Like many Canadians, I’d love to own a Kindle reader from Amazon but the service is not yet offered in Canada.
Soon, I’ll be moving to Victoria, BC which has a clear view 30km across the Straight of Juan de Fuca towards Port Angeles, WA.
Since Kindle material is downloaded in the US through the cell phone system, could I buy my Kindle in the US and bring it across the water into Canada and download content while in Victoria through the cell phone system in Port Angeles?
I don’t think so. You have to be able to reach a U.S. cell phone tower, which means you can’t be more than a mile or two away from one, at most (I think.)
Next best thing…move to Tsawwassen and get access from Point Roberts! I wonder when Canada will get Kindle service. I’d like to try it out.
You don’t have to have access to the cellular service for the Kindle to work. I do virtually all of my Kindle downloads from my computer and just copy the books over to the Kindle via USB. The cellular service is a big plus, though, in case you want to get something on the run.
This. I bought a Kindle as a birthday present for my husband even though he lives in Shanghai so he can read US papers and such.
OTOH, he DID need a US credit card to be able to buy stuff (via cellular only maybe?), so I’d be more worried about that if I were you. I bought it back in October before the Kindle2 came out so it may have changed since then. ETA: Now that I think about it, maybe you could get rid of that requirement (if it still exists) by using Amazon gift cards.
But if going this route make sure they’re amazon.com gift cards. In my experience Amazon gift cards can only be used at the country store they’re purchased from.
There are portions of Victoria where you will occasionally lose cell coverage and roam onto a tower in Port Angeles. There’s a pocket of Oak Bay right on the water where it’s virtually impossible to get a local signal – you’re surrounded by hills on three sides, and then a clear shot across the water to Port Angeles. Even in other parts of the city, it can happen. When I lived there, I was once woken up in the middle of the night by my phone beeping. It turned out to be a text from AT&T welcoming me to the US! However, any signal from Port Angeles that you wind up picking up in Victoria is generally very weak, and I wouldn’t want to try to rely on being able to roam over at will.
You just made me think of a friend of mine in Victoria. He lives in an apartment on Dallas Road that faces the water and thus the USA. He has virtually no cell service in his apartment because he lives on the very border of Canadian cell service facing the wrong way and those towers nearest him can’t penetrate through the building to his apartment.
Now THIS sounds like the way to go.
I have a Kindle, and I live in an area with no Whispernet coverage. According to the Whispernet map we have it now; according to my Kindle, no go.
Like Sue Duhnym’s husband, I just download everything. Works just fine.
I don’t believe the issue is getting ebooks you have purchased into your Kindle. It’s buying them in the first place. If I’m not mistaken, you need an Amazon.com (not .ca) account with a US cc & billing address in order to purchase any ebooks in the first place.
Nope. The kindle uses Sprint’s EVDO wireless internet service. My phone uses the same service and I had zero data connectivity in Canada near the border. The towers know who they belong to. I also believe that the Canadian telco implementation of EVDO is on different frequencies than the US, so a software fix or hack cant fix this.
I’m talking about using a US product near the US cell phone network.
**All the towers it will connect to in Victoria will be Canadian. ** The towers know who owns them. Being near the US doesnt magically change those bits. Unless youre going to drive to WA and get on a Sprint tower physically in WA you are out of luck.
I’ve stood on the beach at Batchawana Bay and hit a US cell tower 40+ km across the lake in Michigan. That’s too for for regular GSM to actually work, though (not enough power in the mobile transmitter, too long a delay for response there and back), so it was useless, but it is possible to pick up towers far across water.
I don’t quite understand the bolded part. The towers know who owns them, of course, but if you’re close enough to the US border that you’re within range of a US tower, and your device is physically capable of connecting to that tower, why wouldn’t the device connect even if you’re technically in Canada? Is it that there will be other Canadian towers closer that will prevent you from connecting to the more-distant US tower, or something?
30km is not close in terms of cell networks.
That is may be true, but, as indicated up thread, people have been able to get a U.S. signal in Victoria.
Cell phones arent two kids with walkie talkies. The EVDO protocol understands your distance from the tower and can deny service from whatever radius the operator specifies. Im sure there are cases where people thought they had a connection, but the tower was just denying them even though the phone claimed to have a signal.
30km. Aint gonna happen. Use the USB cable.
Whispernet is nice, but not necessary. There are plenty of people in the U.S. who don’t have whispernet access. What is important is that you have a U.S. credit card registered to a U.S. address, otherwise you will be unable to purchase content from Amazon.
There are plenty of other places from which you can buy compatible ebooks, but, besides whispernet, the biggest draws of the Kindle is its library and prices. Most other ebook sellers either do not have the content or charge higher prices, or both.