A Geek Goes Flying

NOOKcolor showing Android home screen Holy cow, this thing still works!(?!) Picked up this O.G. Barnes & Noble NOOKcolor ($249) in 2010 (IIRC) when I coudln’t afford an iPad ($499), because “ they” had figured out how to load an unrestricted Android build onto it ( CyanogenMod ; this thing reports it’s running Android version 2.3.7, kernel 2.6.32.9,  CyanogenMod-7.2.0-RC2-encore, on an ARMv7 CPU with 480MB reported RAM... ). This thing has been sitting without a charge for probably a couple of years at least, but a few minutes on its charger and it fired right up. (Compare with a couple of Kindle Fire tablets I had, that are much newer and totally dead, and headed to e-waste recycling.) This was a device designed and shipped when USB charging beyond the 5V 500ma standard was still in its infancy , so it came with a "proprietary" cable that ends in a weirdly long USB Mini B plug that illuminates to show charging state (I don’t recall if it will charge at all on the stan...

I present the Nook GlowLight Plus (model BNVR510):         Nook GlowLight Plus (BNVR510) eReader I have no idea when, where, or how I acquired this thing, or how much I spent on it, but even though it’s almost 10 years old, it’s still a compelling little gadget. Mine already has a couple of small marks in the screen that aren’t gonna “buff out,” so when I decided to carry an eReader in my unisex shoulder bag , I figured I’d load this up and not risk my more expensive, larger, Libra 2 or Elipsa 2E . In the process, I found out I really like it. It’s diminutive (6.4x4.7x0.34"), light, backlit, has 4GB of storage (about 2.5 GB usable) which is plenty to carry a reasonable number of books around, it’s IP67 certified for dust / water protection, and it shares an E Ink Carta HD display (1080 by 1440 resolution on the 6" screen for 300 ppi) it shares with the Kindle Voyage, Oasis, Scribe, Paperwhite 3 and newer, Tolino Vision 2, Kobo Klo HD, PocketBook Touch HD and HD 2...