Barnes & Noble Nook Reviews

Not Hooked on Nook

It was 2:00 pm when the guy in the brown uniform knocked on my door with a brown box in his hand. The Nook had arrived!

By 2:30 I had finished setting it up, charging the battery, registering at Barnes and Noble, and downloading a few free items. I also brought over a few books from my PC that I had been reading using B&N’s PC reader software.

The Nook looks good: sleek design. Though a bit smaller in overall dimensions, the Nook’s screen is the same size as Kindle and Sony—6”. All in all, it’s a nice looking device.

As for reading, the default font looked similar to what I was used to on the Kindle, but when I switched to the Helvetica Neue the print looked much brighter and easier to read. My eyes need a strong contrast, and Helvetica provided it and made reading on the Nook a pleasure.

Reading, though, is only part of the experience when using an electronic reader. Operations– things like page turning, menu selection, font choice, page marking, etc. — also contribute to the pleasure (or not) of using the device. For operations, the Nook uses a small, colorful touch screen, located in a 3.5 inch panel below the reading screen. And here, the implementation of what seems like a good idea, fails.

The screen is too small and crowded for my fingers to punch or slide around on. The space allowed for the virtual keyboard is also too small for my fingers, and I often hit the key beside the one I was targeting. Correcting errors is even harder, because the back space icon is so tiny, and the response time for a screen punch is far too SLOW.

Overall, I would prefer either a larger screen, with enough room to navigate on, or some other mechanical way of controlling its function. I have nothing against touch screens, by the way. I use them on cell phones. But the Nook’s implementation of this idea is not an enhancement—it’s a detriment.

The news is better for connectivity. The Nook use AT&T 3G services for the default connection, but it also has WiFi. This is a big improvement in speed and for those times when the AT&T signal is non-existent or too weak to be useful.

Set up with my home WiFi was simple and fast, and I was soon logged on to the Barnes and Noble site. Most unfortunately, this feature is somewhat negated by the absence of a browser. This means that the B&N site is the only internet address you can reach with the Nook. At least the Kindle has a browser that lets you get on the web, although, the E Ink screens are not exactly made for easy browsing. But, it is nice to be able to do it now and then. This was a disappointment for the Nook, and to me, a major one.

Battery life seems short. Using the color screen certainly drains the battery quickly, and I used it frequently and for extended sessions. Part of the reason was that it was too difficult to use, so I had to do many operations over and over.

On the up-side for the Nook, the downloading and PC connections for transferring books, magazines and pictures work well. I had no trouble bringing in non-B&N content. It reads ePub and PDF files easily, as well as its own native format. The only hitch I ran into was that to put a non-B&N content on the Nook, it must be downloaded into the directory for magazines, newspapers and personal documents.

The last crimp in the Nook is that it froze up on me overnight. I put it to bed with the screen saver on, as they recommend. But, next morning, it would not wake up. I tried everything I know, but nothing worked. Finally I exercised the nuclear option: I removed the back, took the battery out and then put it back in. That did it. The Nook awoke and was ready for work. But, that shouldn’t happen. It usually means a software glitch that the programmers did not anticipate when they wrote the code, so a software fix is probably in the mix sometime in the future.

This was the last straw, and prompted me to make an appointment with the guys in brown again to pick up what they had dropped off. A return trip to a Texas warehouse is called for, and I won’t be seeing a Nook again.

It is a nice looking machine with some excellent features. But the negatives are too serious for me to keep it. I’ll try again when the Nook II is released.

This is the WORST electronic device I have ever purchased. I was home after surgery and thought it would be entertaining to have. It never worked properly. It clicks when pages turn, takes several minutes to turn on -if it does. Usually have to remove the battery and reset everything to get it to turn on. B&N offered to replace it. I had to ship it back and am now waiting two weeks for it to arrive. Now I’m on hold with their tech people and they have lost it. Guess it doesn’t matter because it’s a piece of crap anyway…
Oh, and I can’t give any feature a one, it is a zero!!! but the site required a minimum.

I just got a Nook reader a few days ago. It is a nice reader, but I found a few things I do not like.

Screen is actually very good. Very little eye strain even after reading for several hours at a time. Fairly easy to acquire new books and start reading. And no, unlike JBarrett’s experience, page turn is very quick, even though the E-Ink jitter is there. And while I did experience a seeming lockup once, clicking the power button on the top did restart it, and it remembered the page I was on… So being used to mobile phones needing reboots, I am willing to accept this one for now. 3G works well, WIFI works well too and is faster than 3G, although I wish B&N has allowed for 802.11n ability instead of only 802.11g. But that’s only the techie in me…

I am running v1.4, which it updated itself to almost as soon as I switched it on. That is nice. The option of having a few screensavers is also nice. There is browser on this version, but I ca not get it to anything else other than the initial page. It does say beta on it up front…

Here is what I do not like so much: The Nook claims 2GB of storage for B&N stuff and personal items. What I did not find mentioned anywhere is that the OS storage is part of that, and is a whopping 700+MB. That leaves you with approximately 1.28Gb of storage for your books and music. That is, before you add an SD card. Almost halves the storage right there.

The second thing I have run across is after getting full charge, and with WIFI mostly off, the battery is at 55% after roughly 48 hours. I have actually used the Nook for reading for maybe 10 hours at most. WIFI was on for less than 30 minutes out of that. I did not switch on Airplane mode, just turned WIFI off. I am not sure how long the charge will actually last. I am something of a speed reader, so I guess I may turn pages more frequently. And perhaps some settings need to be played with. But at the moment I am somewhat skeptical of the 10-day claim.

On another note, B&N Digital Support folks have been VERY helpful, even to the extent of researching their answer before coming back to me with it. For that kind of service, I do not mind being put on hold for five to ten minutes. Thanks guys for the clarification about the memory issue.

I’ve had the Nook now for several weeks. Overall, I love it! To make this short and to the point…the LCD color screen is a great feature.It’s great to see your book covers in color. Great design especially compared to the Kindle. I love being able to swipe my finger to turn the page. Not a fan of the clicking which is the only available option on the Kindle. Overall size isn’t bad. Froze on me once but I quickly fixed it. Barnes and Noble offers my favorite classics for free. Right now you get 12 free books every week. LOVE IT!. Battery life is questionable. It will lose power when not being used. I recently turned on airplane mode so I will see how that works. Books download crazy fast and you can sample read any books AND share many with friends for 14 days. The best part. I already have nearly 100 books that are not taking up space in my home. The Nook is going to receive more upgrades every few months and will only improve. Give it 24 hours and you will get used to the Nook.

I just got a Kindle 3 as a gift, and I am VERY glad I did. I’ve tried the Nook before, and OH MY GOD HOW CAN ANYONE STAND THAT LAGGY TOUCHSCREEN

Seriously, I’ve been using Apple’s iPhone lineup since 2007, and the touchscreens are absolutely perfect! How can anyone dare to come late to the game with something sooooo horrid? It’s like using iTunes coverflow on XP with a Motion Computing tablet utilizing a 400MHz processor and 128MB of RAM- downright UNUSABLE. They need to fix this, it’s just awful right now. Having a device this bad would make me physically ILL!

My husband and I got a Nook to share right after Christmas. We liked it so much that we had to get another so we weren’t fighting over it. I thought I’d share a few of our pros/cons.

Pros:

* Reasonably Light
* Decent Battery Life
* Really like the touch navigation
* The ability to lend books is a huge plus. We only need to buy 1 book between the two of us and we just pass it back and forth.

Cons:

* Only comes with 2GB of memory (at least it can be expanded)

That’s what we’ve come to like/dislike in the last 3 months of owning a Nook. We’d definitely recommend it.

~ Jen

I can not really state anything that has not been said already.

Yeah the touch screen is a little laggy, but it is not an iPhone. It is a book reader, and for the features involved a damn good one.

The Nook Color stinks. It does not have the text to talk (text to speech) feature. It cost $50 to $100 more than the kindle. This is such an important feature to have. The manufacturer offered it to Barnes & Noble. Barnes & Noble declined it even as an app. I rate this as a very big disappointment!!! How can an ereader distributor not know the huge importance in having a text to talk (text to speech) feature & cost much more than its competitors. Thanks for caring Barnes & Noble.