Right. . . . (interlaces fingers and cracks knuckles )
First off Elyse, Do you. . . .
1) want to have a great reading experience, where you can read comfortably for hours no matter where you are.
or . . . .
2) do you want a tablet that you can occasionally read only indoors with. ??
Dedicated Ereaders, KIindles, Kobos, Nooks are dedicated ereaders with primarily one fuction. . .To read books.
The Matte screen means no screen refection even in the brightest sunlight.
You can take it to the beach and the park and still read with no problem at all .
and with the latest generation of all ereaders they all have lights built into the screen so you can read in the dark.
Tablets on the other hand have a shiny reflective screen, which allows bright rich colour saturation.
However take it outside on a bright summers day and you struggle to see anything but the reflection of your face
or the sky.
Indoors, you have the reflection of the bright walls behind you or the lights on the ceiling or the windows behind you etc.
You can usually find a sweet spot where the reflections aren't too bad and whatever you're looking at can be seen ok.
I've had a Kobo touch (died on me a few months back, great ereader though) and I now have a Kindle Paperwhite
(as a replacement for the dead Kobo from the store)
I haven't had any dead pixels, yes in the dark with the backlight on right at the bottom there are a few spots of uneven
illumination, but guess what when you're caught up in the narrative you don't notice it.
The battery life isn't anywhere near as good as the Kobo,
however turn the light down to near minimum (you actually don't need it on that often and in bed at night you only need it on low)
and turn off the Wifi (you only need it to download books or do a whispersync, probably once a week)
Do that and your battery lasts weeks and only takes a couple of hours to full charge.
All in all it's a great ereader.
I gave tablets a bit of a bashing earlier, don't get me wrong tablets are great.
I have a Google Nexus 10, it is awesome for watching movies, reading comics, surfing the net, emails, social media and playing games.
But like all shiny objects it's crap outside on a bright sunny day.
So. . . .
If you do a LOT of reading then get a Kindle Paperwhite
if you do a little bit of reading but surf the net a lot get a tablet.