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Amazon Kindle Oasis
Would you pay $290 for an eReader?
Amazon bets that bookworms neck-deep in Amazon’s eBook market will buy theKindle Oasis.
But unless you’re rich, there are a lot of reasons why youmightwant to rethink that purchase.
You could find yourself in a bone-dry Oasis.
Initial Impression
The Oasis comes with a minimal number of peripherals.
Specifications
Judging from the exterior, the Oasis brings nothing new to the already saturated eReader market.
It includes the now ubiquitous combination of a Carta-series E-Ink screen and a Freescale i.MX6 system-on-a-chip.
The two parts give all modern eReaders approximately the same battery life and performance.
Just because nearly all eReaders offer the same internal components doesn’t mean you shouldn’t buy one though.
Both components make for an amazing gadget but you might get a similarly amazing eReader for far less money.
If your answer is “yes”, then the AmazonKindle Oasismight satisfy.
I must note two potential weaknesses.
First,withoutthe battery-cover, the Oasis’s battery life seems to be weeks, not months.
Second, there have been multiple reports that some Kindlesdo not correctly draw energyfrom the external battery.
Does the Oasis Have Solar Charging?
Despite rumors, theKindle Oasisdoes notoffer solar charging.
Today’s eReader hardware just can’t do it.
If your needs include solar-charging, 2017 might bring the product you need.
Consequently, today’s eReaders are functionally identical to those produced in 2012 and 2013.
Your best bet is to wait.
For example, a refurbished Nook Glowlight sells for $71.95 on Amazon.
And a regular Kindle sells for $56, refurbished (but with a 1-year warranty).
Ambidextrous Design and Tiny Form Factor
The Oasis’s form factor is its biggest virtue.
While possessing a six-inch screen, its dimensions are decidedly compatible with one-handed reading.
Because of its smartphone-like screen rotation capabilities, the Oasis manages to dispense with an extra set of buttons.
In short, the Oasis is the smallest, lightest eReader available in its class.
On the other hand (pun intended), the emphasis and light weight might prove a double-edged blade.
While elegantly designed, the Oasis does not look rugged.
A single drop might turn your $290 investment into a mirage.
The setup process takes about 5 minutes to complete.
In addition to a short configuration process, users can choose to customize their gadget.
Each of the buttons, for example, can remap to a new function.
Overall, theKindle Oasisoffers an easy setup process combined with excellent customization options.
However, most eReaders offer a similarly smooth experience.
Unlike several other mainstream eReaders, the touch zones offer optimized locations and size.
Users will not often touch the wrong section of the screen.
As mentioned earlier, the Oasis includes an accelerometer which can detect when the machine twists 180 degrees.
Screen rotation automatically reorients its user-interface for both left and right-handed reading modes.
It feels natural to switch the gear between hands, particularly when turning pages with its physical buttons.
My favorite design feature: the physical buttons switch when the machine rotates.
The design affords a higher degree of comfort than its competitors.
Unfortunately, the Oasis doesn’t offer landscape mode, which would have made reading wider PDFs much easier.
Backlight Mode
The backlight on the Oasis looks fantastic.
Its lighting range scales between almost invisible to eye-burning bright.
Registering an Oasis with Amazon creates a Kindle email account.
The biggest problem with sideloading books: Amazon doesn’t make it easy to locate your copied content.
Of the 12 PDFs that I transferred to the Oasis over USB, only seven showed up.
OCR methods vary between manufacturers.
Some intelligently convert smudged or faded letters into digital characters, such as Optical Word Recognition.
Google Books, for Android, can search through books using OCR.
The Oasis doesn’t seem to offer any kind of OCR.
The Final Analysis: Should You Buy an Amazon Kindle Oasis?
Maybe, if you’re Scrooge McDuck rich.
Otherwise, no way.
For almost $300 an eReader needs to beat down its competitors.
The Oasis offers only a marginally better experience.
ATTENTION GIVEAWAY PARTICIPANTS: We are experiencing difficulties with the video.
The giveaway code is “wonderwall” without the quotation marks.
