Kindle DX : A Specialized Reader
I have a Kindle 2, and my wife has a Kindle 1. My Kindle DX arrived yesterday. The Kindle DX is basically a K2 with a larger display. I prefer the K2 over the K1, and this review is concentrated on the differences over the K2.
The primary reason I ordered it was that I have many PDF files, lots from the Physics sections of the ArXiv.org website, that I want to be able to carry with me.
So far, the PDF reader works well for those documents. Even an article from the Physics Review of 1959, which is a scanned image, I believe, is entirely readable, though the typeface is small. I also have David Pogue’s "Windows Vista: The Missing Manual" in both PDF and .mobi formats, from the O’Reilly website. The PDF version presents a page for page image of the book, but with searchable text. If you select "Go to Page" from the Menu button, you can enter a page number from the printed book, or the Table of Contents, and skip to that page. This is probably dependent on how well the PDF file is formatted, but in this case printed page 638 corresponds to PDF page 656. Text-to-speech does NOT work for any PDF files, even when the text is searchable.
The PDF text is legible in Portrait view, but some of the Windows screen images are not. Rotating the device to Landscape orientation preserves the PDF page numbers, and increases the screen image legibility to that of the printed book. But the image may be chopped in two, requiring paging back and forth for complete viewing. And switching to landscape viewing requires the PDF viewer to repaginate the file, and, for 850 page files, takes 25 seconds. At least on (printed) page 638 ! It takes the same amount of extra time if you wake from sleep while in Landscape mode.
At present, the Menu option for Table of Contents is grayed out, and unavailable. A work around for this is to find the Table on your own and bookmark it. Jumping to a bookmark is quick. In the PDF Vista manual, the Table of Contents is at Page v (Yes, lower case Roman numeral "v").
The .mobi version of this book has no page numbers, only locations, which correspond to about 25 characters, as far as I have been able to figure out. Figure 21-8, that appears on printed page 638, is quite legible in portrait mode, and does not require landscape mode for reading. Landscape mode does result in magnification of the graphic, though, making it easier to read. Since the reader reflows the text from the same starting location of the portrait page, you have to page forward to get to the image. The figure is at location 14337 out of 17715.
I have copied a complete set of the manuals for IBM’s iSeries computers to the Kindle DX (483 MBs !!) and still have, with all the 580 items, 1,929 MB free. The Go to Page function does not work the same as in the O’Reilly document: you must add an offset for the pages assigned Roman numeral page numbers. The speed of page display is adequate, around a second.
The weight of the device is much more noticeable than for the Kindle 2. But my laptop is 5 lbs., more than 4 times the Kindle DX, and hotter to boot. And my DX has frozen for no apparent reason - in Amazon books - 3 or 4 times, requiring a reboot, and page forward to recover my place. I hope a sofware update is in the works.
The Kindle DX has only one set of buttons along the right side (when its held with the keyboard at the bottom). This is less convenient than the K2, but I find that turning the Kindle DX over, with the keyboard at the top works quite well when I want buttons on the left. If I need to create a note, rotating back is easy and quick.
I have a Kindle 2, and my wife has a Kindle 1. My Kindle DX arrived yesterday. The Kindle DX is basically a K2 with a larger display. I prefer the K2 over the K1, and this review is concentrated on the differences over the K2.
The primary reason I ordered it was that I have many PDF files, lots from the Physics sections of the ArXiv.org website, that I want to be able to carry with me.
So far, the PDF reader works well for those documents. Even an article from the Physics Review of 1959, which is a scanned image, I believe, is entirely readable, though the typeface is small. I also have David Pogue’s "Windows Vista: The Missing Manual" in both PDF and .mobi formats, from the O’Reilly website. The PDF version presents a page for page image of the book, but with searchable text. If you select "Go to Page" from the Menu button, you can enter a page number from the printed book, or the Table of Contents, and skip to that page. This is probably dependent on how well the PDF file is formatted, but in this case printed page 638 corresponds to PDF page 656. Text-to-speech does NOT work for any PDF files, even when the text is searchable.
The PDF text is legible in Portrait view, but some of the Windows screen images are not. Rotating the device to Landscape orientation preserves the PDF page numbers, and increases the screen image legibility to that of the printed book. But the image may be chopped in two, requiring paging back and forth for complete viewing. And switching to landscape viewing requires the PDF viewer to repaginate the file, and, for 850 page files, takes 25 seconds. At least on (printed) page 638 ! It takes the same amount of extra time if you wake from sleep while in Landscape mode.
At present, the Menu option for Table of Contents is grayed out, and unavailable. A work around for this is to find the Table on your own and bookmark it. Jumping to a bookmark is quick. In the PDF Vista manual, the Table of Contents is at Page v (Yes, lower case Roman numeral "v").
The .mobi version of this book has no page numbers, only locations, which correspond to about 25 characters, as far as I have been able to figure out. Figure 21-8, that appears on printed page 638, is quite legible in portrait mode, and does not require landscape mode for reading. Landscape mode does result in magnification of the graphic, though, making it easier to read. Since the reader reflows the text from the same starting location of the portrait page, you have to page forward to get to the image. The figure is at location 14337 out of 17715.
I have copied a complete set of the manuals for IBM’s iSeries computers to the Kindle DX (483 MBs !!) and still have, with all the 580 items, 1,929 MB free. The Go to Page function does not work the same as in the O’Reilly document: you must add an offset for the pages assigned Roman numeral page numbers. The speed of page display is adequate, around a second.
The weight of the device is much more noticeable than for the Kindle 2. But my laptop is 5 lbs., more than 4 times the Kindle DX, and hotter to boot. And my DX has frozen for no apparent reason - in Amazon books - 3 or 4 times, requiring a reboot, and page forward to recover my place. I hope a sofware update is in the works.
The Kindle DX has only one set of buttons along the right side (when its held with the keyboard at the bottom). This is less convenient than the K2, but I find that turning the Kindle DX over, with the keyboard at the top works quite well when I want buttons on the left. If I need to create a note, rotating back is easy and quick.
By P.R.Widing
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