Miller reviews the Kindle 2- likes the new controller
Kindle 1, Kindle 2, Sony Reader
The latest-generation Kindle is now hitting customer’s hands and a lot of reviews are cropping up. I was waiting for Matt Miller’s review as I know what he likes in mobile devices and I was interested to hear his take on the Kindle 2.
Matt has published his review and it is a positive one which bodes well for the new Kindle. He particularly likes the new 5-way controller:
“The 5-way controller makes interacting with the Kindle 2 an experience that is loads better than what took place on the original Kindle.”
Matt’s review is worth a read, as it sounds like the Kindle 2 is a good step forward for Amazon over the original Kindle. I must admit I don’t remember much of the Kindle, I haven’t seen it for a long time. ;) The Kindle 2 is available from Amazon for $359.
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To me the more compelling Sony comparison is against the PRS-700. I personally have one to go with my Kindle 2 because the Kindle’s don’t have reflow PDF capability. This ability lets the PRS-700 really excel in reading things like the library of manuals for Microsoft’s Office Communications Server 2007 R2 which has dozen’s of titles in the collection (thus really showing off the advantage of an eReader.)
I do enjoy the new dictionary in the Kindle 2 (and hope they can retrofit it to the original Kindle at some point.) I’m currently reading “Use of Weapons” in which the author (Iain M Banks) shows of his mastery of French cross over words and so far the new dictionary hasn’t missed one (the Kindle 1 dictionary is a bit thin). It has truly helped me enjoy the story more than I would have otherwise by letting me easily understand what the heck is being discussed. The new 5 way controller allows the dictionary to work much better since it now only has to look up one word and can leave the page on the screen for context (very handy!)
The feel of the new unit can be a bit distracting. Someone took great care to make it feel very smooth, silky and sumptuously curved. It feels so nice I’ve caught myself just idly touching it at times.
The only real negative I have to the new unit is that the buttons are almost as loud as the touchpad buttons on the Acer Aspire One.
One hidden gem no one has mentioned to date is the supplied USB charger.
Yes, .36″ is too thin for even mini-USB. The unit uses a micro-USB connector so you get to carry yet another USB cable/tip with you. However, the USB charger brick is something special and has now taken over as my carry around USB brick in my Vaio P ditty bag. It is a 1 amp capable USB charger and handles iPhone 3G’s, HTC Fuze’s, Jawbone’s and SPOT watches with equal aplomb while looking (and feeling) far sexier than the iPhone 3G USB brick.
In addition the brick is greener than that supplied with any of the mentioned devices. I’ve been testing it with my Killawatt unit and not only does it go zero power when done charging, it uses less power to generate that 1 amp of juice.
The Apple and Jawbone bricks both pull 13W at full charge but the Kindle unit is only pulling 7W. I had been wondering why Apple and Jawbone thought it was OK to use 13W to produce 5W so I applaud Amazon for stepping up and showing you can save the world in tiny ways.
James, so I picked up a Storm today. One more reason to get a Kindle 2: that micro-USB connector is the same as the one on the Storm. So you can use the superior greener smaller sexier more portable Kindle 2 USB brick and Kindle 2 USB cable to charge your Storm. :-)