New Kindle Paperwhite Up for Preorder

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Amazon's new Paperwhite will arrive September 30.

Soon after Amazon announced the Kindle Paperwhite, the company copped to some limitations that early adopters had noticed in the device. Perhaps those issues will be addressed in Paperwhite 2.0? Because the device is on Amazon.com right now.

 

The device's appearance online seems to be a little ahead of schedule, as Amazon pulled the listing this morning. However, it seems the company has made peace with the early leak as the new Paperwhite is once again appearing on Amazon.com and is actually available for pre-order. The Kindle Paperwhite is priced at $119 with special offers or $139 without Amazon's deals.

So, what's different? Amazon is promising higher contrast, a 25 percent faster processor, and improved touch technology as well as some software improvements. These include Good Reads integration, which Amazon says is coming soon, Kindle FreeTime, which is aimed at getting kids reading more via a tracker and rewards system, and a new Page Flip feature that lets you skim page-by-page, scan by chapter, or skip to the end without losing your place. Unfortunately, there doesn't seem to be any audio or text-to-speech, both of which were notably missing from the first Paperwhite. It also still has only 2 GB of storage, compared to the 4 GB of storage of other Kindle models.

The new Kindle Paperwhite will be available September 30, though Amazon is currently only taking pre-orders from customers in the United States. No word on a release date or pricing for the rest of the world.

Follow Jane McEntegart @JaneMcEntegart. Follow us @tomshardware, on Facebook and on Google+.

Jane McEntegart
10 Comments Comment from the forums
  • house70
    Meh. I have more books on my SD card than that 2GB available. Besides, I can switch my library from one device to another should I have the need to do it.
    The moment Amazon adds SD card support they'll get my money. As it is now, I am not paying for a crippled device just to support their copyright paranoia. Sorry.
    Reply
  • inherendo
    I have a kindle and don't mind not having expandable memory. A book is like 10 mb max, why would you need your whole collection all at once?

    Reply
  • beta212
    Damned, this sure teaches a lesson about patience. I bought the kindle PW less than 1 month ago, maybe I should return it as defective(kindle quality control sucks, more than 35 sand grain sized white specks on my screen. Warning for new buyers, the screen often is defective), and cash in it as a new PW? I know it's unethical, but...it's not illegal.


    And just in case anybody from amazon is reading this, please give us the option to turn off autocomplete, that's slowing down typing significantly.
    Reply
  • alextheblue
    House70: You can download your library at any time onto any device which has Kindle software - which is basically all platforms. Although I would also like to have an SD card slot, it just isn't all that necessary. 2GB stores a TON of books, and you have access to your all your other archived books via Amazon's Cloud. What you call copyright paranoia, many call convenience and safety. If my device is stolen or destroyed, I can just redownload everything seamlessly via Amazon. It's really no different from what Google does.

    If this was a smartphone or tablet, and I want to store a bunch of movies, music, games, etc locally for speed/bandwidth purposes then of course SD cards rule. My tablet and phone both have 32GB microSD cards installed. But I have found that with my singular-purpose Kindle e-reader, I just don't need an SD card.
    Reply
  • bustapr
    i was just looking around amazon at the paperwhite yesterday. the thing was $125 at launch and went up in price for some reason. now its back at 120. seems like a great buy for anyone who reads tons of books. 2gb really is more than youd ever need really. itd take many years to read through 2gb of books like a common reader would. i was hoping for some color eink kindle to appear this year. guess the wait will be longer.
    Reply
  • bad_student
    11475376 said:
    =maybe I should return it as defective(kindle quality control sucks, more than 35 sand grain sized white specks on my screen. =

    I'm not sure if the white speck comment was meant seriously. The white specks are part of the lighting technology.

    I do have problems with my touchscreen. I often have to restart it multiple times before the screen becomes responsive. Mine's only a few months old.
    Reply
  • nino_z
    So the whole thing repeats again...Sell old kindle on ebay, buy new one :D
    Reply
  • house70
    11475389 said:
    House70: You can download your library at any time onto any device which has Kindle software - which is basically all platforms. Although I would also like to have an SD card slot, it just isn't all that necessary. 2GB stores a TON of books, and you have access to your all your other archived books via Amazon's Cloud. What you call copyright paranoia, many call convenience and safety. If my device is stolen or destroyed, I can just redownload everything seamlessly via Amazon. It's really no different from what Google does.

    If this was a smartphone or tablet, and I want to store a bunch of movies, music, games, etc locally for speed/bandwidth purposes then of course SD cards rule. My tablet and phone both have 32GB microSD cards installed. But I have found that with my singular-purpose Kindle e-reader, I just don't need an SD card.

    Fortunately, I am the kind that likes to have control over what I have purchased, in this case, books. I have plenty of books that are not from Amazon, and I have books from Amazon. If my device is destroyed I can always get my books back from my PC where they're saved on a drive, and copy the whole library on the SD card., as opposed to waiting for the downloads. To me, convenience is having access to my library without needing to be online for that.
    Also, what happens when Amazon gets in a pi$$ing contest with an author/another publisher or some other entity over distribution rights? They can always pull the book(s) from the library, and voila! Puff, it's gone from yours as well. Remember "1984" debacle (I believe it was that book)? It can always happen again.
    Reply
  • beta212
    11476866 said:
    11475376 said:
    =maybe I should return it as defective(kindle quality control sucks, more than 35 sand grain sized white specks on my screen. =

    I'm not sure if the white speck comment was meant seriously. The white specks are part of the lighting technology.

    I do have problems with my touchscreen. I often have to restart it multiple times before the screen becomes responsive. Mine's only a few months old.

    Yes I was, I just sent a picture to amazon support, they agree it's defective.

    Reply
  • bildo123
    I knew they were going to release another model soon enough. I hope they actually fixed the leaked lighting issue that occurred with the first model.
    Reply