But,
the new firmware on the nook (1.5)
is soo amazing!
It is very very fast!
touch screen far more responsive..

everything has greatly improved since they first came out a year ago.

very impressive.!
<3

Have not found page turning slow at all with v1.4. I have read several books in PDF format, no problem, though font size changing is a bit less predictable in effect than with ePUB format. Still, I’ve been able to read all PDF books so far with no trouble. Hardware PDF manuals don’t always cut it on my nook, however.

Battery life could be better. I’m a voracious reader, so I probably use it more than most. However, no biggie to just charge it every few days. The screen is nice and easy for me to view. I don’t play the two games, so those are rather useless to me. I don’t often bother reading the daily anymore.

I really LOVE the swipe gesture on the touchscreen for turning pages. It was a little hard to get the feel of at first, but now I can swipe with just about any finger on either hand. Much nicer than pressing a button, as button pressing aggravates my tendinitis. Swiping is wonderful! It also feels much like you are turning the page of a real book.

One thing your review left out, the ability to borrow library eBooks! That was a big deal in choosing the nook for me! Gives me the option of borrowing and reading, but not buying unless I really want the book. I’m reading a library book now with two more on hold. It’s nice having both access to free classics and being able to read bestsellers for free, though of course, sometimes there is a wait. And not every ebook I could want is available from my library yet.

Hubby also has a nook, and even though we each have our own BN account, we can still share books via side loading and opening them with our name & default credit card number. Once opened this way, the book will be indefinitely readable for the other person as long as they keep it on their nook. It works… he missed out on a BN freebie book the other day, but I gave it to him via side load and he’s reading it now.

nook needs major improvements for pdf reader.
the same issue persist accross all android devices

thanks!

The lack of customizable book organizing is a pain. The touchscreen seems a little too sensitive at times, especially when you meant to scroll and it selects a chapter. It would be less of a problem if the Go To function stayed at the last menu position, but it goes right back to the start of the book. Not being able to go to a page number is a real pain if the book has no chapters! Try spending a few minutes of button pushing to get through tens of pages.

I like the ability to customize the wallpaper images and screensaver images – I have created several myself with the nook “n” appearing somewhere in the frame.

The new web browser is useful if you have no other option, but the navigation via the touchscreen is not easy. The music/audio file player is OK, but not much use if you already carry an iPod. The chess and Sudoku games are no value to me, especially when I have my iPod with me.

Occasionally a page turn hesitates (especially if there’s an image on the next page) and you have to wait for the nook. Re-pressing the page button just jumps you by yet another page when nook gets around to doing what you asked of it in the first place.

With wi-fi turned off, the battery life is good and has proved no problem at home, so far. I charge it every night anyway.

I love the fact that I can edit epub files using Sigil (freeware) and upload them via Calibre (freeware). I’ve added chapters to the TOC in free books and images in my child’s Beatrix Potter stories.

No tech. problems so far and I’m hoping for the next V1.4 software update to fix some of the above-mentioned issues (must be coming soon??)

I purchased the 2-year warranty, so if I accidentally drop my nook and bust it, it will be replaced.

nook is a really serious e-reader contender with the Kindle

When you mention startup being slow… you’re not turning your nook all the way off when you’re done using it are you? You shouldn’t ever need to do that unless it’s for a software update or long-term storage. Just put it to sleep — even with wireless on it can go days (or longer) asleep without a recharge.

The screen and form factor are really nice. The touch screen works, that’s about it. I don’t expect a good interface for that: I expected kludgy. I suspect that a lot of the difficulties in the touch screen stem from them wanting you to be able to touch it while reading without inputting commands. That will improve over time with software changes.

The book prices were low enough that I don’t care if amazon is cheaper. Most of the books I’m looking at right now are $20-$30 bound and under $10 for the e-book. And the e-book is nicer to read.

The Lend feature sucks. B&N screwed that up royally. I’d be happier if it wasn’t there at all. I actually planned to use it when I bought it, only to learn later about the one lend per book for life rule: BOOOOOO. Turns out the Kindle’s multiple readers on one account would have been perfect for my wife and I.

I would *really* like to see lend extended and made useful for libraries. I think that if they did that, they’d see Nook take off like crazy. Even if they had to have special versions of books for libraries that cost more.

Otherwise it’s fairly functional, the type is a little soft for my eyes, and the lack of ZOOM on PDF files is a little annoying, and for some reason I thought the Nook had page rotatation, which it doesn’t.

DRM books don’t allow as large a font size as same book with DRM stripped. Still a little small for my middle-aged eyes.

Wi-Fi works well.

Side by side though, unless some one was really counting on wireless browsing and delivery, the JetBook Lite (currently $119 through NewEgg) is probably a better value at over half the cost. Just get rechargeable “AA” batteries and the TFT reflective screen is even easier to read in subdued light.

The Nook is an aesthically pleasing, does-what-it-says device, but with the exception of epub book reading (JetBook also reads, Kindle doesn’t), it doesn’t seem to have very much over the Kindle. Still, firmware is easy to update, and B&N will likely keep trying (within reason) to correct bugs and update with features their core customers want to see (like PDF zoom, page rotate and at least one larger font size).

3.5 out of 5 stars

It’s a simple problem [or at least seems simple ]

- My first and second languages are not English so while reading an English book I need to use the dictionary a lot… and the process of slowly moving the cursor (*) to the word I want to look up is torturous, then there is a number of .5 seconds involved in showing the definition, its next page(s), and then refreshing and returning to the page itself. Wouldn’t it be nice if we could have a virtual keyboard on the touchscreen, type in the word, see the definition on the touchscreen itself, scroll up and down there (touchscreen)? This approach will also have the advantage of using colors in definitions too, examples, synonyms, etc. Then if the user feels the need to see the definition on eink, they can project the definition to the eink display.