stackoverflow Posted January 10, 2012 Posted January 10, 2012 Looking into buying an ereader with limited functionality and a good price tag ($200 or less), primarily for reading scientific research papers. Has anyone purchased one with good PDF functionality?
robot_hamster Posted January 10, 2012 Posted January 10, 2012 I ended up with an iPad 2, which is much more than $200. The reason was because some of the good ereaders out there are not compatible with proxy servers and therefore are useless at school. I did hear that the Nook Tablet has proxy server compatibility. I tried it out at the store. It was so-so for reading PDF files. You could highlight (although a little wonky) and make notes.
mcstev13 Posted January 10, 2012 Posted January 10, 2012 I bought a Kindle Fire and use it all the time for reading papers in pdf format. It's great because I'll download a whole bunch before I take a flight or train trip and just spend the entire time catching up on the literature. Plus it's priced at $199, so it fits your budget.
robot_hamster Posted January 10, 2012 Posted January 10, 2012 I bought a Kindle Fire and use it all the time for reading papers in pdf format. It's great because I'll download a whole bunch before I take a flight or train trip and just spend the entire time catching up on the literature. Plus it's priced at $199, so it fits your budget. Are you able to use it at school? That was a huge complaint that the Kindle Fire isn't compatible with proxy servers. Unless your school doesn't use one, then I guess it wouldn't matter. I'm just curious because this was the reason I didn't buy one.
stackoverflow Posted January 11, 2012 Author Posted January 11, 2012 Are you able to use it at school? That was a huge complaint that the Kindle Fire isn't compatible with proxy servers. Unless your school doesn't use one, then I guess it wouldn't matter. I'm just curious because this was the reason I didn't buy one. Yeah I would also prefer that it had the free 3G just in case this becomes a problem. I know that the screen on the Fire is pretty small too (7"?). Is there a zoom function for papers because I can imagine they would be pretty difficult to read on such a small screen.
rising_star Posted January 12, 2012 Posted January 12, 2012 I don't know about your campus but, if I log onto the campus network, then I don't have to use a proxy server to access databases and journals electronically.
LLajax Posted January 12, 2012 Posted January 12, 2012 I have a Nook color (the tablet one) and adore it for reading pdfs (and romance novels). My roommate has a regular Kindle and uses it to do all her class readings, but I think she has bionic eyes or something, because the font is extremely small.
robot_hamster Posted January 18, 2012 Posted January 18, 2012 I heard good things about the Nook Tablet. They need to work on their PDF reader though. It's okay, but about the same (a little wonky) as the one on the Kindle.
katerific Posted February 1, 2012 Posted February 1, 2012 I recently got a Nook tablet. I love love love it. Reading pdfs is much easier for me. No more printing or lugging my laptop around! And I can check email on it and surf the web too, which is nice. Need wifi access, but it works fine on my campus/Starbucks/McDonald's/home/etc. The only problems so far: connecting to home internet was difficult for me because I am tech-retarded and had to go change my router settings and fiddle with MAC filtering (actually easy to do, but like I said, I'm tech-derpderpderp). Apparently this is a common problem though? Also, I still haven't figured out how to change pdf file names using the nook alone, although you can do that when you hook it up to your computer. As far as reading goes, it's easy to navigate around and zoom in and out, and you can highlight, bookmark and make sidenotes. The entire purchase for me was ~250, but I also bought a lovely and fashionable case for it. But you also get a free B&N membership when you buy the nook.
go3187 Posted February 10, 2012 Posted February 10, 2012 (edited) Yeah I would also prefer that it had the free 3G just in case this becomes a problem. I know that the screen on the Fire is pretty small too (7"?). Is there a zoom function for papers because I can imagine they would be pretty difficult to read on such a small screen. I have a regular Kindle (4th generation, Wi-Fi), and yes, you can zoom in. I prefer to read papers in landscape format (you can choose the orientation of the text on Kindle) without zooming in, but for some the text might still be too small. One can zoom in on an individual text column though, and assuming a 2-column format, a 200% zoom makes a column fit almost perfectly on the screen (for all the papers I've read on my Kindle so far, the screen at 200% zoom is still a bit larger than one column, so you see one column and about 1/10 of the other). I personally don't find it difficult to scroll down the text or jump from one column to the other. One possible disadvantage with the regular Kindle is its black and white screen. How big of an issue this is probably depends a bit on your field. It generally doesn't bother me much, but there've been times when I had to check a figure later on my computer. Edited February 10, 2012 by janet239
mandabeth Posted February 20, 2012 Posted February 20, 2012 I have the basic kindle (7" screen.) I love it for pdfs because you can email them to yourself and have them automatically download. I'll send an email with all my problem sets for the week, and then I don't have to carry my laptop with me all the time.
go3187 Posted February 20, 2012 Posted February 20, 2012 I have the basic kindle (7" screen.) I love it for pdfs because you can email them to yourself and have them automatically download. I'll send an email with all my problem sets for the week, and then I don't have to carry my laptop with me all the time. Oh, I never thought of that! Great idea!
CarlieE Posted February 21, 2012 Posted February 21, 2012 Any complaints about the Nook? Not the original nook, but the nook color was awful for me. I traded it in and got a Kindle Keyboard (the Kindle 3) and I LOVE LOVE LOVE my kindle keyboard. In fact, over 99% of my readings on it are in PDF - you can switch the font, size and orientation so that the pdf is very readable. And it's super light so my wrists don't get tired (I like reading in bed with my "book" propped up in my hands, while I lie down). As mandabeth said, you can email pdfs to yourself, but I just connect my kindle by USB and download all my pdfs that way. What's ncie is that if you have a pdf you like especially, you can email it to yourself and ask Amazon to make it into a kindle book. It might cost you - I think a few cents per mb? - but I've never had to do that. Also, a lot of my advanced readings for class are available as kindle books and MUCH cheaper than "real" books. ..my $0.10..
msafiri Posted February 21, 2012 Posted February 21, 2012 I got a Kindle Touch 3G for Christmas this year. I love it for reading novels but, I haven't really enjoyed reading PDFs on it. It's hard for me to get the text the right size so that I can read it without having to scroll all the freaking time. And maybe the scrolling is actually harder with the touch screen? I don't know. I'm hoping it'll get easier as I get more used to the touch screen but, I don't know. What I am currently liking is being able to download the first chapter of various academic books I might want to read in their entirety (either by buying them or getting them from the university library). For example, most of the recent Duke University Press books are available for the Kindle, and offer the option to get the first chapter for free as a preview. That said, this is even more useful right now since I'm in the field in Central America and don't have handy access to a library of books.
coffeeplease Posted February 21, 2012 Posted February 21, 2012 (edited) Not the original nook, but the nook color was awful for me. I traded it in and got a Kindle Keyboard (the Kindle 3) and I LOVE LOVE LOVE my kindle keyboard. In fact, over 99% of my readings on it are in PDF - you can switch the font, size and orientation so that the pdf is very readable. And it's super light so my wrists don't get tired (I like reading in bed with my "book" propped up in my hands, while I lie down). As mandabeth said, you can email pdfs to yourself, but I just connect my kindle by USB and download all my pdfs that way. What's ncie is that if you have a pdf you like especially, you can email it to yourself and ask Amazon to make it into a kindle book. It might cost you - I think a few cents per mb? - but I've never had to do that. Also, a lot of my advanced readings for class are available as kindle books and MUCH cheaper than "real" books. ..my $0.10.. Is it possible to annotate pdfs with the Kindle Keyboard? I've had my eye on that one, but wasn't sure if it would be worth the investment without the ability to take notes. Edited February 21, 2012 by coffeeplease
CarlieE Posted February 21, 2012 Posted February 21, 2012 Is it possible to annotate pdfs with the Kindle Keyboard? I've had my eye on that one, but wasn't sure if it would be worth the investment without the ability to take notes. It IS possible to annotate the PDFs (and kindle books) and highlight sections as well. The keyboard works like any other qwerty keyboard and isn't difficult to navigate. But it is simple and there are no "bells n whistles". I find that taking notes while reading can be disruptive and usually my notes during reading are very scattered so I still use a piece of paper to jot down random words/phrases that strike me as I read, then take more details in my notebook on the second or third reading of the article.
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