Tablets vs e-readers, Which one should you choose?

Over the past 2 years two different types of consumer product have really taken off. In one corner you have the tablet, a multi-functional device who’s prime feature is online access, with the ability to support the web’s most common tasks through apps, and in the other corner you have the e-reader, made popular thanks to the e-ink display and book stores across different brands. Both of these products have become very succesfull indeed, however for many people making the choice between one or the other is difficult.

E-readers are well known for being cheaper than tablet’s whilst offering some of the basic functionality of a tablet whilst tablet’s are well known for offering more at a higher price. So how should you base your decision?

e-readers

For us you should only really consider two e-readers which are on the market and these are the Amazon Kindle 3 and the Barnes & Noble Nook. Both of these e-readers feature importantly an e-ink display for brilliant indoor and outdoor reading, and both of them are very well priced indeed. The Kindle is Amazon’s best-selling product ever and as the user you have access to well over 500,000 e-books. On top of the above two milestones, the Kindle is also a fantastically built and well featured device incorporating WIFI as standard all at an amazing price of £111 GBP. The 2011 version of Barnes & Noble’s Nook has received excellent reviews all round thus far and features a 2 month battery from a single charge and a very chic design.

Unlike tablet’s the two e-readers above don’t run a mobile operating system or have access to an app store out of the box, and so other than basic internet browsing (which both e-readers do very well), you are stuck with the prime feature of reading e-books, however this is what they are all about anyway.

Tablet’s

Argue as much as you like however the tablet market only really kicked off when Apple introduced their iPad all the way back in 2010. Since then, a wealth of manufacturers have jumped on board to try and make a quick profit. Whilst many analysts predicted in 2010 that tablet’s would have short term success and were a fad, we now know that they are in fact here to stay with thanks to offering pretty much everything a smartphone can only larger. Moving on from older Windows based tablet pc’s, the majority of the latest generation of tablet’s run Android, Google’s open platform mobile OS. Just like Apple’s iOS as seen on the iPad, and HP’s webOS as seen on the TouchPad, Android allows users to access the web through multiple and highly customized apps very easily.

On top of sporting its very own bookstore, iBooks, Apple’s iOS App Store also has a number of other book stores such as the Kindle store, meaning that you as the user can access well over 250,000 e-books for use. The main downside to using a tablet for reading however is the display, as the majority of them have LCD or AMOLED parts, making them tiresome to look at for extended periods especially in low light. One tablet which broke the mould with this was the Notion Ink Adam, which we gave a great score in our review for using a PixelQI display.

Downsides

The major drawback of tablet’s when it comes to reading is the display. Due to the nature of tablet’s (apps, browsing, multimedia) the need for a color reproducing light emitting display is evident, but you’ll find that with this type of display reading can become a chore and tire out your eyes.

With the price of the two e-readers above (Nook, Kindle) being significantly cheaper than the Motorola Xoom, iPad 2 and Notion Ink Adam, we don’t see why you shouldn’t have both an e-reader and tablet in your bag. Looking towards the future, e-readers will always continue to threaten tablet’s when it comes to functionality because as a recently knighted Bruce Forsyth says, the price is right.

The choice as to which type of product you purchase is yours at the end of the day, however if your sole purpose is for reading, then having an e-reader is the clear choice. As stated above, though, we’d preferably have both devices in our bag as they are both better than the other for different functions.