Nook Color first hands-on! (updated: with video)

Sure, the lighting’s not great and its only a mock-up at this point, but that’s Barnes & Noble’s new Nook Color. We’re being told there will be a chance to handle a real working unit soon, but in the meantime, enjoy the shots below!

Update: We just got some more time with a functional unit, and while we aren’t allowed to use it, we can say the build quality is sturdy, there’s a good rubber backing, and the viewing angles are quite nice. It’s crisp, too, the screen, although page turning is somewhat sluggish, the software perhaps not finished. Article view is a nice touch, being able to read just the piece formatting-free — and you can skim through the articles alone by swiping to the left and right. You want some more shots of the UI in action? You know where to look.

Update 2: Well, that was tough! We finally got some “alone time” with the Nook Color, although we still weren’t allow to put our apparently grimy fingers on it. You can check it out in the video below, but we still seem to think there’s some software tweaking going on as it’s a bit sluggish to switch through menus. While we’re still of the mind that this device should have had a PixelQi or Mirasol display, we can report that the LCD is responsive to finger swipes and the viewing angles are quite good (believe us, we were looking at this thing from all angles as book-loving journalists swarmed it.) We can’t and won’t make a final call on the Color until we get one into our hands, but the video below should give you a better idea of the UI and performance until then.

Continue reading Nook Color first hands-on! (updated: with video)

Nook Color first hands-on! (updated: with video) originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Oct 2010 16:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Nook Color first hands-on!

Sure, the lighting’s not great, but what you’re looking at is the first look at Barnes & Noble’s new Nook Color. We’re going back for seconds, but in the meantime, enjoy!

Nook Color first hands-on! originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Oct 2010 16:43:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Barnes & Noble Nook Color revealed

Barnes & Noble just unveiled its all-new Nook Color, an Android tablet fronted by a 7-inch color touchscreen… so long, e-ink! (Not really, the $149 original Nook is sticking around for now, owns 20 percent of the e-reader market, and is about to get a major software update). B&N is billing it as a hybrid of e-reader and tablet device, and has beefed up its software with a full-on tablet-style UI, along with Facebook and Twitter integration. There’s built-in WiFi (802.11b/g/n) and 8GB of storage, but no 3G at this point. Thankfully, the price stays aggressive as a result: $249. You might think that means the screen is going to be weak, but B&N has managed to put an impressive-sounding “VividView,” 16 million color, 1024 x 600 IPS display in this thing. Interestingly, there’s a “full lamination screen film” on top of the LCD to reduce glare, apparently from the backlight, not just from external light sources.

Build-wise, there’s that striking corner handle we saw before (smacks of the XO-3, doesn’t it?) and a microSD slot, with a 0.48-inch thick body and a 15.6 ounce overall weight. Battery life takes a notable hit, of course, with a rating of 8 hours of reading with the WiFi off. Of course, underneath it all is still Android, and Barnes & Noble is launching the Nook Developer program to allow third party apps on the device, and it even ships with a few favorites like Pandora and Lonely Planet. The color screen also enables a new library of “Nook Kids” children books, full-color magazine and newspaper subscriptions, and video playback if you’re in the mood. The Nook Color ships on November 19th, pre-orders are available now.

Looking for more? Check our hands-on video, photos, and impressions of the Nook Color!

Continue reading Barnes & Noble Nook Color revealed

Barnes & Noble Nook Color revealed originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Oct 2010 16:10:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Nook Color: Barnes & Noble’s Full-Color Tablet With Apps, Mags and Books for $250 [Video]

Barnes & Noble’s touchscreen Nook Color—a reading-centric, 7-inch Android tablet with full color books, magazines, newspapers and apps is well, surprisingly good. It might be the best Android tablet yet, even. Update: Video! More »

Live from Barnes & Noble’s ‘Very Special Event’

To think, it’s been just over a year since Barnes and Noble’s Nook was officially unveiled, a 6-inch e-reader with a secondary, Android-powered colored display for navigation. And here we are now, in attendance at a “very special event” from the bookseller’s Union Square store in New York — for what, we can only guess. Stay tuned, things could get very colorful.

Continue reading Live from Barnes & Noble’s ‘Very Special Event’

Live from Barnes & Noble’s ‘Very Special Event’ originally appeared on Engadget on Tue, 26 Oct 2010 15:40:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Barnes & Noble Leaks Nook Color Details

Nook_Color_mockup.jpg

Barnes & Noble is set to announce a new version of the Nook at a ‘very special event’ in New York City this week–this much we seem to know for sure. Okay, well, not for sure, for sure, but the event coincides nicely with the anniversary of the first Nook, announced roughly a year ago.

In what’s becoming something of a habit amongst tech companies, the bookseller has apparently leaked out some details about a Nook successor. The site briefly posted a product page for an screen protecting film–an accessory for the Nook Color.

There’s obviously not a lot of information about the device, at present–the information was pulled from the site pretty quickly. CNET does, however, have information from the proverbial “anonymous tipster,” who told the site that the device features a full-color tablet-like touchscreen, runs Android (like its predecessor), and is priced at $249–high for the current crop of eBook readers, but certainly well below the iPad’s starting price.

Sneak a Premature Peek at Barnes & Noble’s New Nook

Accessory makers are the weak link in keeping any super-secret product launch super-secret, even if the folks making accessories are in the same company. So it’s not especially a surprise that a Nook Color Film Screen Kit appearing on (then quickly pulled from) BarnesAndNoble.com has leaked a likely image of the Nook Color a day early.

Barnes & Noble has a media event tomorrow (October 26) at its Union Square store where it’s expected to announce its next-generation Nook. On Friday, CNET reported sourced information that the new device would be called Nook Color, have a 7″ color-capable screen and retail for $249, splitting the difference between its current-generation E Ink Nook and more expensive Android or iOS tablets. Now a CNET source again has the Nook Color Film Screen Kit, featuring the image above.

Meanwhile, the Wall Street Journal reports that Barnes & Noble is launching a subsite of its e-book store called NookKids.com. Nook Kids should have 12,000 chapter books available by this Sunday (October 31), with 100 or so picture books following in mid-November, and enhanced children’s books coming in early 2011.

Picture books suggest color screens and a mid-November availability for the Nook Color. (David Carnoy’s source at CNET also tipped towards a November release.) In addition to NookKids.com, Barnes & Noble has also registered NookColor.com. So if nothing else, the new device will almost definitely be called Nook Color.

Assuming the mockup above is a fair image of the new Nook Color, we’re looking at a single hardware button on the face — so touchscreen, probably Android-based like the first Nook.

As I reported Friday, the big question hanging over the Nook Color, like all color e-readers, is its choice of screen technology. E Ink is low-power and highly readable, even in direct sunlight, but is limited to grayscale still images. LCD and LED screens have great color and video capability, but are power-hungry and harder on the eyes for extended reading. Qualcomm’s Mirasol technology, which combines aspects of both (low power consumption, good readability, color/video capability) is still probably six months off, maybe longer for larger screens.

Barnes & Noble’s EPUB-based e-book format is color-capable, so they could switch over to producing color books without many problems. But Pandigital, a company that partnered with B&N on a touchscreen e-reader, produced an LCD color e-reader earlier this year that was generally considered a failure.

Unless Barnes & Noble’s has a really neat trick up their sleeve, they have some tough choices. It’s a huge gamble. When it comes to e-readers and e-books, adding more color, more interactivity, more features always seems like a good idea. But there’s a very fine line separating an absolutely amazing, incredibly capable e-reader and a really crappy, hamstrung tablet.

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Barnes & Noble launching Nook Kids this week, set to be the Nook Color’s killer app?

Barnes & Noble launching Nook Kids this week, set to be the Nook Color's killer app?Say what you want about the current spate of e-books, few will do anything to hold the interest of your three-year-old nephew. To those who like to keep peanut butter and jelly out of the keys if their Kindles that’s a good thing, but for Barnes & Noble that’s a business opportunity waiting to be tapped. According to The Wall Street Journal, the company will soon launch Nook Kids, a dedicated collection for young readers expected to start with an impressive selection of 12,000 titles. Many of those will be “enhanced,” like the book Jamberry, having one page with falling blueberries that kids can pop with a tap. That seems to be further proof of a full touchscreen on the rumored Color Nook, expected to be unveiled this Tuesday. Later in the year look for a Nook Kids app on the iPad and other devices, so now might be a good time to start teaching little Joey about regular hand cleaning.

[Thanks, Carson R.]

Barnes & Noble launching Nook Kids this week, set to be the Nook Color’s killer app? originally appeared on Engadget on Mon, 25 Oct 2010 09:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Nook Color revealed by overzealous screen protector?

Barnes & Noble’s done a pretty decent job of keeping a supposed Nook Color hidden from our prying eyes, but an errant accessory may have jumped the gun — the “Nook Color Screen Film Kit,” to be precise, whose product image is pictured immediately above. CNET discovered the protective film hanging out on Barnes & Noble’s website, and quickly grabbed this picture before it could be removed. Even if we’re legitimately looking at the new Nook, of course, this doesn’t tell us much about the seemingly button-less product underneath. How’s this: We’ll go out on a limb and tell you it’s got a color touchscreen.

Nook Color revealed by overzealous screen protector? originally appeared on Engadget on Sun, 24 Oct 2010 21:14:00 EDT. Please see our terms for use of feeds.

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Amazon Will Let Readers Lend Kindle Books This Year

Amazon has good news for Kindle owners that it wanted to share with them first. A post from the Kindle team on Amazon’s Kindle Community forum says that 14-day lending will come to the Kindle sometime this year.

There is a catch: “Each book can be lent once for a loan period of 14-days and the lender cannot read the book during the loan period.” If you’re familiar with Barnes & Noble’s lending feature on the Nook, this isn’t a surprise. “Additionally, not all e-books will be lendable – this is solely up to the publisher or rights holder, who determines which titles are enabled for lending.” Again, to borrow some jargon, this is a known issue.

Books will be lendable both to Kindle owners and users of Kindle apps, which is nice: even if you don’t have your own Kindle, you can borrow an e-book from someone who does.

The Kindle team also revealed that Kindle app users will soon also be able to read Kindle magazines and newspapers through the app. Periodicals had been a Kindle-only feature. Support for newspapers and magazines is coming to iOS “in the coming weeks” and Android and other app platforms “down the road.”

Since there’s so much news about Kindle’s e-reading competition lately, I guess Amazon just wanted to let Kindle users know that the company still loved them — and more importantly, that it’s going to keep giving them reasons to love the Kindle.

Coming Soon for Kindle [Amazon/Kindle Community Forums, via Kindle Review]

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