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Kindle Fire or Nook Tablet

Kindle Fire or Nook tablet

  • Kindle Fire

    Votes: 8 50.0%
  • Nook Tablet

    Votes: 8 50.0%

  • Total voters
    16
  • Poll closed .
At twice the price for web browsing and watching videos? Sounds wasteful.

Apple doesn't have a ridiculously commanding tablet market share (95% or so I think) because their products are "wasteful". If they were then tens of millions of people wouldn't be spending their hard earned money on iPads.

If someone was looking to just read books then the iPad would be "wasteful", but if you are surfing the net, and watching videos,... and probably listening to music,.. and probably will play some games as well... then the iPad is the clear best choice.
 
^Not at that price. I can do all of those things on Nook Color that I paid $120 for. It just took me 5 minutes to load CM7 onto an SD card in order to do it.

Apple has market inertia and really good marketing on it's side, but for actual capability, there are alternatives.
 
I understand that the ipad is indeed better. I just wanted her to have something fairly portable and useful to use. Ipad's just a bit more expensive than I wanted to pay.
 
Worst-case scenario you can install Go Launcher on the Nook Tablet and add apps from the google market, or even the amazon market. Combined with the superior screen, peppier hardware (512 megs of ram just isn't enough for a tablet) and expandable memory it is an easy decision for me.

This. The expandable memory is a factor, but for me it really comes down to the ram. When I tested both, I found the Kindle quite a bit more laggy, which annoys me. Since I'm much more likely to use it for media watching and browsing than for reading, I look at it as an affordable stop-gap until I'm prepared to lay out the cash for an iPad anyway. YMMV.
 
At twice the price for web browsing and watching videos? Sounds wasteful.

Apple doesn't have a ridiculously commanding tablet market share (95% or so I think) because their products are "wasteful". If they were then tens of millions of people wouldn't be spending their hard earned money on iPads.

If someone was looking to just read books then the iPad would be "wasteful", but if you are surfing the net, and watching videos,... and probably listening to music,.. and probably will play some games as well... then the iPad is the clear best choice.

You misunderstand. For it's intended use, buying an iPad at twice the price of what is needed is wasteful. When all you want or need is a bicycle, don't buy a Mercedes. See what I mean?
 
Worst-case scenario you can install Go Launcher on the Nook Tablet and add apps from the google market, or even the amazon market. Combined with the superior screen, peppier hardware (512 megs of ram just isn't enough for a tablet) and expandable memory it is an easy decision for me.

This. The expandable memory is a factor, but for me it really comes down to the ram. When I tested both, I found the Kindle quite a bit more laggy, which annoys me. Since I'm much more likely to use it for media watching and browsing than for reading, I look at it as an affordable stop-gap until I'm prepared to lay out the cash for an iPad anyway. YMMV.

For what it's worth, Amazon is promising a software update pretty soon which is supposed to help with the lag. There's no reason why 512mb isn't "enough" for a tablet either, but of course more is better. The Nook Color was perfectly okay with 512mb. The hardware of the Fire doesn't really seem to be the problem... it's got the same type of CPU seen in a lot of other devices. Hopefully Amazon can get their software in order for their sake.
 
Worst-case scenario you can install Go Launcher on the Nook Tablet and add apps from the google market, or even the amazon market. Combined with the superior screen, peppier hardware (512 megs of ram just isn't enough for a tablet) and expandable memory it is an easy decision for me.

This. The expandable memory is a factor, but for me it really comes down to the ram. When I tested both, I found the Kindle quite a bit more laggy, which annoys me. Since I'm much more likely to use it for media watching and browsing than for reading, I look at it as an affordable stop-gap until I'm prepared to lay out the cash for an iPad anyway. YMMV.

For what it's worth, Amazon is promising a software update pretty soon which is supposed to help with the lag. There's no reason why 512mb isn't "enough" for a tablet either, but of course more is better. The Nook Color was perfectly okay with 512mb. The hardware of the Fire doesn't really seem to be the problem... it's got the same type of CPU seen in a lot of other devices. Hopefully Amazon can get their software in order for their sake.
512 wasn't enough for the Color, as clearly evidenced by the horrid performance on flash-based websites, many of the apps, quickly flipping through big magazines or even trying to load up an HD youtube video. Compare the performance side by side to the tablet and it really is night and day.

It takes essentially stripping off the extra shell of software to get performance to an acceptable level, and amazon surely doesn't want you doing that, which is why they've tied certain prime features to needing to be accessed through the fire and not just any android tablet with the kindle app on it.
 
Just got the 1.4 update to the Nook Color and I love it so far. Biggest change was adding Netflix for me. If this is any indication of what the Nook Tablet is like (but supposedly better) then I further my vote for the Nook Tablet!

Netflix play back is pretty good, although like with any Netflix device it is partly dependent on how good your connection is. I can only assume the tablet handles it even better since it was made more for such a task.

The in-book menus look a lot like the screen shots I've seen of the Nook Tablet now, I like the changes they've made - more customization options for your reading experience now.

Browser is more or less the same to me, I some times have trouble with it. Some times it just likes to stop loading sites after a period of browsing, usually an hour or so. I have no idea why and I haven't bothered exploring any solutions either. I usually have to restart the thing, which really isn't a solution at all if it keeps happening. Was hoping this would get an update but it seems not. So if the NT uses the same kind of browser that might be a minus to consider (although the problem may be entirely on my end). I guess for me this is the only downside to my experience overall with the Nook devices.
 
512 wasn't enough for the Color, as clearly evidenced by the horrid performance on flash-based websites, many of the apps, quickly flipping through big magazines or even trying to load up an HD youtube video. Compare the performance side by side to the tablet and it really is night and day.

Those aren't tasks that are particularly RAM bound. If you want to compare it to a tablet... the iPad 2 still only has 512mb of RAM. This causes it issues, but not the sort of ones you're talking about. The culprit is more likely the single core 800mhz CPU and performance tends to be a lot better on the Color with CM7 and a 1.4Ghz overclock.
 
At twice the price for web browsing and watching videos? Sounds wasteful.

Apple doesn't have a ridiculously commanding tablet market share (95% or so I think) because their products are "wasteful". If they were then tens of millions of people wouldn't be spending their hard earned money on iPads.

If someone was looking to just read books then the iPad would be "wasteful", but if you are surfing the net, and watching videos,... and probably listening to music,.. and probably will play some games as well... then the iPad is the clear best choice.

You misunderstand. For it's intended use, buying an iPad at twice the price of what is needed is wasteful. When all you want or need is a bicycle, don't buy a Mercedes. See what I mean?


Yeah, that's similar to asking for recommendations for a good netbook mainly to be used for email, and getting lots of recommendations for the iPad instead, something which actually happened to me elsewhere. Realistically, the device needs to fit the needs rather than the needs changing to fit the device. An iPad as an email machine would indirectly fit the need and would actually complicate things if one doesn't want to use the on-screen keyboard, and it also seems very wasteful to me if one can get something far simpler and cheaper to get the job done. So, just because it's popular and many are using it, doesn't mean it's automatically going to be the best tool for everyone.
 
You misunderstand. For it's intended use, buying an iPad at twice the price of what is needed is wasteful. When all you want or need is a bicycle, don't buy a Mercedes. See what I mean?

I would never buy a Mercedes, but yes, I got you :)
 
It's a matter of personal preference. I already had the first generation Nook and have been nothing but thrilled with the reading performance. e-Ink really is the way to go. The backlit version of either tablet (Nook Tablet or Kindle Fire) is straining to the eyes very quickly.

What I wanted was something to watch movies and tv shows on ... For me, the Nook Tablet was the right answer. One, any books I buy on one are automatically downloaded to the other too. Second, it has the ability to expand the memory. Kindle Fire doesn't.

Now, my friend bought her Kindle Fire at the same time. We have compared each others tablets side by side. They basically do the same thing. The Nook is a tad brighter (screen brightness), but their speeds are comparable and they can both do the same sort of things.

Also, the performance of Angry Birds is exactly the same on both. Had never played the game before my new tablet ... I have since then. :P

It's also handy being able to use the same charging cables .... and I can listen to movies and stuff while I work. Got through half of the Tenth Kingdom today.
 
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