Review: Amazon Kindle 3 (Keyboard) – A Comprehensive Test of Features and Usability
The Amazon Kindle 3 is one of the most successful electronic devices of the past year, with an estimated number of 8 million units sold. In addition, eBook sales have significantly increased in recent months.
Amazon even announced that in 2011 more eBooks could potentially be sold than paperbacks. This is reason enough to take a closer look at this bestseller and determine whether it’s just hyped or if Amazon indeed offers the leader in the mid-range category. And is the American eBook reader even suitable for the German-speaking market?
Note: This review was written at a time when the Kindle still had to be ordered from the USA. In the meantime, Amazon has expanded its offering to the German-speaking region, which means some notes about language support and the Kindle Store offering may no longer be applicable.
Ordering
Normally, the ordering process isn’t included in our reviews, as the manufacturer cannot be held responsible for the unfriendliness of third-party distributors or be praised for exceptional customer service and quick delivery. However, due to the current sales processing, we would like to touch on this briefly.
The Amazon Kindle 3 is not available in Europe, and must be ordered from Amazon in the USA. However, similar to a product purchased on Amazon, the Kindle is selected on the Amazon Germany or Austria sites. You then enter the US Store section and can process your order as usual. Amazon has made a great effort to make the import as uncomplicated as possible. It should only be noted that payment cannot be made by direct debit or invoice, and that the price listed in the shop in dollars does not include taxes, shipping, or customs fees. The final total is displayed during the checkout process before order confirmation, and for a Kindle 3G with Wi-Fi priced at $139, it amounts to around €150. The shipping time is also displayed and, according to our experience and numerous user reports, is adhered to. There is nothing more to pay upon receipt of the device.
Unboxing
The Kindle arrives in an unassuming brown cardboard box, and there’s nothing extravagant about its contents either. The box contains only the device, a USB cable, and a quick-start guide. As with other eBook readers, it is noted that important accessories like a power adapter or protective cover must be purchased separately. This should be factored into financial considerations prior to purchasing.
Contents – Kindle, USB cable and Quickstart guide
Build Quality
The Kindle immediately gives a well-built impression. Although it doesn’t match the classy look of a Sony PRS-650 with its aluminum front, the device feels sturdy and solid. The front is made of sturdy dark gray plastic, while the back is made of a more slip-resistant and textured material that feels very comfortable in hand. Since the Amazon Kindle has no touchscreen, the built-in QWERTY keyboard results in slightly bulkier dimensions. Nonetheless, the Kindle appears slim, particularly due to its very flat design, and the weight of 241 g was not found to be discomforting after prolonged reading. The keys themselves are well-crafted and promise a long lifespan. The pressure point and arrangement are very well thought out. The buttons placed on the sides of the screen, for turning pages, make sense and allow for ergonomic book handling.
The Kindle’s keyboard features a good pressure point
On the bottom of the device is a slider to turn the device on/off or put it into standby mode. Holding the slider for a longer time turns the device off. If you only briefly push the slider, one of the many pretty screensavers appears. Unfortunately, the buttons here feel a bit flimsy, but they should withstand frequent use. Next to the slider are the volume control and a 3.5mm jack for plugging in headphones. If you’d rather not use headphones, there are two small speakers on the back that deliver an acceptable quality of audio files or books via the text-to-speech function.
Features
Amazon offers its Kindle in two different versions, differing by only one feature. Both versions come with the mandatory micro-USB port, audio playback capability (either through the headphone jack or the built-in stereo speakers), and offer internet access via Wi-Fi. Here is the key difference: the $50 more expensive Kindle 3G+WiFi version also offers a UMTS connection, allowing free access to the Kindle bookstore and Wikipedia anytime and anywhere. There are no costs for the connection, as the use of the so-called “Whispernet” is already included in the purchase price. To secure data downloaded via Wi-Fi or Whispernet, there is 4 GB of internal storage available. Unfortunately, the Kindle does not have a memory card slot to expand its capacity.
Display
The highlight of the device is definitely the display. Thanks to excellent eInk Pearl technology and a resolution of 800×600 pixels with a 6-inch screen diagonal, the Kindle offers extremely high-contrast and razor-sharp text and images. The same technology is used in Sony’s PRS-650 and PRS-350 and has already impressed in their reviews. The refresh rates are exceptionally fast, and ghosting effects are hardly noticeable. Due to technical reasons, the eBook reader doesn’t have any backlighting – this is true for all eInk displays and results in eye-friendly rendering performance. There is really nothing to criticize about the display, as the eInk Pearl display currently plays a leading role in the eBook reader market.
The good display of the Kindle allows excellent readability
Reading & Usability
Since a major part of the reading experience depends on display quality, the display description already suggests that it seems to be excellent. And practical impressions confirm this suspicion. The text quality is truly outstanding, closely resembling that of a printed book. Moreover, Amazon has chosen a remarkably pleasant font, which we believe surpasses those of Sony models. Alternatively, Amazon offers the option to choose two additional fonts. Furthermore, line spacing and line width can be adjusted in three stages each. The text options, which can easily be accessed via the “Aa” button, are completed by eight different font sizes.
The options menu for the text layout – accessible by pressing the Aa button
The page-turning is facilitated by the previously mentioned, conveniently placed side buttons. This makes it very comfortable and allows for an ergonomic grip on the reader. While reading, as with other eBook readers, bookmarks can be set or notes can be added. These functions also work flawlessly in practice.
The Amazon Kindle does not have a motion sensor, but the screen orientation can be manually set in the font menu. Another feature, which Amazon has been advancing for some time now, is the text-to-speech mode (TTS). When activated, either a male or female voice reads the currently open book. Clearly, the quality doesn’t match a professionally read audiobook, but for those with visual impairments, this mode offers a reasonably viable option – at least for English texts. It’s important to note, however, that this is a limitation that affects multiple areas of the Kindle: the text-to-speech mode is optimized for the English language. Applying it to a German book makes it sound as if an American is attempting their first steps in the German language – thus making it barely usable for German texts. Whether you can listen to a whole book this way is something everyone needs to determine for themselves – we would find it too exhausting.
The user interface of the Kindle is less impressive. It is very simplistic and is presented in a list format. Books can be grouped and sorted here.
The Kindle Store, accessible through the menu, is somewhat more appealing. Depending on the model, you can connect to the shop on the go either via Wi-Fi or the UMTS module. The shop presents a pleasant view – at least cover images are frequently offered to jazz up the otherwise somewhat dull book lists. We would have liked a similar display for the Kindle’s user interface. The Kindle Store offers an extensive range of both free and commercial titles. Virtually every current book in English is available, and the overall English-language selection is very ample. The catch, however, is as expected: the books are almost exclusively offered in English. The Kindle is primarily a product for the American market, and it’s tailored accordingly. When searching for the top 10 German fiction charts from Spiegel, we couldn’t find a single title in the Kindle Store – in comparison, the eBook store from Thalia.de had 7 out of 10 titles available. Until the Kindle is officially released as a German version, we can expect some time to pass. Unfortunately, the store is also somewhat disorganized. While you can sort books by categories or use the search function, advanced search options like viewing all free books or exclusively German titles are missing. However, if you do find a book of interest, you can purchase it with just one click. When selecting the “Buy” button, the credit card linked to the Amazon account is immediately charged, and the book is downloaded. Bought a book too hastily? No problem, the order can be canceled with another click.
The Kindle Store – packed with ENGLISH books
Let’s move on to one of the biggest weaknesses of the Kindle: PDF display. Unfortunately, the Kindle lacks any internal PDF optimization or text reflow technology (adjusting the text to fit the display window). As a result, the PDF display becomes increasingly inadequate the more complex and larger the document becomes. PDFs optimized for 6-inch readers are still very readable (the font size cannot be adjusted here, of course), but reading larger A4 documents becomes a struggle. Only the full view of the document displays entire sentences, but these appear so tiny due to the reduction that they’re hardly readable. If you want to enlarge the text, you can only zoom into a section of the page, causing sentences to be broken off at the edge and requiring scrolling to continue reading. If you cannot avoid reading portrait A4 documents, we recommend either formatting the document beforehand with computer software or switching to landscape mode to gain some width. If reading complex and large PDF documents is a key use, purchasing the Kindle might not be the best option. However, less complex documents can be quite well adapted to the Kindle with the help of our conversion tutorial.
With the Kindle (left), scrolling is required as the line is cut off at the image edge. The PRS-650 (right) has a “reflow” function, hence a line break is set at the image edge
Regarding future features, one can expect a lot from Amazon. Thanks to the many units sold, there will likely be plenty of support and, hopefully, new features in the future – at least until the successor to the Kindle 3 hits the market. There is a special section (“Experimental”) where beta features are available to try. Among them, for example, is a web browser, which works quite well. It certainly doesn’t replace a computer or smartphone, but it’s more than adequate for quickly looking up who really won the battle described in the novel on Wikipedia.
Compatibility
Format compatibility is also not a strength of the Kindle. Only AZW (the Kindle’s own format) as well as PDF, MOBI, and TXT files are supported. The increasingly crucial ePUB format is unfortunately not supported. This particularly limits the selection of free eBooks, as many are offered solely in ePUB format. Our free eBooks section does, however, provide a selection of databases for .mobi, .azw, and optimized .pdf eBooks.
Supported file formats: AZW, TPZ, PRC, MOBI, TXT, PDF, MP3, AA, AAX
Battery Life
The battery life of the Kindle is truly excellent. In our nearly 3-week test, we only had to recharge it once during regular use. Thus, two standard books can be read on a single charge. Even standby mode, despite displaying a screensaver, does not drain the eBook reader, as the eInk technology doesn’t consume energy once an image is displayed.
Power consumption is a bit higher when Wi-Fi is on and can be increased further by activating the UMTS function. But even here, the Kindle performs well, and the manufacturer’s claim of about a week of battery life with constant activation seems realistic. In our test, we only activated wireless features as needed, which is likely how most users would handle it in everyday use.
Software and Synchronization
The Amazon Kindle can be connected to a computer using the included USB cable. The device is recognized as a USB stick, no additional software is needed to transfer books to the Kindle. Book files can simply be moved via Copy & Paste into the Documents folder and are immediately displayed in the list on the device. If a synchronization program is desired, several available programs, like Calibre , can be chosen.
Conclusion
The Amazon Kindle leaves us with mixed feelings. On one hand, the Kindle currently offers probably the best reading comfort of all available eBook readers. The great display, the lovely fonts, a long battery life, and the conveniently placed buttons are the reasons for this. The Kindle can even narrowly outdo the Sony PRS-650 in this area.
However, this brings us to a point that costs the Kindle a very good rating: The device is almost entirely geared towards the American market. Both the Kindle Store and the text-to-speech mode are, at present, only limitedly recommendable for lovers of German literature. While the Kindle Store offers a lovely opportunity to shop directly on the device, it doesn’t help if the selection doesn’t meet the requirements of the German market. Moreover, the Kindle Store is far from perfect. The presentation of the offerings is too confusing – options like displaying free eBooks are completely missing, as are useful filter options. While these issues might be forgivable, the limited format support makes importing external content much more difficult. Especially paid content is often hard to prepare for the Kindle due to DRM protection. Additionally, the poor PDF display without a reflow function often requires advance work on a computer to ensure good readability. All these points undermine the Kindle’s easy-to-use principle somewhat.
However, if you are interested in English literature or are willing to put in a bit of advance work in searching for literature or preparing formats, the Kindle offers really good value for money. We advise perhaps exploring the market before purchase to check if the desired literature is available for the Kindle, as this factor is likely the deciding factor on whether we can make a purchase recommendation or not. If this condition is met, and the focus is primarily on reading books rather than displaying complex PDF documents, we offer the Kindle, due to its low price of around €150 in the base version, our value-for-money purchase recommendation.
