[Becca2904]

Heyyy,

So I'm off to uni in October to do an MSci in Environmental Geosciences and I was wondering if it was worth getting an eReader, like a kindle or something?

I've had a look and they're perfect for me to be reading books on over the summer and stuff but I was wondering if they were any use at all for university. I tried to see if you could get any reference/ uni looking books on there but seeing as I have no idea which ones I'll be using this has proved quite difficult.

Plus the Uni i'm going to say that they buy books in bulk in october and sell them to students cheaper than the RRP anyways.

So thats my dilemma anyways- to buy or not to buy?
Any help much appreciated, thanks

[Mad Vlad]

(Original post by Becca2904)
Heyyy,

So I'm off to uni in October to do an MSci in Environmental Geosciences and I was wondering if it was worth getting an eReader, like a kindle or something?

I've had a look and they're perfect for me to be reading books on over the summer and stuff but I was wondering if they were any use at all for university. I tried to see if you could get any reference/ uni looking books on there but seeing as I have no idea which ones I'll be using this has proved quite difficult.

Plus the Uni i'm going to say that they buy books in bulk in october and sell them to students cheaper than the RRP anyways.

So thats my dilemma anyways- to buy or not to buy?
Any help much appreciated, thanks

It's a question whether that obscure mandatory text book (that's conveniently written by a senior lecturer at your uni......) is available in eBook format.

[thecrimsonidol]

Unlikely that the textbooks you need will be available on Kindle. I could be wrong, but I find it unlikely.

And even then, you wouldn't be able to easily write/make notes in it in the same way you could with a textbook.

[Z-6H820]

I've found my Kindle extremely useful for university, but only the odd textbook was available on the Kindle and it's not practical anyway - if you're told to turn to page 75 and you're sitting working out the menu, it just doesn't work :P it's not easy just to flick pages and obviously you can't write in it. What it's best for is putting PDFs of your notes on for when you're on the bus or sitting having lunch. I'd definitely get one, particularly if you've got travel time, but even if you don't they can be really useful.

[fire2burn]

Many of the texts I used at university were limited print runs only stocked in academic libraries. Couldn't find them anywhere else for the love of money, google books, amazon, ebay, etc. Thus I'd question whether an eReader is going to be of much use to you. Sure might be great if you want to get a Terry Pratchett novel, but for academic texts the availability isn't particularly mind blowing

[DrunknMonkey]

Text books you should be able to find in your university library but what I always found was a pain was reading endless papers off of a computer screen so that's where I I'd find an ereader helpful. I don't know how much trading you will have to do from papers on your choose but probably a lot.

Having said that, using the kindles it was quite hard to navigate around a pdf file so I'd advise finding an ereader where you can swipe across the screen to scan across odds easier.

This was posted from The Student Room's Android App on my GT-N7000

[Reader 79]

There's also a problem with the screen size of e-readers - most of them are the size of a fairly small paperback. I don't know anything about your subject, but if you need to read lots of large textbooks with illustrations and diagrams, the only e-reader I can think of that would be of any use is the Kindle DX, which has a 9.7-inch screen - roughly the same as a standard hardback. PDFs and such are much easier to read on this, but it's expensive - £240.

Personally, I think that if your uni does what it says and gives you all the textbooks at a cheaper price - combined with the limited digital availability of academic books, as mentioned above - it's probably better to stick with print for now.

[harreeeee]

E readers are not very good at showing images and diagrams.

[Becca2904]

Thank You Thats helped me a lot

[dbmag9]

I agree with what everyone else has said re academic books, but would add that for fiction (or books you just read straight through) the Kindle is awesome. The screen is great, it stores a ridiculous quantity of books and weighs less than a paperback. If you want to read fiction over the summer/while you're at uni I would still recommend getting one, if your budget stretches to it.