Rooted NOOK Color or Kindle Fire (rooted?)

[MeLikeyRoot]

Hi all,

I just bought a Nook Color refurb for $129. I will definitely root it (ie run CM7 on an SD). It's for my 6 year old for reading and videos, etc.

I thought it was a great deal so I jumped on it. But now I am second guessing myself. I have been watching videos that compare the Nook Color and Kindle Fire. The Kindle Fire can be root now as well, but I don't plan on rooting it if I do get it. Our family is Amazon dependent and have Prime so it matches. It seems the Kindle Fire is t he way to go... if money isn't an issue.

Any opinions on this?
Are there still issues with the choppy video playback on the Nook?

So, I guess the real question is: NOOK color rooted for $129 or Kindle Fire (unrooted, maybe later) for $199?

BTW, the Nook has been shipped but I still have the option of rejecting the order at no cost... or I would just play with it.

 

[koopakid08]

I personally do not like the Fire. No SD card slot limits your space by a lot. I also don't like how Amazon is trying to play "Apple" by making it's own closed garden ecosystem.
The Nook is a great hackers device and will get ICS eventually (there is already a very stable test build).
Both the Kindle and the Nook will not play HD video without hiccups but there isn't really any point as the screen is not HD anyway. I watch Netflix, Hulu, and some standard definition avi's on my Nook with no problems at all.

But in the end it is still your decision. My suggestion is keep the Nook, put a custom rom on it (or root it if you want the stock reader) and save yourself 70 bucks.


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[JonMark#AC]

I had the Kindle Fire, for maybe a total of 12 hours before returning it. I went out and bought the Nook Color and even without rooting either, the Nook was a lot better than the Kindle in my opinion. The reader was smoother, the web browser was better and it just seemed snappier. Once I rooted (CM7 on SD card), it was even that much better than the Kindle Fire. But since you wouldn't be rooting the Kindle at first, even at just stock OS's the Nook beat out the Kindle for me. Once rooted, there's no comparison at all. I, too, have an Amazon Prime account, but it wasn't that much of a difference.

One of the main deciding factors for me, was that on the Kindle Fire it was so hard to load documents on it. I'm a minister and was wanting to use the document reader for my sermon notes when I preach, so that was a big factor. Side loaded documents on the Kindle wouldn't show up in the "documents" section and could only be viewed through DocsToGo, which was a pretty crappy reader. With the Nook, the document reader is flawless.

Kindle Fire does offer the "borrow" book thing for Amazon Prime members, which was cool. But it was only one book per month. Nook Color has a comparable LendMe feature. Though I never used those, they're about the same except the the borrow feature on Kindle is from the Amazon library, whereas the LendMe feature are books on other user's Nooks.

The lack of physical buttons on the Kindle was also a drawback for me. I like physical volume buttons, home button, etc. The Kindle only offers a physical power button, the rest is done within the OS touchscreen. It's innovative, but just not my style. As far as build quality goes, I feel the Nook is much better made. It feels more sturdy and the metal (?) band around the whole thing definitely makes it a strong device. True the Kindle Fire has gorilla glass, but if I were to drop both of them on the sidewalk (heaven forbid) I would definitely have more confidence in the Nook than the Kindle to hold up against said drop. -- Since this device will be for a 6 year old, a good sturdy device would def be something to consider.

Long story short, I highly recommend you keep the Nook over the Kindle Fire.

 

[kimberlyinmn]

I also had second thoughts over which one would be best for me. I think the ONLY advantage that the Kindle Fire has is Amazon's Kindle customer service. A 30-day no questions asked return policy compared to Overstock only refunding about 50% if the return is due to buyer's remorse. Trust me, I bought two NCs. My mom's wouldn't connect to her Mifi so she wanted to return it. They only refunded $61.59. After a couple of email exchanges and a supervisor calling me, they refunded the rest. (Again, Overstock, not B&N.)

That being said, my Nook Color works as expected. It's rooted and has CM7 installed internally. The biggest benefit is the additional memory from the microSD. If you've ever owned an iPod Touch with only 8 GB, you know how easy it is to fill that up - especially if you want to watch videos. There's talk over on the Kindleboard forum about how some people have already filled up their Fire! Who knows, maybe the next Amazon tablet will have external storage capabilities, but for now, I'd say to stick with the NC.

In addition to being able to watch Netflix, if you have Amazon's Prime account, you can also watch those movies as well, on the NC.

 

[jr369]

Here is a thought/question.......

On my nook tablet I "side loaded" the amazon market. With that said would you then be able to do the book borrowing and other amazon downloads (besides apps) like newspapers and magazines?

I would like to get the New York daily news for 99 cents a month but it says its a kindle only thing but I have the amazon market so would I be able to get it?

 

[MeLikeyRoot]

Thanks for reassuring the purchase everyone.

I guess, now the decision is to root internally or via SD. I originally thought SD because my daughter might like the original nook interface. It would be simpler to use and we can revert at anytime. I'll just play with it.

BTW, is there a way to do a soft dual boot? I have read on the threads here that, I'll need to pop out the SD to use the stock Nook UI. Any way to select which UI to load on boot/start? It'll just be simpler that way.

Thanks again for the replies.

 

[jr369]

A few things to consider.....

1- the nook tablet is twice as fast than the (color and fire) and has better screen than the nook color but it's 50.00 more
2- the nook tablet can side load apps (indirect way to root) or full root
3- ONLY the nook color can do the BOOT ROOT OF SD CARD cause the boot loader on the nook tablet is locked (which is what you need to boot from an SD card)

I went for the tablet. I'm playing full DVD quality rips with no problem at all. and I don't need to wste time converting the files down to a 700MB size

hope this helps

 

[kimberlyinmn]

Here is a thought/question.......

On my nook tablet I "side loaded" the amazon market. With that said would you then be able to do the book borrowing and other amazon downloads (besides apps) like newspapers and magazines?

I would like to get the New York daily news for 99 cents a month but it says its a kindle only thing but I have the amazon market so would I be able to get it?

No, I think the magazines/newspapers can only be read on a Kindle device. They can't be read on the Kindle app on another device. Hmmmm... I think the book borrowing can be read via the Kindle app. I haven't tried that yet, although I think that works okay.

 

[jr369]

I get what you're saying...

But I remember seeing somewhere that as long I was using the kindle reader app no matter what device I can use it.

I just can't remember where I saw this. I think it was the kindle newspaper section on amazon.com but I can't get it at work cause it's firewalled

 

[kimberlyinmn]

What?! How dare they!

This is what it says on the Kindle Newstand page. They don't specifically SAY that you can't read it on an app, but they kind of imply it.

Kindle Newsstand
Magazines, Newspapers, and Blogs auto-delivered wirelessly to your Kindle, and all subscriptions start with a 14-day free trial

Okay, I did see that I was able to send one of my magazines to my Android phone and I was able to open it just fine. I guess that some of the magazines and newspapers aren't able to be sent to devices other than Kindles based on the publisher's request. I clicked the NYT newspaper and saw this "Available only on these devices" and when you hover over that, a list of just the Kindle devices displays. But the Washington Post newspaper does let you read this on the Kindle app.

 

[roberto]

Thanks for reassuring the purchase everyone.

I guess, now the decision is to root internally or via SD. I originally thought SD because my daughter might like the original nook interface. It would be simpler to use and we can revert at anytime. I'll just play with it.

BTW, is there a way to do a soft dual boot? I have read on the threads here that, I'll need to pop out the SD to use the stock Nook UI. Any way to select which UI to load on boot/start? It'll just be simpler that way.

Thanks again for the replies.

I ran mine with dual-boot for a few months before I decided to stick with CM7. Instructions for doing so are here. I have even seen talk of having both on internal eMMC memory but haven't tried it.

 

[Uncle Louie]

A few things to consider.....

1- the nook tablet is twice as fast than the (color and fire) and has better screen than the nook color but it's 50.00 more
2- the nook tablet can side load apps (indirect way to root) or full root
3- ONLY the nook color can do the BOOT ROOT OF SD CARD cause the boot loader on the nook tablet is locked (which is what you need to boot from an SD card)

I went for the tablet. I'm playing full DVD quality rips with no problem at all. and I don't need to wste time converting the files down to a 700MB size

hope this helps

The Nook Table has better specs, for sure. But $129.00 for the Nook Color (through the official Barnes and Noble ebay account), was too good to pass up.

 

[MeLikeyRoot]

The Nook Table has better specs, for sure. But $129.00 for the Nook Color (through the official Barnes and Noble ebay account), was too good to pass up.

My thoughts exactly. I intended to buy her the Fire mid-January for her Bday. But jumped on the $129.

 

[koopakid08]

Thanks for reassuring the purchase everyone.

I guess, now the decision is to root internally or via SD. I originally thought SD because my daughter might like the original nook interface. It would be simpler to use and we can revert at anytime. I'll just play with it.

BTW, is there a way to do a soft dual boot? I have read on the threads here that, I'll need to pop out the SD to use the stock Nook UI. Any way to select which UI to load on boot/start? It'll just be simpler that way.

Thanks again for the replies.

If you hold N while booting up you will get the option of what OS to boot into stock, or your SD install.


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[koopakid08]

A few things to consider.....

1- the nook tablet is twice as fast than the (color and fire) and has better screen than the nook color but it's 50.00 more
2- the nook tablet can side load apps (indirect way to root) or full root
3- ONLY the nook color can do the BOOT ROOT OF SD CARD cause the boot loader on the nook tablet is locked (which is what you need to boot from an SD card)

I went for the tablet. I'm playing full DVD quality rips with no problem at all. and I don't need to wste time converting the files down to a 700MB size

hope this helps

I wouldn't buy the Nook Tablet until there is a boot loader bypass which may never happen. No custom roms makes it a no go.



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[MeLikeyRoot]

If you hold N while booting up you will get the option of what OS to boot into stock, or your SD install.


---------------------------------
Sent from my LG Optimus V using Tapatalk

Thanks!!! All set now, I guess. Oh, she is going to be so happy!