NOOK GlowLight 4 from Barnes & Noble -- REVIEW
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Jun 22, 2024
Want a great ebook reader that's easy to read in direct sunlight or late at night in a dark room? One with space for hundreds of your latest books and a crisp 300-dpi eInk screen? I review the Barnes & Noble NOOK GlowLight 4 ebook reader and find that there's really a lot to like about this new device. Check it out at: https://www.BarnesAndNoble.com/ Check out Dave's Q&A Web site at: https://www.AskDaveTaylor.com/ #nook #ebook #barnesandnoble #kindle #ebookreader #askdavetaylor
View Transcript
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Should this be your next e-book reader? Let's check it out
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[♪ Music ♪ Dave Taylor here, and I'm checking out this
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This is the Nook Glowlight 4 from Barnes & Noble. It's the first of their new generation of Nook e-book readers
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Easy way to tell, it has USB-C for charging, rather than that yicky old micro USB
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Not a fan. But there's a lot to really like about this tiny little, incredibly light
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and small enough to hold in one hand without any fatigue, e-book reader
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It's a 6-inch, high-res, 300 dpi screen, and its actual resolution, if you look at it this way, is 1440x1080
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So this is actually kind of, sort of, an HD resolution e-ink screen
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Now, e-ink is super interesting because it is actually a technology designed to mimic the light characteristics of paper
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So, here's a photo of me with the e-ink screen in direct sunlight
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I promise you, if you took your tablet, or your iPad, or your computer screen
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and had it in that bright a direct morning sunlight, you'd barely be able to see it unless you cranked the brightness all the way up
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But that is without any backlighting at all. It's just the default light because that's how e-ink works
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Now, the challenge is that e-ink then has to be illuminated somehow
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for you to read it in low-light situations. And the Barnes & Noble team came up with two different solutions for that
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They have what they call Night Mode, and I can show you
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There's two, right? So there's Night Mode. So now I've turned off the backlighting
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You see it's not quite as bright. Let me sort of keep it on camera while I turn it back on
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You can see that makes a big difference in the lower-light situation
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But they also have Night Mode, and Night Mode's really interesting because this is all part of that whole sort of industry recognition
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of the blue light problems at nighttime. So if you turn on Night Mode, it will gradually change the lighting on the screen
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from a blue tint to an orange tint based on the time of day
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So you probably won't even notice. If you're just sitting there and you're immersed in your latest book
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then over time, it'll be like, oh, it's not as blue as it was
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And that's actually really good for the serotonin in your brain, for your ability to go to sleep, for eye strain, lots of reasons to like that
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And that's separate from what they call the glow light, hence the name Glow Light 4
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So generally speaking, I keep that on during the day, but if I'm going to be outside, I will turn it off and even further extend my battery life
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And you can also see one of the other interesting characteristics is that it has buttons on the edges
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And you can actually change their behavior, but generally speaking, the top button's going to go in this direction
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and then the top button on the other side will go back. And now I'm here, I'm just looking at the library
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And one of the other great things about this, 32GB of storage
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A lot of these devices, if you look at the comparable size Kindle from Amazon, it's 8GB, right
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If you want to go up to 32GB, you have a significant bump in price
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But 32GB literally lets you save and store hundreds of books, hundreds of books
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You can pick your favorite authors, and you can have all their works all on your device
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And then once it's fully charged, it generally runs three to four weeks on a charge
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You could take it for that week-long backpacking adventure up in the mountains
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and not have to worry about, oh, how do I charge it when it's three days in and I've run out of battery
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That won't happen, and you can read like a lunatic. Now, if you're backpacking and reading, then you probably also want to keep an eye out on where you're walking
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But generally speaking, there's a lot of interesting capabilities here. It also, by the way, works with PDFs
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So if you're a student, this is sort of an interesting way to get some PDFs
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and read them while you're on the train or on an airplane or something
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And again, what I really like is this extraordinary battery life because it just lasts and lasts and lasts
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It's a soft-touch finish. For people that are familiar with the entire Nook line, the bezel, which is this outer frame
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is considerably thinner than on previous generations. So they have a small form factor with a decent-sized screen, which is always a win
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And let's see, what else can I tell you? That's much of what makes this really interesting
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What I did is I just sort of picked a book, and you have to sort of get used to e-ink
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because e-ink doesn't just immediately change. There's a little bit of a delay, but not much
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You can see here, if I was reading, this is as painless as it gets
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And if you don't like the buttons, you can always swipe. That's fine
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You can use it however you prefer. You can remap the buttons
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There's two on each side, so you can reverse the order. You can do everything on one side, forward and backward, all on that one side
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I mean, it's super flexible. And the Nook Library from Barnes & Noble has tons of books
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I mean, thousands and thousands and thousands and thousands of books. And what I really like is they also have a section called $2.99 and less
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so you can go and pick up a book. And maybe it's not the very best book from one of your favorite authors
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but it's kind of fun to go back and read other titles. And if you're preparing for a cruise or something
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then being able to dump a dozen books on there gives you the freedom to say
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eh, I don't like this one so much. I think I'm going to just go to the next one
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Super easy. So dimensions-wise, 6.1 inches by 4.7 inches by 3 tenths of an inch thick
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and it's 6.7 ounces. Honestly, if you had an apple or an orange in the other hand
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that would be heavier than this Nook. So there's lots to like about it
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And I will just say in the really cute little box, there is one more thing worth noting
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and that is the charging cable, USB-A, the rectangle on one end
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USB-C on the other. And there is no little charging cube, so you will need to have something to plug this into
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More likely than not, you already have something, and you could also plug this into your computer
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and it will charge off of that. And that's it. It's a really nice little box
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I feel like Barnes & Noble is really stepping up their game, and I know that their plan is to have a lot more revision on the Nook line
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and it totally makes sense. You know, the idea that something this small can contain hundreds of books
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is kind of magic. And then to have this screen technology, which is very, very close to reading it on paper
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I know it's not actually paper. You don't actually move the screen to get to the next page
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And I like paper books too, but I really like the convenience of this
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and particularly if you're traveling, and particularly if you're traveling overseas and you're not sure about connectivity
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here you go. You have your travel guide and your 10 favorite books that you have on your reading list
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So all of that is going to keep you covered for weeks on end
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Super convenient. Super handy. Only thing left to talk about is the price
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But before we get to the price, I'm going to ask if you could subscribe to my channel
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Really appreciate that. A click or a tap on the subscribe button
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and we're connected. Cool. Now this, let me get back to the home screen
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You can do that with a single tap on the end button at the bottom. If I push it correctly
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There we go. So now I'm back to my home screen, and you can see there's some toolbar along the bottom
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But this is the Nook Glowlight 4 from Barnes & Noble, and it's $149.99 at BarnesAndNoble.com
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Now, I don't know whether they'll have discount pricing at some point
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but I will say it's a little spendy until you remember the 32 gig of storage
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and then you realize, ah, well, that actually is pretty darn sweet
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It's also, honestly, the price of what? Five hardback bestsellers. So, you know, instead of that, get them on this
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and now you've paid for the device forever. And generally, e-books are less expensive than print books
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which should be the case. Anyway, that's all I got. I'm going back to this Alex Shaw novel
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so I'll have to catch you in my next video. ♪♪♪��
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