Comments on: Amazon Delivers Kindle for PC — Works Great on a Netbook

By: Andy

Andy — Wed, 11 Nov 2009 16:28:41 +0000

I downloaded it yesterday and gave it a try. It does have a lot of work to go, but I like the idea and I hope to see a lot of improvements in the future.

I don’t own a Kindle, still waiting to make an e-Reader purchase, not sure which one I want to go with yet. Another Kindle price drop or two might make me purchase one.

By: Joe

Joe — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 18:37:45 +0000

Not impressed whatsoever with this reader, honestly. As of right now, it’s very, very bare-bones. Completely ignoring ink annotations (which unfortunately MS Reader for Tablets is the only program that can do that), you can’t even make text annotations or highlight anywhere. Hell, you can’t even search yet.

And while it does support touch gestures, some sort of page turn transition would be nice when you’re flicking through the pages. This isn’t a Kindle where we have a horrible refresh rate, so there’s no need to keep things so basic.

By: Zeuxidamas, GearWERKZ.net

Zeuxidamas, GearWERKZ.net — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 18:24:56 +0000

Amazing that I have been trying to undork my Mobipocket Account for the last several days and finally got fed up this AM. Amazing that I checked out the word on the Kindle for PC beta, ’cause I had no idea it just released today; happenstance.

But…I think it is more likely that I will go with a Nook, so I downloaded the B&N eReader for PC this AM. I have yet to check it out, and I am not sure it does anything like WhisperSync. Since I am a B&N regular, however, I wanted to keep all of my book reading consolidated in a single-account (digital and print). Glad to see both are offering this type of cross-platform functionality, as I want the trifecta of reading on an eBook reader (when I get around to buying one), my TabletPC and my UMPC. I need to check out what each is offering in the way of magazines. eBook readers may not be color, but PCs sure are.
– Vr/Z..>>

By: Kevin C. Tofel

Kevin C. Tofel — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 18:07:42 +0000

For starters, it’s a beta version, so I wouldn’t expect niche functionality like that. To be honest, I’m not sure it’s even an obvious option — screen rotation for netbooks would require you to hold the device while reading – plus the device is unevenly weighted, which isn’t going to make the experience any better. In normal landscape mode, you can read hands free and have zero weight distribution issues. I can’t think of many PC apps that rotate outside of the OS either. Just my $0.02 though — I’m sure some folks would like screen rotation. It might be possible through the native graphics options… and of course would work on a Tablet PC or UMPC but again, the entire OS gets rotated… not just the app. ;)

By: Rick Broida

Rick Broida — Tue, 10 Nov 2009 17:57:28 +0000

I’m not seeing any option to rotate the reader for portrait viewing! Is it possible Amazon actually forgot to include that? Seems like an obvious option, especially for netbook users.