Kindle 2

Does the free web browsing over 3G work in Ireland?

I just upgraded my pre-order for the new Kindle from WiFi to 3G on the strength of that feature.

bp1989 wrote: »

According to Amazon it does.

Correct. I ordered my Kindle 3 on the basis that it specifically says on Amazon.com that I _can_ take advantage of the free 3G in ireland. I was most impressed that it apparently even works in South Africa!

I am however a bit confused as to why I HAVE to order it from amazon.com, and more to the point, why Amazon.co.uk does not supply it to Eire? It was a serious wtf moment for me :eek:

Amazon have offices here (albeit IT related infrastructure and not other services _afaik_) and yet we have to order something like the Kindle 3 from the US?

Anyway. Meh.

boobar wrote: »

I was thinking of buying one of these new kindles. Seems like a very cool gadget. My only concerns are:

What are the price of kindle books in comparison to paperback or hardback new releases? You'd expect it to be cheaper to buy the kindle book....

The other thing is what is the selection like? Hardly worth buying if you are limited to a small selection.

Boobar

Kindle books are cheaper
The girl with the dragon tatoo sells at $5.30 while paper edition is $7.14.
Think of all the trees that will be saved thanks to the kindle etc.
Im sure there will be a great selection of kindle books ,but that is a good point, in a few months time they expect kindle book sales to beat paper editions so im sure the selection will become better and better.
I personally havent many books , I have around 15, and they take up a lot of space, I think the kindle would be fantastic, Digital all the way!

You can change the country associated with your kindle to UK using

http://www.amazon.com/manageyourkindle

However you also need a UK invoice address with your amazon.co.uk account before it is possible to purchase Kindle books from the UK Amazon site.

Here's a response on the matter someone on the Amazon.co.uk discussion boards got from Amazon.

"Dear Sir, Thank you for contacting Amazon.co.uk. If you purchase a Kindle from Amazon.co.uk you'll be able to download content and shop in the Kindle Store as long as your invoice address is set up in the UK. In your case, if you purchase a Kindle and ship it to Northern Ireland but then you use the Kindle in the Republic of Ireland, you will be able to shop in the Kindle Store from the Republic of Ireland as long as you continue to use a UK billing address, and your country settings in the Manage Your Kindle (this will appear in Your Account after the Kindle is released) page are set up to the UK. If you move country and no longer have a UK invoice address, you will need to switch your account to Amazon.com in order to shop in the Kindle Store. If you are travelling outside of the UK, you will be able to continue shopping in the Amazon.co.uk Kindle Store as long as you have a UK invoice address". Permalink to source

floggg wrote: »

For all those who have already bought/received a Kindle, do you know how much the import duty actually comes to?

On the order page, it says a deposit of $40 (if i recall correctly). Will you actually be billed for all this amount, ,less or more?

Kindle 3G $189.00
Shipping & Handling $029.98

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Total before Tax $209.98
US Tax $0
Import fees deposit $044.10

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US$ Total $254.08

That $44.10 is exactly 21% (Irish VAT rate) of $209.98.

So I wouldn't hold out much hope of a refund.

Are there any advantages/disavantages apart from the inital purchase price in buying from amazon.com or amazon.co.uk.

Im thinking of book price, range of books, that type of thing.

I don't read, but I think the device and the technology is great. Definitely the future of books and reading. Was very surprised to see they are offering free 3G connectivity, very impressive and a big advantage over competitors like the iPad.

They should look into offering school textbooks on their store and on the Kindle. It would be a very handy device for college.

You can convert the pdfs through a programme called Calibre and that is meant to improve the compatibility a lot. Although if you are looking to read pdf manuals etc then I would definitely look at the more expensive Kindle DX.

There is free web surfing through 3G but also a wifi option for faster performance too. Plus there is a cheaper modle that just has wifi.

Tried this out earlier and seem to have been successful.. a bit long-winded but well worth persisting with.


1. *Go Amazon.CO.UK as if you were going to buy anything but an ebook (you won't be let anyway... it will force you to go to amazon.COM instead to buy ebooks).
2. *Sign in with your *normal* e-mail address. *(You will also need an alternative e-mail address and a new, alternative amazon account for this cunning ploy to work).
3. *Buy a gift voucher for whatever value you desire. *See*https://www.amazon.co.uk/gp/gc/order-email?ie=UTF8&ref_=gc_lp_eb2 and 'gift' that value to your OTHER e-mail address. Best do this for small values initially until comfortabe with the procedure.
4. *Shut down your browser, empty cache, cookies etc to avoid any possible confusion.
5. *Go to amazon.co.uk and create a new user account, using the alternative e-mail address as the login.
6. *Next, login to your alternative email address (gmail, hotmail, whatever). *You will see that you have received a gift voucher from yourself.
7. *Inside the e-mail, click on 'Apply to account'. *This will open amazon.co.uk in a new window. *Copy over the code contained in the e-mail to redeem the value of the voucher you sent to yourself.
8. *Next, sign out of the account. Again, trash cookies etc and restart the browser. *
9. *Now goto a proxy server website such as daveproxy.co.uk
10. *From here goto amazon.co.uk
11. *Order yourself the ebook you want at the UK price and pay for it from the voucher.
12. *You'll be asked to provide a UK invoice address. *As you won't be posting/delivering anything physical from this account, just fill it up with anything you want. The address won't be varefied against the fictional postcode. At this time, it might be prudent to deregister your Kindle For Mac/PC application (the one reg'd under your normal account), it also woudn't be a bad idea to rename your orig 'My Kindle Content' in 'My Documents' folder to something else, so that you have a backup, just in case.
13. Go through with that and elect to send the ebook to a particlar PC or Mac Kindle device.
14. Open that PC or Mac application.
15. Goto 'Sync and Check for new items'
16. The book you just bought a few moments ago for the UK price should start to download.

Phew!! I know that was very long, and doubtless that somebody will tell me that some of the steps could have been omitted, but the next time you want to buy some books cheaply at UK prices all you have to do is 'gift' yourself a voucher from one amazon account (your original one) to the other (the one that uses the makey-uppy UK address) for the purpose of just buying ebooks

In future when you go to amazon and log in with your alternate account all you need do is log in and buy ebooks and then sync. You no longer need to use proxy servers etc.

If you haven't already bought a Kindle, you can buy the Kindle from this alternate account and have it shipped to somewhere in Northern Ireland, such as a friend or relative who can then forward it onto you in the Republic. You could save about €25-30 using this method, plus you get the correct AC adapter for the Kindle. You should then register this Kindle's serial number with the alternate/ebook only amazon account.

The above paragraph I HAVE NOT tried for myself. Please do so at your own risk!! { You can always unregister the Kindle from that account if things don't work out anyway, and move it to the original amazon account.}

If you have already bought ebooks under your original amazon account and if you have a PC with the Kindle Reader app and purchased books loaded on it, you can follow the guide at http://nyquil.org/archives/1128-Converting-Kindle-Books-a-painful-process-that-works-for-reading-Kindle-books-without-a-Kindle.html to learn how to strip the books of DRM (copy-protection) and then manually bring them (MOBI fikes) back into the Kindle reader app reg'd to the new alternate account or drag and drop them manully onto the Kindle via USB.


I hope that wasn't too confusing!

Yeah. Point taken. I can easily buy DVDs, printed books etc from the UK amazon store using my Irish credit card and have them shipped to my Irish address no problem. However, due to licencing laws or whatever other rules there might be you simply cannot do this with kindle ebooks and reader devices, hence my somewhat longwinded solution above. These steps need only be done once. The saving you'll make on UK priced kindle ebooks is well worth it.