Which is better, the Amazon Kindle or the Barnes and Noble Nook?

[a93]

I'm deciding between the Kindle 3G(Free 3G + WiFi, 6'') or the Nook Color.
If you have either one what do you like about it?
Which one would you choose?

[MindStorm]

I like the old fashion books with paper pages and ink. If I had to choose I would go with the BN Nook Color. Amazon is hard to deal with. With BN you could go to a store for help.

[Uncle Pennybags]

These are almost two different classes of device. It's hard to say which is better.

The Nook Color is more expensive, it's got a color LCD Touch screen. Battery life will suck compared to the Kindle, but you'll be able to read in color, pictures will look a lot better, and things like web browsing and shopping in the B&N store will look a lot nicer.

The Kindle on the other hand is less expensive, it's got an e-Ink black and white screen. Battery life is far superior than on the Nook color. You can't read in color and web browsing is slow and looks terrible.

[JaKi]

Hi, a93, Nook from Barnes & Noble is the best combination of price and features of the eReaders market. When choosing an eReader, you need to consider not only the physical properties of the device, but also compare eBook stores behind it. Sony has never been a contender for any comparison by anyone as they only have like 5 books in their Ebook store and their devices are way overpriced for what they offer. Borders is behind Kobo/Cruz devices in US and as you might of heard, Borders is on a brink of bankruptcy. Kindle and Nook are the only devices to be considered as their eBook stores have over a million of free public ebooks as well as over a million of ebooks that you need to pay for available.
Having that out of the way, you should then decide which screen you want: e-Ink or LCD. It depends on what you're reading. If just black & white novels then the better one would be Kindle or e-Ink Nook from Barnes & Noble. If you read electronic magazines or college text books with a lot of color graphs and charts or children’s' books with a lot of pictures then the better would be Nook Color LCD from Barnes & Noble. Then, you should understand the limitations of e-Ink eReaders - they are limited to be black & white for now they "blink" at each ebook’s page turn, they're not too good for web browsing, they need external light source for reading when dark, and they cannot handle videos.
Whichever device you choose, here's the advantages of the Nook’s (both e-Ink black & white and Nook Color) over Kindle:
- Any Barnes & Noble store provides free Wi-Fi to Nook's
- Nook allows to lend Nook books for two weeks to friends and family or share with your other devices that run B&N app (PC, MAC, Android phones, Apple iPhone, iPod and iPad, etc.) Barnes & Noble allows (when you walk in with the Nook to B&N store) to read any available eBook for free while in the store via free provided in the store Wi-Fi. With Nook, while in BN store you get exclusive articles from top authors, and great offers including cafe treats and unique deals.
- Nook (unlike Kindle) can be used for library ebooks.
- Nook (unlike Kindle) can be used for renting text-ebooks.
Nook Color is worth mentioning separately as this is a hybrid Android eReader/tablet device, something between Kindle and iPad. Even though Nook Color has LCD touchscreen, it's a new generation screen which is anti-glare coated and is better performing in sunlight and produces less glare all of which are dooming reading on iPad. Also, the screen is amazing and readable/viewable at wide angles.
Overall, Nook Color is more than e-Reader as you can also watch video and use Android applications on it. It's a hybrid device, much more than just an e-Reader but not a full tablet as it doesn't have a camera. If all you want is to read novels, the original e-Ink Nook might be better for you. If you want something more from your device (color graphs and charts of college text books, childrens books, photos and videos, web sites in full color) at half of the price of iPad or Galaxy tab, then Nook Color is your best bet.
Nook Color has several apps that already come with the device (Pandora Internet radio, QuickOffice, etc.) Also, Barnes & Noble recently released Nook SDK and Nook Developer platform that will allow most of the existing 100,000 Android apps be ported to it. Also, you can use the Social Settings screen to link your NOOK Color to your Facebook account and your Twitter account. You can also import all your contacts from your Google Gmail account. Once you have linked to Facebook and Twitter and set up email contacts, you can lend and borrow books, recommend books, and share favorite quotes with your friends.

[Micheal Shwan]

In short:

> Don't go for Nook Color. It's using backlight screen like computer screen, and is difficult to our eyes. Just not suitable for reading purpose.

> Choose the Nook if you want to be:
- Able to borrow ebooks from library to your ebook reader
- Able to read books in epub format (without need of conversion) on your ebook reader

> Choose the Kindle if you want to be:
- Able to have free 3G wireless access
- Able to download books and use 3G wireless even you're outside of the United States
- Able to have text-to-speech function to read books to you like audio books

There is also quite a good review for comparison between the two here:

http://bit.ly/nookorkindle3

[Kristopher Shea]

I think if you're getting an ereader, it's function is for reading, and not web browsing. If you need the internet functionality a pad is much more useful. However if you're looking to read more efficiently ereaders, especially kindle (over nook) are more efficient b/c:

1.) less expensive
2.) longer battery life
3.) less DISTRACTION (b/c less color). All about reading!

[asailorman]

If you value Customer opinions about these devices, go to http://tinyurl.com/aaidemo, enter the product name or model like Kindle or Nook Color and click on "Submit" button. The system will aggregate and analyze customer reviews to calculate the reputation metrics for you and will let you read the reviews if you want to.