There are many ebook devices like Kindle, Sony reader, Nook are available in the ebook market. The consumer who wants a device primarily for reading, Kindle beats the iPad on prices. Amazon’s Kindle costs $259, which includes free 3G connectivity. The cost for a version of the iPad with wireless 3G is $629. But for consumers who want more out of a device in this class, there is no comparison between the iPad and the Kindle.
Why iPad?
iPad comes with the nice lay out and has a large color capacitive, multi-touch screen. It uses the same iOS that’s used on the iPhone and iPod Touch, makes it instantly familiar for consumers. It contains many available apps in market which makes it more effective than other devices.
According to James McQuivey, Forrester Research principal analyst “there are about 6 million people who are gearing up this year to buy an e-reader. And they’re going to spend between $250 and $700 on it”. It shows the increasing value of the devices in ebook market. As iPad is coming up with many features, it might attract many consumers towards it. Apple is not pushing this as a Laptop or the Netbook replacement, but as an audio/visual entertainments product.
As an eReader, one of the main advantages of iPad is the ePub format compatibility. Which separates it from the Kindle (Kindle can play only mobi ebook format). ePub is a format which can be played on different devices and Apple’s iPad gives a very nice rendering of the ePub format. ePub is the open ebook format, used by many online stores. The books purchased through the iBooks Store are actually in ePub format, but include DRM to prevent unauthorized sharing or copying.
You can go with the Barnes & Noble Nook also but it is not compatible with large number of apps as Apple iPad does. If you are a Kindle owner and want to switch over to iPad or if you are already an iPad owner and just want to buy a book from Kindle store, then Kindle for iPad is a very useful application.
For books that do not have DRM, you can also convert other formats to ePub and then sync them to the iPad via iTunes. ePub can also be converted to other formats like .Mobi, .prc, .Lit etc.
The Apple iPad’s native eBook format is ePub. This of course makes sense as many publishers have been working on creating their content in this format, therefore Apple haven’t forced the providers to come up with another format yet. So over all iPad with the multifunction facilities and nice rendering of ePub, is the best eBook reader in the current market.
eBookHands offering the ePub conversion of Apple iPad. We follow the IDPF standards to produce validated ePub files from .indd, PDF, Word and other formats.
The author is the Team coordinator of eBook conversion team at ebookhands.com.
