Amazon's Kindle 3: Solid Improvements, Buggy Software

When I saw the latest Kindle on Amazon, I almost kicked myself for buying the K2 three months earlier for $259. That's the way it goes, I told myself as I began to read the specs for the new Kindle 3.

I liked the new design with the graphite coloring. I'm glad that Amazon gave their customers the choice between white and graphite. I've had the white with the K2 and designed a skin for it because the white stains too easily.

I didn't care whether or not I had 3G. Wi-Fi has served me well, since all I do is read on the Kindle. What sold me on the Kindle 3 was the lengthy battery life, the expanded storage and the enhanced PDF reader. I placed my order on July 27th and waited until my Kindle 3 arrived on my doorstep yesterday afternoon.

The New Kindle Design

I'm glad that I chose the graphite because it adds richness to the sleek design. The plastic material is porous, so it will catch oils and grease if you're not careful. I liked the rounded edges but found myself missing that stupid joystick lever that I had gotten used to with the K2.

The Power slider is located on the bottom of the Kindle 3, which will take some getting used to. Amazon also changed the location of the Home, Menu and Back buttons to keyboard area and reserved the sides for the page navigation.

The smaller size is perfect for me. Holding the Kindle 3 is like holding a thin paperback. I can put my larger purse away and use my smaller ones, thanks to the new smaller size.

Reading ebooks on the Kindle 3

Right off the bat, I liked the contrast. It's a noticeable improvement over the K2, especially when you hold the two under the light. However, I did notice some ghosting on the Home page.

You can enlarge the fonts and change the typefaces. The typefaces come in regular, condensed and san serif. You also have the ability to change the line spacing, the words per line, turn on the text-to-speech and set the screen rotation.

Reading PDFs on the Kindle 3

This was the feature I looked forward to testing the most. I have several ebooks in PDF format that I wasn't able to read very well on the K2. Reading them on the Kindle 3 is a better experience because I can not only rotate the screen so that I can see more of the page, but I can enlarge the page to whatever size I want. I appreciate the way that I can scroll if the page is too large to fit the screen. I can also highlight the text.

Another feature that I appreciated was being able to transfer the PDF files from my computer to my Kindle without have to go through the email process. This proved especially helpful with the transfer of a large ebook. All I had to do was hook my Kindle up to my computer and copy the ebook to the Documents folder on the Kindle drive.

Reading in Sunlight

I took my Kindle outside and held it under the late morning sunlight. Holding it at a slight angle, I saw some glare but not enough to distract me from reading. The best positions for no glare are holding it flat or vertically.

Experimental Section

Because I use my Kindle for reading, I don't bother with the Experimental section, which contains the web browser, MP3 player and and text-to-speech. For the purpose of this review, I decided to test the browser and the text-to-speech. I'm not at all interested in the MP3.

When I clicked the web browser option, I was presented with a list of websites to choose from. I didn't get much of a chance to see what they all were because the Kindle took me to the Amazon site within two seconds. I couldn't figure out how to navigate back to the list, even when I hit the Back button. All that did was reload the Amazon site.

Although the audio sound quality was good, I didn't like the mechanical male voice that rattled off the words in the novel I'm reading. It didn't matter that I can change the speech rate; his voice sounded robotic, like the text-to-speech voices on my computer. A female voice is also available, but I decided to pass.

If I want to listen to an audio book, I think I'll buy them from Amazon or Barnes & Noble. You'll get much better quality than the audio on the Kindle.

Social Media

You can share your notes and highlights on Facebook and Twitter. Since my friends and I have completely different reading tastes, I'm going to have to pass on this feature.

Troubleshooting

My Kindle decided to freeze while I attempted to move a book into a collection. This happened several minutes after I had installed my PDF ebooks into the Documents folder. The screen froze and refused to budge.

Unlike the nook, you can't dismantle the Kindle battery and reinstall it. I went to Amazon and checked the troubleshooting section for the Kindle. They suggested to hold the power button for 15 seconds, and then release it. I did that with success.

While poking around with it this morning, I experienced another freeze. This one didn't last long, and the Kindle managed to unfreeze itself without me having to do anything.

Conclusion

Despite the touchy software, I like the Kindle 3 and would recommend it to anyone who is looking to buy an ereader. The size is perfect, reading PDFs is a better experience and I can expand my library to include both Kindle and PDF ebooks. I like the $139 price the best, although I think it might drop again for the holidays.