I’ve posted about how much I love my Kobo e-readers more than once. I have the one with e-ink and the Kobo Lookbook. I love both, and I use both for different reasons at different times. The one with e-ink is easy to slip into a bag and take to the doctor’s office or anywhere I have to wait for a long time. The Lookbook is a little bigger, but not heavy, and I like to read at home on that one. Both are simple to use when it comes to downloading e-books and I’m a huge fan of Kobo’s web site.

But I wanted a tablet. And I didn’t want to spend what Apple is charging for the iPad…I have an iPhone, which I like, but I’ve never been completely sold on the concept that Apple is the be all and end all of all computers. I just didn’t drink the Kool Aide…that time. And I’ve seen my mother’s iPad and iPads that belong to friends. I like them. But again, I’m not willing to spend that kind of money for status reasons.

In the same respect, I’ve been looking for a tablet that will do almost everything the iPad does. And they are out there. It’s not something I’m going to use too often, and I tend to be conservative when it comes to spending money on items I want more than I need.

So I checked out the Nextbook Premium 8 tablet in a few places, and fell in love with it. I’ve had it for a few weeks now and I don’t have any major complaints. The one big complaint would be that I find the keyboard a little difficult to navigate. But that’s probably more about my skills than a reflection on the actual tablet. The reading experience is also good. But I will warn people who have never owned an e-reader and are thinking about getting one: if you’re just looking for a device that will let you read e-books, go for the Kobo or something like it in the beginning. You don’t need a tablet to read e-books. In fact, I find that the tablet is distracting when it comes to the overall reading experience.

In other words, speaking as someone who is not a techie and only wants to push a button to read an e-book, I would highly recommend the Nextbook Premium 8 to anyone looking for a tablet who doesn’t want to pay Apple’s prices. But I still go back to my dedicated e-reader to get the full impact of the personal, relaxing reading experience I have always cherished.