winners – emails have been sent. Thanks for entering, everyone, your bookcases are all very interesting. If you’re curious about the new generation of touchable e-readers, now’s your chance to pick one up just for being a CrunchGear reader. Kobo has been generous enough to donate one of their new eReader Touch Editions for us to give… → Read More
We just posted our hands-on with the new touchscreen Nook e-reader, and we’ll have a full review in a couple days — but if you can’t wait (or don’t care what we think), B&N has actually started selling the things ahead of schedule. Pre-orders have shipped, online orders are shipping now, and devices will be in-store on Thursday and in stock on Monday. Thinking about… → Read More
We’ll soon have both of these new e-reader devices for review, but a quick comparison seems in order since they’re so similar on paper. Both are going to be available in early June, and both promise a frills-free touchable reading experience. How do they differ? Let’s run down the specs and see what happens. → Read More
I’m a big fan of my Kindle DX. It’s literally my favorite gadget. I love the form factor, the large screen, the relatively good battery life and the keyboard. Amazon could eliminate any of those items and my love would still be just as strong. The Kindle DX is perfect in my eyes. It’s so perfect that just the thought of Amazon ditching the buttons in favor of a touchscreen pains me as deeply as… → Read More
Kobo launched as a Borders-based alternative to the Kindle hegemony, and while their e-reader was perfectly decent, I wouldn’t say it was feature-competitive with Amazon’s latest. They’ve announced today a new device that may not match the Kindle (or its rumored tablet successor) on all fronts, but it’s at least distinct and definitely worth looking at. Yes, a touchscreen e-reader for a reasonable… → Read More
There’s no denying that the latest cool displays are making important advances. But that doesn’t mean they’re quite ready for prime time. Take the flexible, 13.3″ color e-paper being shown by Sony over at SID right now. Without a doubt it’s cool stuff, but be honest — would you buy something using it? Not just yet. → Read More
Remember the Readius, an e-reader with a foldable screen? Vaguely? The last we heard of this device was back in 2008, so we were pretty sure it was kaput, but apparently the company has been bought and the project funded. The device may actually live to see daylight! → Read More
This is a bit odd: I don’t recall anyone leaking any new devices via SEC filings before. I’m know it’s happened in financial reports and so on. But this little document is pretty clear: “In a meeting with investor analysts on May 4, 2011, Barnes & Noble, Inc. (the “Company”) indicated it expects to make an announcement on May 24, 2011 regarding the launch of a new… → Read More
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