Amazon drops the Kindle DX

The Kindle DX, which Amazon launched in 2009, is to be discontinued - Beginning on Monday, the online retailer's Kindle e-reader family now includes only the bargain-basement, ad-subsidized $69 Kindle model, the Kindle Keyboard 3G, and the newest Kindle Paperwhite and Kindle Paperwhite 3G models. The Kindle DX is no longer advertised.

This hardly comes as a surprise. The Kindle DX, with its large, 9.7-inch e-ink screen, was a favorite of students and others who wanted to view documents featuring large, complex graphics and diagrams, but it was never a brisk seller. Given the current proliferation of low-cost tablets with full-color, high-resolution screens – including Amazon's own Kindle Fire line – it also wasn't much of a bargain. The original DX debuted in 2009 for $489. Amazon lowered the price to $379 after a 2010 hardware refresh, but that's still $80 more than what an 8.9-inch Kindle Fire HD goes for today.