Ye Olde Faithful Kindle

This weekend I bought a Kindle Paperwhite on a whim. I had watched my friend since the start of school enjoying his e-reader device, and thought, “Why not? I’m an avid reader, too!”

Admittedly, not the wisest financial decision.

I went for the newest model because A) I’m kind of a tech-snob, and B) it was shiny. Literally. The Kindle Paperwhite is the first of Amazon’s e-readers to utilize e-ink technology and have a lit screen.

At first, it seemed too good to be true.  Wouldn’t built-in light cause eyestrain, and therefore defeat the whole purpose of using e-ink? Turns out, the Amazon design team is a little smarter than that. Eyestrain occurs when a device is backlit, meaning that the light comes from directly behind the screen and is pointed at the viewer’s eyes. The Paperwhite is not backlit. It is lit from the sides of the screen, pointing inward. And so, to my delight, I was able to read deep into the night with a perfectly illuminated screen and not suffer through an eye-piercing headache.

The list of “pros” also includes a Chuck-Norris battery, a surprisingly useful vocabulary-builder application, integrated access to Goodreads (a reading-based social network), and an awesome X-Ray tool.

... It's hard to explain the awesome.

Unfortunately, it’s not as pretty as I’d hoped. In all the advertising, the screen is shown radiating with angelic whiteness, casting godly rays in all directions. The reality is that the lighting feature gives off a mostly-white-but-slightly-blue glow that seems a little colder than it should (at least on the lower settings). Not that the look really matters – it functions exactly as it’s supposed to – but upon realizing that the packaging had exaggerated, my inner raccoon died a little.

Aside from that minor disappointment, the only thing I would say is this: if you are thinking about buying a Kindle, you should probably get a case as well. I used mine for two days before I decided that the device felt too thin and fragile, even though it’s not. It is actually pretty sturdy, but feels thin and breakable, so much so that I was afraid to put it in my backpack. After spending ten bucks on a low-end leather case, however, I am much more comfortable bringing the device with me to school and on drives. With the case, it weighs about as much as a small book and feels just as comfortable in the hand (possibly even more so, because you don’t have to fight the binding to keep it open).

Overall? Not sparkly, but built and designed well, hence the "Ye Olde Faithful". 

 

Possibly my new best friend.