Now that we’ve seen, unveiled by Jeff Bezos today in New York, I can’t help but conclude that the more powerful machine provides only a slim additional reader benefit. Here’s why:

There are improvements that make the Kindle 2 marginally better for readers, like faster page turning, smaller better page-turn buttons, longer battery life and the ability to charge via USB. None of the rest of the tweaks affect the actual business of reading directly or indirectly, and even these upgrades probably won’t turn Kindle 1 owners an envious shade of green:

• 20% faster page turning: It nice because flipping ahead several E-Ink pages can be annoying—but it’s not what’s needed to make a real difference. You still can’t leaf through a Kindle book like a real book, and that won’t happen until the page refresh is 100 times (maybe 1000 times) as fast.

More of the Kindle 2 Review here.