Amazon Kindle Paperwhite gen 12
Weight: 205g. Price: from R5,000 at Circuit City
If I was stranded on a desert island and could only have one thing — as the dinner party thought experiment goes — I’ve always answered that I’d want a Kindle. And a solar panel to charge it, obviously, it being a desert island.
I can’t stop myself from buying a new Kindle whenever new versions come out. I love this device so much; I see it as a birthday present to myself whenever a new one launches. (My wife and friends, who get the previous models, never seem to mind.)
The newly arrived 12th-generation Kindle Paperwhite has a slightly larger screen (7 inches from 6 inches) and a faster processor, promising 25% faster page turns. It is waterproof and delightfully light — it weighs only 211g.
Amazon promises 12 weeks of battery life, but its USB-C port will recharge it in 2.5 hours and you can read while it charges, as I once found out.
I love my Kindle despite that I have essentially moved on from it. I mostly “read” with Audible. But there’s no getting away from reading the old-fashioned way, and the gold standard — still — is the Kindle’s electronic ink (e-ink). After real paper, that is.
Beyerdynamic Aventho 300
Price: R8,900 at Circuit City
Legendary German brand Beyerdynamic has a new range of active noise-cancelling (ANC) headphones and the top-end Aventho 300 are excellent. So good, in fact, that they have usurped the position of being my primary travel cans.
The fit is the first thing you notice, then the quality of the sound; followed (in my case) by the lack of sound. Good ANC is a must for travelling, especially in an aircraft and walking through an aerodrome. (This may well be the only time you will read the phrase “Good ANC” for a while.)
Over-ear cans always give better sound isolation, and I find them more comfortable. The Aventho 300 has spatial audio thanks to Dolby Atmos and its head tracking technology; it pauses what you’re listening to when you take it off.
Best of all, the headphones offer 50 hours battery life with the ANC on. And they look good.
• Shapshak is editor-in-chief of Stuff.co.za.
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