Amazon launches a new Kindle, with modest improvements

Amazon today announced a new version of its flagship 6-inch Kindle e-book reader that's lighter in weight, faster on page turns, and longer in battery life. Available today for preorder and shipping on August 27, the device will sell at the same $189 price tag as its predecessor.

There will also be a new, budget Kindle: a Wi-Fi-only version that duplicates the regular version, save for access to the AT&T 3G data network. It will cost $139, which is $10 less than the Wi-Fi-only version of the Nook e-book reader that Barnes & Noble launched last month. (Wi-Fi, a feature of the standard 3G version of the Nook, has also been added to the new standard 3G Kindle, too.)

As expected, the new Kindle also offers other enhancements introduced on the revamped version of its bigger sibling, the Kindle DX, $379, which shipped to buyers this month. Those include the option for a second color, graphite black, after years of all-white Kindles, along with improvements in screen contrast and range of font sizes.

The new Amazon Kindle, announced on July 29, 2010,
is about two ounces lighter than the previous Kindle
and is available in "graphite black." (Click to enlarge.)
Photo: Amazon

Based on preliminary use of a Kindle DX we've bought and a preview demo session with the Kindle, Amazon's new readers appear to successfully, if modestly, upgrade what were already fine devices. Side by side with their predecessors, the improvements in contrast and type clarity were just noticeable, as was the shorter page-turn time for the Kindle—which Amazon claims is 20 percent faster.

Amazon also says the new Kindle offers double the battery life of its predecessor, and so will run for a month with the wireless capability off, or 10 days with it on. Also doubled is the reader's capacity; it now holds 3,500 books, Amazon says.

There's also an innovative new optional Amazon case for the device, at a price that was not announced in advance. In addition to offering protection (durability being the top priority of would-be e-book reader buyers, according to one survey), the case also has a pullout light in a corner, and so promises to conveniently offset the nighttime disadvantage of e-ink screen readers like the Kindle compared with units with backlit LCD screens, such as Apple's iPad. (The light does draws its power from the Kindle battery, and so would almost certainly reduce battery life for the reader.)

At 8.7 ounces (8.5 ounces for the Wi-fi version) the new Kindle shaves less than two ounces in weight from its predecessor. But that reduction—along with a slight decrease in depth and width—make the new Kindle seem significantly more portable than its predecessor. Indeed, it's now among the lightest 6-inch readers on the market; the Barnes & Noble Nook, for example, is more than a third (or a full 3-plus ounces) heavier than the new Kindle.

The biggest surprise, and a possible misstep, on the new Kindle: It replaces the five-way navigation joystick used on the second- generation Kindle. Though criticized by some, the Kindle joystick was, we thought, pretty easy to use and fairly intuitive to learn.

In our short preview, e-reader test leader Rich Fisco and I both struggled a bit with the joystick's replacement, a square button surrounded by very thin arrow bars. But our discomfort may in part have been due to having to unlearn the joystick navigation—a problem first-time Kindle buyers would not face.

We'll more fully evaluate navigation, and other aspects of the new Kindle's performance, and report back after we get the device into our labs next month. We expect to complete full tests, and add the device to our Ratings of e-book readers, available to subscribers, in September.

—Paul Reynolds