Barnes & Noble debuts Nook Simple Touch ereader

By: Geoff Duncan
May 24, 2011

Barnes & Noble's new Nook SImple Touch Reader features a 6-inch touchscreen display with 50 percent better contrast and up to two months of battery life.

Bookseller Barnes & Noble isn’t resting on its ereading laurels, revamping the lower tier of its Nook ereader line today with an all new Nook Simple Touch Reader. The Nook Simple Touch features a 6-inch E Ink Pearl display that the company says offers 50 percent better contrast than its first edition Nook ereader, along with a touch screen interface that eliminates awkward buttons and controls from the front of the unit. And Barnes & Noble says the optimized display offers 80 percent less flashing and the unit can run for up to two months on a single battery charge.



“We set out to design the easiest-to-use, most optimized, dedicated reading device ever created and accomplished it with the all-new Nook,” said Barnes & Noble CEO William Lynch, in a statement. “Touch makes it simple to use, and the beautifully compact design makes it the most portable eReader in its class.”

The Simple Touch Nook weighs just 7.48 ounces and is under half an inch thick, making it 35 percent lighter than the original first edition Nook and 21 percent more compact—in part because controls have been eliminated by the new touchscreen interface. The unit has 2 GB of onboard storage (enough for about 1,000 books) with a microSD slot that can handle up to 32 GB of additional removable storage. The Nook features 802.11b/g/n Wi-Fi for wireless downloads (remember: free Wi-Fi in Barnes & Noble stores, as well as AT&T hotpots nationwide), and users can charge and sideload via microUSB. The Nook Simple Touch sports ePub and PDF documents, along with a range of standard image formats. CLICK HERE to read the full story. 

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