The Nook Color, only recently announced, with little to no hype, dropped earlier this week. I enjoyed the original nook a lot. I kept a lot of reference manuals and reading material on it. It was a nice little device for a decent price.
When the Nook Color was announced, I was pretty taken aback, and excited as well. I assumed that they were going to branch out and make a tablet to compete with the iPad.
Unfortunately the Nook Color doesn't live up to that. The Nook Color is just an overpriced color e-book reader, not a fully fledged tablet. It is very solidly built and has a beautiful screen. It runs an 800mhz OMAP processor with 512 MB RAM. A good, solid little device, hardware-wise. Most of my gripes with the device are software side.
It runs a proprietary and stripped down version of the Google Android OS, likely 2.1 or 2.2. With it being stripped down, you are limited to use the software which comes with the device. The software is essentially just an ebook reader, a web browser, chess, sudoku, and crosswords. The device doesn't even come with a basic note-taking application. My hopes and dreams of the device being an Android Tablet weren't yet dashed. I took a look around online to see if possibly it had been rooted yet.
Much to my chagrin, it wasn't. The device is very locked down from a software standpoint. When connecting the device to a computer, you can't enable ADB, which is the Android Debugging interface many hackers use to obtain root for the device, and later install different ROMs. When connecting the device, it is only detected as an external media, much like a flash drive or external hard drive. I do have high hopes once Barnes & Noble release a patch for the device, which can then be reverse engineered and then enable all the features I'd like to see. But at the moment, it feels extremely limited and 'gimped'.
That said, their proprietary UI is very responsive and easy to navigate. With the ability to browse files on a folder level (which isn't on the original nook) it make finding the PDF documents uploaded to the device easy to find, and even easier, you can place books on the home page, much like apps for an android phone or an iPhone. Another bonus is that the device can read/play just about any format you can throw at it. A list of features and comparisons can be found here [http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2372819,00.asp]
Obviously, the device isn't for me, likely because I expected something it wasn't, I guess that's my fault. But that shouldn't deter users which want a solid e-book reader. With around 5 gigs of internal storage, and the option for up to 32 gb micro-SD card, there is more than enough room for books, ebooks, magazines, music, or whatever users want to throw on it. I do see a lot of potential for the device in the coming months, so I'd recommend keeping an eye on it.
When the Nook Color was announced, I was pretty taken aback, and excited as well. I assumed that they were going to branch out and make a tablet to compete with the iPad.
Unfortunately the Nook Color doesn't live up to that. The Nook Color is just an overpriced color e-book reader, not a fully fledged tablet. It is very solidly built and has a beautiful screen. It runs an 800mhz OMAP processor with 512 MB RAM. A good, solid little device, hardware-wise. Most of my gripes with the device are software side.
It runs a proprietary and stripped down version of the Google Android OS, likely 2.1 or 2.2. With it being stripped down, you are limited to use the software which comes with the device. The software is essentially just an ebook reader, a web browser, chess, sudoku, and crosswords. The device doesn't even come with a basic note-taking application. My hopes and dreams of the device being an Android Tablet weren't yet dashed. I took a look around online to see if possibly it had been rooted yet.
Much to my chagrin, it wasn't. The device is very locked down from a software standpoint. When connecting the device to a computer, you can't enable ADB, which is the Android Debugging interface many hackers use to obtain root for the device, and later install different ROMs. When connecting the device, it is only detected as an external media, much like a flash drive or external hard drive. I do have high hopes once Barnes & Noble release a patch for the device, which can then be reverse engineered and then enable all the features I'd like to see. But at the moment, it feels extremely limited and 'gimped'.
That said, their proprietary UI is very responsive and easy to navigate. With the ability to browse files on a folder level (which isn't on the original nook) it make finding the PDF documents uploaded to the device easy to find, and even easier, you can place books on the home page, much like apps for an android phone or an iPhone. Another bonus is that the device can read/play just about any format you can throw at it. A list of features and comparisons can be found here [http://www.pcmag.com/article2/0,2817,2372819,00.asp]
Obviously, the device isn't for me, likely because I expected something it wasn't, I guess that's my fault. But that shouldn't deter users which want a solid e-book reader. With around 5 gigs of internal storage, and the option for up to 32 gb micro-SD card, there is more than enough room for books, ebooks, magazines, music, or whatever users want to throw on it. I do see a lot of potential for the device in the coming months, so I'd recommend keeping an eye on it.
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