“…When you send a PDF to your @kindle.com email address Amazon does not put the file through any conversion process, and it is impossible to have Amazon convert a PDF file to an .AZW Kindle file….”

I found this out by experience tonight, although my unsubstantiated belief is that PDF files ARE converted IF you have a Kindle 2 account instead of a Kindle DX account.

Of course, this belief comes from hints within written Amazon documents, not a particularly trustworthy source.

Are .AZW Kindle files identical for both K2 and KDX?

Although I never would have bought a Kindle DX without its native PDF support, it turns out that the large screen normal files look so good that I have even paid $9.99 for books that I already had fully satisfactory free PDF files for. In general, the PDF file support is something of a crapshoot. Some files work very well, and others are abysmal, even with 100% text. It is ironic that I avoided the K2 because of no PDF support without conversion, and now I already miss the conversion.

The keyboard is the worst-implemented feature ever installed on a consumer device, IMO. To advance to page 123, do the following:

MENU
DOWN
EXECUTE
alt
1
alt
2
alt
3
RIGHT
EXECUTE

Even worse, the reliability of a keystroke is about 50%, especially the alt key. I have to use an unsharpened pencil as a stylus, pressing the key with the eraser as hard as possible.

Regards, Don

The inability to annotate and clip from PDFs is a huge downer, speaking as a person who has to read and annotate a lot of PDFs for work. I’d say that maybe Amazon would remedy this with a future software update but their track record on software fixes even for glaring omissions (FOLDERS ANYONE??) doesn’t leave me with much confidence.

Thanks for the review!

Cap height – a bit under 5mm

X height – bit over 3mm

No more number keys means having to hold down the ALT key with the number key. Why doesn’t the Kindle recognize that you’re going to a numbered location?

I think they are stuck with these 6 font sizes because all their TOPAZ ebooks contain a font as bitmaps in these 6 sizes.

The iRex DR1000S is much more expensive, but it supports larger font sizes for MOBI ebooks.

Brad, I think you are right with respect to many people. For some, the clarity of the display at this larger size will be compelling. And part of what makes it worthwhile for me is the fact that this one comes closer than anything I’ve seen to having tablet functionality, with free 3G connectivity.

I haven’t noticed the problem you mention regarding the magnification of rotated pdf’s. Every pdf I have viewed (so far) has magnified when viewed in landscape. All of the pdf’s I have on mine were formatted for letter size printing. Perhaps pdf’s that were formatted for smaller print sizes won’t magnify when rotated since they may have already been displayed at “full size” when in portrait view.

Although I shared some of your concerns about damaging the DX due to it’s larger size I didn’t get the extended warranty mainly because my Amazon account runs thru my AMEX card and AMEX automatically provides an extra year of warranty coverage which is all the warranty that is available from Amazon does. Others who purchase a Kindle might check to see if their charge card does or offers the same warranty deal.

Given the size of the DX, I can’t see it being used for much more than reading textbooks and/or newspaper feeds. Personally, I like my electronics portable, especially for an ebook reader. The DX is just too big to read a cozy novel on.

I’m curious what “the Kindle DX does not consistently make optimal use of landscape-view rotation to magnify PDF files for easier viewing.” looks like for some PDFs as this would be my primary reason for picking up the DX to go alongside my K1.