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Amazon’s Kindle satisfies preferences identified by e-book readers in the United States, based on a recent survey released by Strategy Analytics. The survey reported that current e-book readers report a high level of satisfaction with their devices, and prefer e-books to physical or “dead tree” books. It also reported that e-book readers are looking for three things in their devices: ease of access to books, ease of content transfer, and newspaper and magazine availability. With more than 400,000 titles available to purchase and increased access to free content through services such as Scribd, Amazon offers superior content availability. In addition, Kindle has 107 newspapers and 50 magazines available for subscription, including most of the major US and international periodicals. Both the Kindle and Kindle DX can access Amazon’s bookstore with 60 second downloads.
The one unknown factor is the strength of Apple’s brand recognition. With its strong marketing strategy, buildin up hype prior to this month’s release of the iPad, Apple is betting on brand recognition to tip the balance in its favor. While the survey reported that Apple ran a close second in terms of preferred brand, it also said content will still trump name recognition.
“While brand name is still an important factor for current owners when choosing their next e-book reader,” commented Chris Schreiner, Senior Analyst at Strategy Analytics. “Consumers buying their first e-book reader will focus more on the durability and availability of e-books.”
Strategy Analytics is an international research and consulting firm that specializes in the information, communication and entertainment industries.
 Amazon Kindle DX Right after international Kindle 2 was shipped there were some speculations about international version of Kindle DX shipping sometime in 2010. Well… There is no need to speculate anymore. Amazon has just announced international availability of its 9.7″ eBook Reader. International Kindle DX is available for pre-order right now and will ship on the 19th of January 2010 worldwide.
There doesn’t seem to be any changes to the software as compared to the US version. Kindle DX will most likely get software version 2.3 that is now standard for the entire line-up of Amazon eInk readers. Since it now runs on GSM 3G wireless rather than CDMA it benefits from the latest software update that extended battery life with wireless on to roughly a week.
Last time I’ve checked international Kindle book availability, most countries has 320,000+ books available, while US customers can choose from 404,000+ books.
Most likely new Kindle will have new hardware ID (first 4 symbols in the serial number) so all hacks, including the Unicode Font hack will need to be repackaged specifically for the new version.
This updated version of Kindle Unicode Fonts Hack works on all versions of Kindle software including the most recent 2.3 and installs on Kindle 2 US, Kindle 2 International and Kindle DX.
I’ve added more font combinations:
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GNU FreeFont – this hack uses GNU Free Fonts that come with Linux and are free to redistribute. All font styles are preserved (serif, sans-serif, mono-spaced, bold and italic) but these fonts only support Latin, Cyrillic characters and some others (click here for full coverage data). So if you are only interested in Russian books – this is the way to go. Otherwise this patch will do you little good. Here are download links:
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GNU Free Fonts SansSerif (recommended for Cyrillic) - same fonts as before but SansSerif family is used instead of Serif. In my opinion it looks better. Bold and italic styles are preserved:
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Droid Fallback Fonts (recommened for Asian glyphs) - this hack uses open-source Droid fallback font that is part of Google Android platform. Unfortunately styles and typefaces are missing completely. You’ll only get regular Sans Serif. The upside is the broadest character support. It supports Cyrillic, Chinese, Japanese and a bunch of other languages. This font also looks very good on the Kindle screen (in my opinion way better than native Kindle fonts). This is the patch I currently have installed on my Kindle 2. Here are download links:
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Droid Fonts with Styles – Same fonts as above but all families and styles are there. However Asian characters are not supported:
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Droid Fallback with Styles SansSerif – Same as above but Serif fonts are replaced with Sans Serif because I believe it is more readable on Kindle screen:
Visit the Kindle Unicode Fonts Hack page for detailed instructions.
It definitely looks like I’ll have to eat my words… One month ago I made a statement that there will be fewer Kindle software updates and that chances of new features being added via update are slim. At least on the second count I was wrong. Amazon has released Kindle software version 2.3 for Kindle 2 US, Kindle 2 International and Kindle DX. It added significant features to all of these devices. In fact Amazon deemed the update so significant that they’ve sent out emails to Kindle owners about it.
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Kindle 2 International (wireless by AT&T) got a significant battery life boost. You can now go for a week without having to recharge the device and keep the wireless on. Since it doesn’t apply to the US version of Kindle 2 (that uses Sprint for wireless connectivity) it looks like Amazon didn’t change the poll frequency but either fixed some bug in wireless driver or took advantage of a technology similar to PUSH email.
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Both US and international versions of Kindle 2 got native PDF support based on the same code that was used in Kindle DX. Now you can also manually switch screen orientation to landscape. Kindle DX style automatic switching doesn’t work since Kindle 2 devices lack the accelerometer hardware. PDF files are better cropped now as blank margins don’t use up valuable screen space. This is especially important for small 6″ Kindle screens since PDF viewer still lacks zoom feature.
- Since all Kindle versions now support PDF, sending PDF file to @kindle.com email will no longer convert it to native Kindle format by default. If you still want the conversion to happen, you should put the word “Convert” in the email subject.
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Kindle DX screensaver activation time was increased from 5 minutes to 20 minutes. This makes sense since larger screen can contain more text that takes longer to read.
- All Kindle versions will not require signed update packages. This problem however has already been solved.
Normally you Kindle would update itself automatically if you have wireless connectivity. However if you do not or the update failed because you had hacks installed, you can update Kindle manually. This time around though, rather than trying to hit dynamic URLs that are supposed to always provide the latest version, you can download the update from the appropriate static location. These locations are listed on Amazon.com Help page.
By bringing all Kindle devices to the same version, Amazon will simplify software development process in the long run. They may change the update process in the future to cut the update delivery costs. 2.3 update package was around 10 megabytes large. If they keep the current method update packages will get only larger.
At the moment there is no update for 1st generation Kindle. And dare I make another prediction – the chances of it happening are rather slim.
While we are on the topic of updates. There might be another update currently in the works in Lab126. On Kindle Facebook page Kindle developers have posted the following message:
Amazon Kindle Kindle Customers, We have heard from many of you that you would like to have a better way to organize your growing Kindle libraries. We are currently working on a solution that will allow you to organize your Kindle libraries. We will be releasing this functionality as an over-the-air software update as soon as it is ready, in the first half of next year. – The Kindle Team
Personally I have just one question left: Where are the bleeping Unicode fonts? Amazon, seriously! Is it too much trouble to replace the current fonts with ones that support wider range of characters? Although with PDF support in place there is workaround via PDF font embedding, it would be nice to have native support as well.
I guess this leaves me with little choice but to recompile Kindle Unicode Font Hack to work with Kindle Software 2.3… I’ll post as soon as it’s ready and tested.
Personally I’m used to updating software. Pretty much every week one or another piece of software on my PC updates – be it Windows itself, the antivirus, iTunes or whatever. I’ve subconsciously come to expect the same from Kindle. And at first Kindle firmware did update quite frequently:
As you can see it seems that Kindle 2 got several updates soon after release and then there was silence.
Early update rush was caused by bugs in the new software. One or two updates were caused by law suit (Text-to-speech, and Orwell book deletion). However, note that none of the updates introduced new features. I guess Amazon sticks to the policy – don’t fix it if it ain’t broken.
Kindle DX and Kindle international share most of the software with original Kindle so there is little room for new critical bugs.
But most importantly, the number of Kindles in operation has exploded since the beginning of 2009. And this is probably the most important reason why we will not see many Kindle updates in the future and probably none of them will be feature driven. Amazon pays Sprint 12 cents per megabyte transferred. It would be safe to assume that Amazon gets similar pricing from AT&T for domestic traffic and a much higher price for data roaming. Average Kindle update is 2 megabytes in size. Because of the way Amazon structures the update packages, this accumulates as each subsequent update includes all previous updates as well. So first update was 2 megs, second one was 4, third – 6, etc.
6 megabytes times 12 cents is $0.72 per device updated. By some estimates there may be 2..3 million Kindle devices in operation. Let’s assume that 80% of devices are within wireless coverage (although in reality this number can be much higher). This adds up to $1,440,000 to $2,160,000 per software update deployment and increasing with every update version. And this is just to update domestic Kindles. I wouldn’t even want to think about the pricing to worldwide distribution. Also I wouldn’t want to be the software developer who makes a critical bug that causes an update or that software developer’s boss for that matter…
Given these numbers I don’t believe that Amazon would release update unless they have a very strong reason to do so. Strong reason being a court order or something else of this sort. This more or less addresses they questions of where Amazon will add folders, PDF support for Kindle 2 or official Unicode fonts for that matter via an update. The answer is a definite NO.
On the issue of fonts I’m most sure since Unicode fonts in the updates that I use (that add only partial support without all of the font styles) are 1.5..3 megabytes. Proper Unicode support can easily add up to 10 megabytes. So this would mean millions of dollars spent with potential to spend more millions in the future and near zero return of investment since although many people would like to have this feature, for most of them it’s not a deal-breaker (especially since on Kindle DX you can have any kind of fonts via PDF files). The few books that have non-Latin characters that Amazon sells use Topaz format to embed the extra glyphs that they need. So adding Unicode fonts would help customers read books that Amazon doesn’t sell. In this light the question about Unicode fonts via an update for existing devices is a no-brainer.
It is possible that this support would be included in Kindle 3 or whatever else the next generation Kindle will be called since in this case the cost for Amazon is just licencing fee for the fonts.
 I’ve create Unicode Font Hack that also works on Kindle 2 International. I’ve also reorganized the files to minimize download times. Each device/font combination can now be downloaded as separate file. That file would contain only update binaries. Source code for all binaries can be downloaded separately. I’ve updated the hack page accordingly. You can find instructions as well as more detailed information there.
I’ve made the following changes to the hack:
- Removed browser only hack since it didn’t add much value – if you still want it you’ll need to build it from the sources yourself.
- Changed the uninstaller so that it removes extra font files completely as some of you have requested this feature.
- Since droid hack uses the same font, rather than making multiple copies I’m using symlinks now so the hack uses less disk space on Kindle.
Here are installation instructions:
- Download one of the following files:
- Droid fonts: this is an open-source font that comes from Android Google OS. This font looks quite nice and supports Asian characters. However it only comes in sans serif style:
- Liberation fonts. These fonts come from RedHat linux and are open-source. Personally I don’t find them as nice as droid. It doesn’t support Asian characters. However it does support all 3 font styles – serif, sans serif and mono-spaced.
- If you have international version of Kindle 2 you need to jailbreak it first:
- Connect your Kindle to PC via the USB cable.
- Download this file: update_freekindle-k2i.bin
- Copy it to the root directory of your Kindle.
- Press Home. Press Menu. Select Settings. Press Menu. Select Update Your Kindle. Select OK.
- The update WILL fail. This is expected. However from now on you will be able to install custom Kindle updates.
- Connect your Kindle to PC via the USB cable.
- Copy update package that corresponds to your device to to the root directory of your Kindle.
- Press Home. Press Menu. Select Settings. Press Menu. Select Update Your Kindle. Select OK.
- The update will install, Kindle will restart and when it does – new fonts are going to be in effect. Please not that for International Kindle it will take some time before the installation progress bar moves as font files are large and it takes a long time for Kindle to verify the update signature.
To uninstall:
- Connect your Kindle to PC via the USB cable.
- Download and copy uninstall package that corresponds to your device to to the root directory of your Kindle.
- Press Home. Press Menu. Select Settings. Press Menu. Select Update Your Kindle. Select OK.
- The update will install, Kindle will restart and when it does – old fonts will be used and there will be no trace of the hack in the Kindle file system. So official updates will install once again.
If you would like to customize the fonts – you can do so by downloading the hack sources and modifying them. I have to warn you that this is risky business though. It may be a good idea to install the antibrick hack before you proceed.
 Amazon Kindle DX Refurbished Kindle DX is once again available for purchase at Amazon. It comes with the same 1 year warranty as the new Kindle DX but at $90.00 discount (18.4%).
I’ve just noticed that refurbished Kindle DX is currently out of stock. You can still purchase the new one for $489.00. I”ll notify you when this changes.
Amazon Kindle DX While browsing the announcements about Kindle 2 international launch I’ve stumbled upon a post on electricpig.co.uk in which James Holland claims that Amazon UK spokesman Ben Howes telling that “we (Amazon) expect to add a Kindle DX family member with international roaming sometime next year.”
This is interesting piece of news, although you can hardly call it surprising since there is obviously demand for such a device, “sometime next year” is a rather wide period of time (I’m sure that Amazon will release something and Kindle DX seems logical), also there is little that is preventing Amazon from releasing such a device:
- Hardware and software changes are rather trivial and low cost.
- Amazon managed to untangle the horrible mess called international copyright law and publishing rights and implement geographical restrictions for books based on country and still come up with decent number of books for most of the 169 countries to which Kindle 2 will start shipping on October 19.
- They’ve managed to set up wireless connectivity in 100+ countries by taking advantage of AT&T roaming agreements. While data prices are substantial and infer usage restrictions (international download surcharge, no web-browsing, etc) but it works for Kindle 2 and it will work for Kindle DX
- Amazon had distribution and logistics set up and figured out long before Kindle 1 was released.
So you would ask why not release it now? There are several possible reasons and most likely all of them play a role to a different degree each:
- If Amazon does two releases that are several months apart, they would generate hype twice and benefit from two spikes in sales. If they were to release both devices together I doubt there would have been twice as much hype. I think that Amazon is carefully timing their releases and price drops to maintain maximum possible customer attention to their product in the long run. After all Amazon was selling products made by other companies (some of them quite hyped, like iPod Touch), they know sales volume and how much does it spike after a piece of news and at what pace it then drops. And it would make total sense for them to use this knowledge to their advantage.
- It’s easier and cheaper to test new technology (3G GSM modem integration) on one device and then apply your experience to integrating this technology into another device. It’s also easier to retool one production line than two. If you consider the fact that Kindle DX was sold out for almost a month this summer it makes sense that Amazon would like to avoid disruptions in production if they can.
- Perhaps international Kindle DX will include additional features like better PDF support, touchscreen or some other innovations. These take time to develop. Taking a pause would also let Amazon see how Sony touchscreen eReaders would fare and make a decision on whether to go down that road or not.
- If you look in the upper left corner of BlogKindle.com you will see that Amazon already sells 6 Kindle devices, all with different price points. Adding another one might confuse customers too much and disrupt the buying process. So Amazon would likely phase out US version of Kindle 2, merging it with refurbished Kindle 2. Then they would have 6 months before they would need to worry about reselling refurbished international Kindles.
If I were to guess when would Amazon roll out international Kindle DX I would say: “not for another 4 months” since this seems to be the pace they’ve set this year and considering that Amazon just did their “holiday season release” and it would make little sense to dump something on the unsuspecting customers amid holidays.
Let’s wait and see…
 Kindle Copy-Paste As I was playing around with my Kindle DX, I’ve found an undocumented feature that can be used in a couple of ways. I checked and it also works in Kindle 2. It’s possible that it is known in the Kindle community or even documented but I wasn’t aware of it until I discovered it by accident the same way as I’ve found Kindle calculator easter egg.
If you start selecting text in Kindle book or document with 5-way controller but instead of pressing the controller the second time to highlight the selection press any alphanumeric key or space bar, the highlighted text would get copied into the search box as shown on picture.
From here you can go two ways:
- either use this text as a search query against current book/document, all of your kindle content, Kindle Store, Google, Wikipedia or default dictionary (to change search scope tilt 5-way controller left or right)
- or select the rightmost search button “note” that would paste text from a search box to a newly created note. You can then edit the note text as you see fit. The note will be anchored to the location where you have finished your selection.
I hope you will find this tip useful.
Amazon Kindle DX For quite some time Amazon was selling refurbished Kindle devices at a discount:
Now you can also get refurbished Kindle DX with 9.7″ screen and PDF support at $90.00 (18%) discount for $399.00.
It should be noted that refurbished Kindles come with the same 1 year warranty as new ones.
Thanks to reader UB for letting me know about this via a comment.
I’ll keep you updated on the stock status of all 3 models at it changes.
I’ve covered before the possible applications that the Kindle and other eReaders could have in education. With Amazon’s pilot program for Kindle usage at universities, this semester is a testing of the waters for the future of eTextbooks. The students involved have begun to voice their impressions, and they’re not entirely satisfied.
Does this mean that eReader adoption in the academic world will slow down? Probably not. The whole point of the Kindle trial is to see what works, and what doesn’t, when eReaders are put in the classroom. So far students like the convenience of textbooks in the Kindle platform, but aren’t happy about studying with it. Complaints are mainly about the inconvenience of note taking and flipping between passages when compared to traditional books.
But these complaints aren’t surprising. The Kindle isn’t designed as an academic tool. The whole reason for its success is that it is an entertainment device, created for the purpose of reading books for entertainment. The opposite would be something like the Plastic Logic, which was created explicitly for the business world with entertainment as a secondary goal. Chances are, Amazon is planning something similar to the touchscreen enabled Plastic Logic, some sort of Kindle academic edition. Touch screen would be the most obvious addition, but a school oriented Kindle will probably find other ways to innovate as well. The pilot program means that Amazon now has tons of data explaining exactly what students need from an academic eReader. I don’t see why Amazon wouldn’t use it.
 Kindle DX, Kindle 2, Sony PRS-505 It so happened that I purchased Sony PRS-505 for my Dad. I chose Sony eReader because my Dad living outside WhisperNet coverage and having very little knowledge of English language (and therefore no interest in any books that are sold on Amazon.com) effectively negated all benefits of Amazon Kindle.
On the other hand Sony eBook reader is extensively used by Russian community so on top of Unicode fonts there’s also complete localization of UI available in Russian (and in many other languages). A lot of credit for this should be given to Igor Skochinsky who also made Unicode Font Hack possible by figuring out a way to create custom updates for Amazon Kindle.
Therefore I’ve had a chance to briefly compare the Sony reader with both Kindle 2 and Kindle DX side-by-side. I would like to share my impressions on the subject. It is in no way a complete review – just an opinion. But perhaps someone will find it useful.
Exterior: Although I found Sony PRS-505 more visually pleasing than Kindle, I found pagination buttons of Kindle more comfortable. This is kind of a big deal since flipping pages constitutes 95% of eBook reader usage. It is nice that Sony eReader comes with protective cover included. I also purchased cover with light prism. It looked really cool all the way up to the moment when I turned it on. Then I found that it somewhat reduces text contrast. On the bright side, it leaks much less light than Mighty Bright XtraFlex that I use with Kindle. I also found 10 numerical buttons on PRS-505 handy and highly functional.
Display: Both Kindle 2 and PRS-505 sport 6″ eInk displays of the same resolution of 600×800. They differ in the number of supported colors: 16 for Kindle vs. 8 for Sony and in contrast which I subjectively found to be higher in the Sony reader.
Storage: Kindle 2 sports 1.4Gb of internal flash memory storage usable for books, while Sony device has significantly less (192Mb) but compensates for it by having 2 expansion slots that can potentially add 10Gb of additional storage. Plus you have the ability to swap memory cards that you carry in your pocket making the storage potentially unlimited. Not that it really matters because as I’ve shown in Kindle 2 vs. Kindle DX comparison, you’ll need to spend around $8,500 to completely fill up 1.4Gb of Kindle storage with books. So unless you use your reader for viewing manga as collection of JPEG files or go on solo many times around the world boat trips without a computer you really should not care either way.
Software: Sony seems to resume from sleep mode faster than Kindle. It also offers more in terms of organizing your book collection. Latter is a major pain point and probably the most requested feature by Kindle users. I would very much like Kindle to do a better job at organizing the books I purchased. There really is no reason for this feature to not be there given that Kindles have fully functional keyboard that would make naming collections and tags really easy. On the other hand Kindle sports some features that are not found in its Sony competitor like text-to-speech and web-browser.
PDF Support: While Kindle 2 only supports PDF via conversion, Kindle DX has a native support like the Sony does. While I didn’t have a chance to explore in detail PDF capabilities of Sony PRS-505 like I did with Kindle DX, I did try one PDF file. I have to admit that Sony does a better job at supporting PDF than Kindle because PRS-505 supports internal hyperlinks and table of contents as well as reflowing text to accommodate different font sizes. 9.7″ screen size of Kindle DX that can also work in landscape mode provides a saving straw because it makes reflowing unnecessary for many PDF files.
PC Software and book buying experience: I didn’t install the Sony software as my Dad would have no use for it (he only plans to read Russian classics that are freely available on the Internet) and I didn’t need to install Amazon software because there isn’t any. Although it may seem unfair (since I haven’t tried the Sony way) I’ll say that comparing book buying experience for Kindle and Sony would be like beating a dead horse. It’s the main selling point of Amazon Kindle and it’s what made it so successful.
Conclusion: Overall I liked the Sony device even tough it’s soon going to be outdated by newer models some of which will have touchscreen (another highly anticipated Kindle feature). Sony seems to have better software and both Amazon and Sony have strong and weak points in ergonomics. If I could have the same book buying experience and selection on Sony as I have with Amazon Kindle, I’d probably go with Sony eReader. However since things are the way they are, I’m staying with Kindle and my dad will use Russian-localized version of PRS-505 to read classics freely available from sites like lib.ru
P.S.: I’ve alredy finished this comparison review when I discovered a new aspect of these devices I wasn’t aware of. Kindle turned out to be much better for non-English speakers who want to learn the language than Sony PRS-505 due to built-in dictionary and text-to-speech capability. My sister started reading English books with intent of enriching her active vocabulary. Built-in dictionary lookup saved her tons of time each time the ran into an unfamilar word. Text-to-speech gave her a very good idea of how each word sounds as she read along with the device. So Kindle although lacking free Internet connectivity outside the US can still be perfect for some foreign users.
When I get my hands on newer Sony eReader models I’ll see how they stack up against the Kindle and post some reviews as well.
I’ve come across yet another way to crash Kindle DX: connect it via USB cable to your PC and try copying over a dictionary file. After copying around 2MB of data Kindle drive disconnects from the computer, Kindle goes into home screen and then freezes. I discovered this when trying to copy over Merriam-Webster’s Collegiate Dictionary without using WhisperNet (since I’m currently outside the coverage zone).
The bug was pretty consistent regardless of which folder I tried to copy the file to. However after I’ve successfully copied the file over (I’ll explain how in a second) I couldn’t get my Kindle DX to crash with this file again. Copying the same file to Kindle 2 also worked out fine.
I’ve noticed that once some portion of file was copied you can append to it and it will not cause crashes. So I used robocopy.exe to resume the copy operation. To do it you need to put the file you want to copy in a separate folder and then run robocopy.exe /z . k:\documents after resetting your Kindle DX, assuming K: is your Kindle drive letter. If you are running Windows Vista it already comes with robocopy installed, for other versions you can download it here.
After the process was complete it seems that my Kindle works fine and there is no lasting damage. However if you would like to try reproducing this bug please to it at your own risk as your mileage may vary. Let me know if you experience something similar.
Later I did some additional testing and found out that other dictionaries would crash Kindle DX in the same way as well and for some dictionary files the robocopy workaround doesn’t seem to work. I’ve notified Amazon so hopefully it will get fixed sometime soon. With any luck this had already happened in Kindle 2.1.1 update that some people are getting already and that’s listed in the Kindle source code section along with Kindle 2.0.4 update.
On the Kindle source code page two new packages recently appeared:
Some users have already reported receiving these updates on your devices. Manual Kindle software update URL still returns 2.0.3 for me and there is no known URL to check for Kindle DX updates at the moment. There doesn’t seem to be any update for the original 1st generation Kindle at the moment.
If you notice any differences after your Kindle updates, please let me know. This would also be a good time to temporarily revert Unicode Font Hack or any other firmware-altering hacks that you have installed so that automated update installation will not fail. You can safely reapply hacks after you get the updates.
 David Byrne Reviews for the Kindle seem to pop up from some of the most unexpected people. One new response to the Kindle DX comes from David Byrne, the front man of the legendary Talking Heads (and one half of the duo responsible for last years phenomenal Everything That Happens Will Happen Today). It might seem a little odd to hear gadget commentary from Byrne, but when you’re a world famous performer you do a lot of traveling. The Kindle DX simply seemed like the ideal traveler’s accessory.
His review is for the most part positive. Byrne likens the Kindle’s screen to the same quality as a black and white newspaper and perfectly suited for reading. He raves about magazines on the device and how he can read the New Yorker without ads and with the latest issue wirelessly appearing on his Kindle. Byrne does have a few gripes about Amazon’s proprietary format, however, and takes some time in his review to decry how closed off the platform is and his overall disapproval of DRM.
More interesting is his speculation for the Kindle’s future. Byrne predicts that it won’t be long before the format is broken open and future of digital book publishing will involve formats with less DRM restrictions or none at all just as it happened with digital music market with Apple, Microsoft and Amazon selling DRM-free MP3 files.
The Kindle DX has a nice, big screen. For the most part, the extra large screen is used to make newspapers and magazines easier to read. But one of the cooler applications that Amazon offers is the ability to buy sheet music.
Amazon sells sheet music from the catalog of Novato Music Press. While reading on a Kindle 2 is made a little difficult by the smaller screen, the Kindle DX does a great job of displaying full pages of music. Plus, sheet music on the Kindle store is cheap: individual pieces can be as little as about $1.50. The only real downside is the hassle of refreshing the Kindle whenever you need to turn the page, but this isn’t that different than regular sheet music.
Are there any musicians who read this blog? Have you tried reading sheet music off of the Kindle? Leave your thoughts in the comments.
Since I’m currently travelling in the UK for more than a month already, I have Wireless turned off on both Kindle 2 and Kindle DX that I have. After a month of moderate reading while Kindle was getting an occasional small charge only when I connected it to the computer to sync new content battery indicators on both K2 and DX were showing roughly 75% battery capacity.
My original intent was to wait some more and then make a post about how great Kindle battery life is if you turn off the wireless. However before I could do that, interesting thing happened. When my wife turned on her K2 the charge indicator jumped from 75% to “critical low” (battery icon with exclamation mark). Kindle had to be charged. In a couple of days exactly the same thing happened to my Kindle DX.
This happened about one month after devices were fully changed. What is interesting that although my wife read roughly 3 times as many pages as I did, batteries in our devices ran out at about the same time. So it looks like it was more related to idle time rather than usage.
Amazon’s official stance is that with wireless turned off Kindle should go around 2 weeks without a charge depending on the usage. Ours lasted twice as long. However what’s more interesting is the way charge suddenly dropped to zero. Something you should keep in mind if you intend to take your Kindle somewhere without electricity for long time.
I’m interested if anyone has observed similar strange behaviour?
 Kindle DX Package After a little bit over a month of being on back order, Kindle DX can be purchased with same day shipping again. Either Amazon has ramped up their manufacturing or the peak of initial demand has been satisfied already. However back-to-school shopping might kick in any time now…
 Business intelligence software vendor, MicroStrategy, has decided to make its reports available to the Kindle DX. Now, any company that is a client of MicroStrategy’s services has the option to download Kindle DX friendly pdfs directly over Whispernet.
While this announcement only applies to those who already buy services from MicroStategy, I think it’s worth mentioning for a couple of reasons. This is an example of a company targeting the Kindle specifically for use in a business environment. This is markedly different from the current, consumer-centric marketing Amazon has done. Thus far, eReaders have been essentially thought of as a toy (not that that is a bad thing) that people use for their own enjoyment. Using the Kindle for work is a somewhat novel idea, if only for the moment.
But while the Kindle’s use by MicroStrategy is fairly rudimentary, it demonstrates the potential of eReaders. They have turned the Kindle DX into an office on the go. The wireless capabilities allow employees to download needed documents from anywhere, and the large eInk display provides and easy to view and easy to share alternative to office paper.
Right now the only downsides are lack of color and the general spottiness of the Kindle DX’s PDF support. These are temporary issues, however, as eReaders will continue to develop. At some point in the future, it’s likely that more and more businesses will move towards some sort of eReader standard. The idea of a paperless office, which has long seemed unlikely, may not be too far off.
After using Kindle DX for a while I would like to add to my first impressions. In my original review I’ve described large screen as more of a disadvantage because of the reduced mobility rather than something good. After Almost a month of usage I’ve changed my opinion.
I’ve actually come to like the larger screen. Reading experience is more book-like. I’ve used second smallest font on both Kindle DX and K2. With DX I have to slip pages less often and I actually like it this way because this actually distracts me a little bit from the process of reading. I’ve also found that additional weight doesn’t tire my hand this much and that I actually read at home much more than I do on the go.
Then there was another occurrence that elevated my opinion about DX even more. My eyes can hardly be called perfect. I wear +4.0/+5.0 glasses or contacts on constant basis. There was this evening when I already took out my contacts and then decided to read a little bit before going to sleep. Yet, alas! My glasses were nowhere to be found. I took my DX and set the font size to second largest that turned out quite comfortable to read with my uncorrected eyesight. With Kindle DX even at such large font size there was enough text on the screen for me to enjoy reading. I tried the same trick on Kindle 2 later and there were only 2 or 3 sentences on the screen at a time so I had to flip pages several times a minute.
I realize that this is all not rocket science but perhaps this first hand experience will help someone to decide Kindle DX vs. Kindle 2 dilemma :)
Looks like I’ve found a bug in Kindle DX PDF viewer: any time I open the second page of this PDF file Kindle DX would go into quick reboot. When it comes out of the reboot all of the items are gone from the home screen. To get them back I needed to create some dummy text file to force folder rescan.
It would be nice if someone could try to reproduce this crash and confirm that this problem is not specific to my Kindle. A word of warning though – although there seemed to be no lasting damage to my device and all my files were intact as well this kind of crashes (I would guess a buffer overflow or NULL pointer dereference) have potential for damaging the data. So if you feel like reproducing this bug do it at your own risk.
I’ll also follow up on this issue with Amazon and keep you posted on the progress.
 Kindle DX cant download PDF (by nirmalpatel.com) Although Amazon added native support for PDF to Kindle DX they didn’t add the ability to download these directly from the Internet. I believe that this feature was left out deliberately rather than by chance because Amazon pays Sprint $0.12 for each megabyte downloaded. In the case of PDFs cost of downloading PDFs to users for free can easily top profits from book and device sales because as we know Amazon’s profit is not that big as they are trying to grab as much market as possible.
Recently Nirmal Patel created a hack for Kindle DX (based on the source code of UFHack) that enables direct PDF downloads. Since at the moment I’m outside US and don’t have WhisperNet coverage I can’t truly test it however I looked at the hack – it’s very simple and should work.
It installs and uninstalls just as any other Kindle hack:
- Download update_install_download_pdfs_from_browser.bin to install the hack or update_uninstall_download_pdfs_from_browser.bin to uninstall it.
- Connect your Kindle to PC using USB cable and copy the file to root folder.
- Press “Menu”, select “Settings”, press “Menu”, select “Update Your Kindle” and then select “Ok”.
- You Kindle will reboot and changes will be applied.
PDF download hack is compatible with other hacks such as unicode fonts hack and screensaver hack.
While I congratulate Nirmal Patel on this hack I do urge you to enjoy it responsibly and don’t abuse Kindle’s 3G connection because should this become a significant financial liability for Amazon they can easily start signing update packages with strong cryptographic keys and this would prevent any other hacks from working altogether.
Also keep in mind that when you download stuff using your Kindle, Amazon knows:
- What exactly and when you download since it all goes through their proxy server.
- Where you live since your address is in your account information.
- Where you are right now since Kindles can triangulate their position based on cell towers with accuracy of several hundred feet.
- Your credit card number since you have it on file so you can buy Kindle books.
Arizona State University is one of six schools of higher education that are planning to deploy the Kindle DX this fall. They are, however, coming under fire from both the National Federation of the Blind and the American Council of the Blind over its use.
The two organizations have jointly filed suit against ASU in an attempt to stop the Kindle’s planned usage. While the Kindle does include a text-to-speech feature, all menus and navigation, including the ability to activate text-to-speech, are completely inaccessible to blind students. According to the lawsuit, if any University uses the Kindle as their primary means of textbook distribution, it is in clear violation of federal accessibility standards. A press release detailing the plaintiff’s position can be found here.
Public Universities, being governmental institutions, are required by federal law to meet strict guidelines regarding accessibility. Since the Kindle clearly does not meet these guidelines, there only seems to be two possible ways this could turn out: Either ASU (and the five other schools) cancel their plans to use the Kindle, or Amazon releases an update which adds accessibility features to the Kindle Store and menus. It would be a relatively simple software change for Amazon to make, so hopefully that is the route that things take. Then, the only problem would be the legal issues surrounding text-to-speech itself.
 Kindle DX Sold Out I recently checked Kindle DX product page at Amazon.com and surpirse -surpise! It’s sold out for another 4-6 weeks. Kindle 2 is still readily available for overnight shipment. It looks like Amazon and me have underestimated demand for it.
I’ll keep monitoring Amazon.com website and keep you updated when it becomes available again.
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