Amazon Introduces New Kindle

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As you may have heard if you’re following the fierce eReader market, the Kindle has been ‘out of stock’ the past few days – leading to speculation, some fair (a new Kindle is coming) and some absurd (Amazon to discontinue Kindle hardware). All that speculation aside, Amazon is introducing a new Kindle which is smaller, lighter and – if you count the new WiFi-only model, cheaper.

For those out of the know – the original Kindle and the bigger Kindle DX had a free lifetime 3G connection – via Sprint and AT&T but branded as Amazon WhisperNet. It allowed free internet access and downloading of books. We’ve always wondered what the cost of a lifetime 3G connection could be, even for something as small as the filesizes of eBooks. Apparently, it costs $50. The new WiFi-only Kindles, sans the free WhisperNet 3G – will be $50 cheaper than the 3G version.

That brings the ‘new’ Kindle to $189, with the WiFi-only Kindle coming to $139. $139 is damn cheap for a fully-featured eReader in this market – and pretty compelling. The Wall Street Journal writes that the Kindle is going “mainstream” with this new cheap Kindle – and it definitely is awesome at such a low price. If the mainstream crowd flocks to it, that remains to be seen.

The new Kindle still goes with the E Ink screen, but offers a 20% faster refresh rate. Overall, the hardware is 21% smaller and 15% lighter. Overall, the keyboard has gotten a refresher. It’ll now come in two colors – Graphite like the DX or the old White. The “experimental” (in my experience – horrible) Kindle browser now runs on WebKit, but it’s still being shown on an E Ink screen, keep that in mind.

Does the new Kindle intrigue you? Is $139 in your price range?