Paperwhite Gets Whiter

<p><em>Amazon keeps refreshing its line of Kindle devices, among which the Paperwhite is a good affordable option</em><br><br><br>Having given up on ‘real books’ I tend to read on multiple devices. Each instantly syncs to the point where I left off in the book, so I don’t miss anything as I pick up whichever device is handy or convenient at that moment. But there’s nothing to beat the Kindle when I settle down for a good read, avoiding too much eyestrain and using a gadget optimised for reading. Actually, who’s only job is provide a great reading experience.<br><br>Amazon keeps refreshing its line of Kindle devices, among which the Paperwhite is a good affordable option, specialising as it does in an experience that is as close to paper books as electronics can get.<br><br>With each refresh, there’s fine-tuning and tweaking rather than the big changes you see from one version of a smartphone to the next. The differences in Kindles are most evident to those who own one and upgrade to the next or to reviewers who are trained to look for these differences. For new buyers,&nbsp; it’s just a better deal.<br><br>Luckily I had a previous Paperwhite with which to compare the newly released 2015 version. To look at, there’s really very little change and this is unfortunately because the device has had a horribly placed power button on the bottom edge which I’ve always thought very hard to get to. It’s also without some give, so it takes an awkward position and an extra hard press on a small thing to get it to respond. In the more expensive Kindle Voyage, the power button has been beautifully shifted to the back panel just around where your finger will rest as you hold it so that you don’t need to do much to turn it on or off.<br><br>But for now, on the Paperwhite, it seems we’re stuck with the old power button. And you do need that button more than you think if you like to turn off the screen when you’ve stopped reading for a while. The Kindle has a battery that lasts a purported eight weeks even with the light on, so it won’t suffer too much from being on for a while, but still.<br><br>What makes the 2015 Paperwhite good to have is that the screen is visibly crisper, brighter, whiter, and better. There’s also a new font, Bookerly, which has been created for the e-reader, and better spacing, better handling of hyphenation, and support for things like drop-caps in the text. Putting the two Paperwhites side by side, I see that the older one does look a lot dimmer at the same screen brightness setting and the text is blockier – not that I mind it terribly the way it was.<br><br>In daylight and bright light, the two Paperwhites are just a shade different in their own brightness – but of course, the 300ppi Paperwhite 2015 has the advantage of finer looking text in that optimised font.<br><br>If you already own the previous Paperwhite, I wouldn’t say it’s essential to upgrade to a new one. The differences are nice but don’t redefine what is a pretty good reading experience to begin with. The new Paperwhite is available, of course, on Amazon.in itself, but also 450 other outlets like Croma. It costs Rs 13,999, for the Wi-Fi plus 3G version which is quite a bit when you look at the varying prices of previous versions. You can get EMI options if you need them.<br><br>The Wi-Fi only version costs Rs 10,999 and has always made more sense to me as this isn’t a device for which you constantly need connectivity on the go. Fill it up with books – which contrary to popular belief are not expensive – and go.</p>