Kindle Advice Required

[Super Dragon 64]

I'm thinking of buying a tablet to read Manga on the train and was wondering if anyone had any experiences with reading Manga on the E Ink display. I was thinking of getting a Kindle Fire or a Nook but if the normal Kindle does the job then I can reduce the strain on my eyes and save some money.

[Errkal]

Personally I would go for a cheap Android tablet, something like an Archos Gen8 70 Internet Tablet, it will do the Kindle stuf but also so so much more.

[Venom]

Dark Dragon 64, because I'm avoiding doing some work I might be able to help a little.

The Kindle Fire has a bright screen. Is colour. And you can easily pinch to zoom in and out. Of course there is the eye strain issue which does affect me if I read anything for too long, but then comics are more images then text. DC have released a handful of graphic novels that only work on Kindle Fire and will not work on the Kindle app for iPad or iPhone. Also, if you intend to buy music or apps you need a US credit card (but there are ways around this).

I downloaded a couple of Manga samples on to my Kindle Touch. This one from the screenshot was automatically displaying the page horizontally but it will depend on the publisher. I reduced the size of the image for the forum, but on my 17" screen that is still slightly bigger, and brighter than the actual Touch.

Where the text is written very small it was a slight strain to read. Many comics on Kindle are just a series of image files. Normally you can zoom in, but this one didn't allow me to. You can if you have PDFs. But overall I was surprised that it was very readable.



My recommendation is that if there are many Manga titles available then just get a Kindle Touch. If you want a graphic rich comic reader then either wait for the new Kindle Fire ( i expect 3rd quarter) or get an iPad 1 and download the comic app.

[Super Dragon 64]

Thanks for the reply Errkal; I think that I'll stick with either the Kindle or Nook as I've seen better reviews for them than the Archos.

Venom, thanks for the very informative post and for taking the time to download the Manga samples. I think that I'll go for either the Fire or the Nook so that I can read Manga and comics. Plus the slightly bigger screen should help with the text which would be great as I'd like to avoid zooming in if I can.

[Oh Teh Noes]

Yeah, the cheap Archos tablets are generally a bit Gashville. Nook Colour would probably be your best bet, unless you're not worried about colour, in which case Kindle Touch.

[Joer]

EDIT: I've just been having a look and it seems that the Nook Colour runs PDF's and ePub's which seem to be the two most popular types. Is it a case of drag and drop to get books on to it or is there more to it than that?

[Joer]

Where the hell can you buy a Nook Color from over here? :S The B&N website wont ship to the UK apparently.

[Super Dragon 64]

I know a guy who brought one over from America for me.

I have to say, the Nook Tablet is better than I thought it would be! I've got 2 Avengers comics on it which looked great as I flicked through it. When I put on One Piece as JPEG files it was big enough to read easily but I had problems navigating the large number of JPEGs in the gallery so I'm working on converting them to PDFs with Calibre.

I also love the fact that it comes with Sudoku pre-installed. I've been doing the one in the Metro/Evening Standard on my way to and from uni so it's good to have something for the weekends when there aren't any free newspapers at the station.

I haven't tried running videos on it yet but a quick go on TV catchup last night fills me with confidence that it will deliver.

[Joer]

My Nook Color should be arriving tomorrow. Managed to bag one on eBay for a reasonable price. I've downloaded a bunch of books from a Kindle torrent, stuck them in to Calibre and it converted about 80 files in a minute or so. Pretty nice software, especially as it lets you read on it too!