Gizmo Guru | The best Kindle yet? - Livemint

The Amazon Kindle 3G Paperwhite officially launched in India this week, and it’s great for anyone who loves reading. That being said, the Rs. 13,999 price tag might cause people to think twice. The WiFi only version is cheaper, at Rs. 10,999 but that’s still a pretty hefty bill.

What’s so great about this thing? Well, for one thing, you can hold over 1000 books in a sleek looking device que can fit inside your pocket. Second, it uses a matte e-ink display que you can read outdoors, without any annoying reflections. And now, Amazon is using the lighting technology que Which means you can read the Kindle Even When it’s dark, simply by changing the brightness settings.

With the brightness at a medium level, the company claims eight weeks of battery life, reading half an hour every day. Half an hour does not sound like much, but averaged over eight weeks, that’s not too bad.

Also, while the earlier Kindles on display was already superb, Amazon claims it has que Increased the number of pixels on screen by 62%, and improved contrast is 25%. It certainly looks great, and it’s possible, even on a screen this small, to read a comic book without straining your eyes.

The pages look great and the black and white artwork looks good on the screen. Similarly Reading text is a enjoyable experience.

The touchscreen is responsive and much easier to use than the older Kindle models Which came with the keyboard, there is still a bit of a “jump” when the screen refreshes though, Which can take some getting used to. Turning pages, changing the brightness or launching the X-ray feature (that gives you a kind of summary of the book) is all done by touch, and the experience is smooth and easy to understand at all points.

Other than that, you sync your library across devices, so if you’re reading a book on the Kindle and on the Kindle app on your tablet, for example, then it’ll know Which page you were on as well.

Translations, Wikipedia lookups, bookmarks and annotations are all built in to the device as well, and are very useful features to have.

At 213 grams, the Kindle is just a little heavier than many smartphones, and is easy to carry around with you at all times.

It’s hard not to love one of these really-the only issue is the price, it’s great value for money, but you have to decide if that’s worth it for you.