More annoyingly, the screen would blink in and out as it tried to perform this operation. In a side-by-side comparison of similarly formatted content, the Nook took noticeably longer the Kindle 2 to change the page. Waiting for a page screen to redraw itself on the Nook’s E Ink screen can be a serious test of your patience. Until it comes, I won’t be able to say whether the sluggish performance is strictly a software shortcoming or whether it implicates one or more of the hardware components along with the software. But the anticipated update has yet to arrive (it was initially slated to arrive in the week following the Nook’s launch now the due date has slipped to late December). I call out the launch software in particular because Barnes and Noble says that it plans to fix some of the performance issues through a firmware update. With its launch software, the Nook stumbles.

Beyond being a navigation tool for the E Ink screen, the touchscreen has an on-screen keyboard for data input (such as for searching or for adding notes) and colorful cover thumbnails that you can scroll through if you flip past the list on the E Ink screen above the touchscreen, the E Ink screen moves to the next page to catch up with where you are in the LCD. The touchscreen also adds a splash to color to a device that remains locked in a world consisting of shades of gray.

Barnes and noble nook reader for pc