Barnes & Noble's Nook server woes rectified

Nook owners couldn't download e-books on Christmas Day.

(Credit: Barnes & Noble)

Over the last couple of weeks we've been writing about how all the e-reader manufacturers have been talking up their robust holiday sales.

Well, there can be some downsides to success, as Barnes & Noble's servers apparently couldn't handle the influx of new users on Christmas Day and continued to experience trouble into Sunday. This is the second year in a row that Barnes & Noble's server issues have kept new Nook owners from buying e-books on Christmas Day.

Across the Web and on Twitter, people were complaining about the problems. For instance, CNET user Ridermom wrote a scathing review of the Nook Color, which received an Editors' Choice award and has had mainly very positive reviews from CNET readers:

I have a product that can not be used because Barnes and Noble server is not working. So all I hear from customer service is to be patient and it should be working by Monday afternoon. So I have a $250.00 product that can not be used and Barnes and Noble will not [give] any compensation to their customers. So after 2-days/6 hours of trouble / and 2 hours of phone calls. I think the Nook is going back to the store tomorrow!!!!

We can't tell you why this inexplicable snafu happened again. But suffice to say that while Barnes & Noble was presumably prepared for the onslaught, the technology didn't cooperate as planned. The good news for Nook owners is the system is working fine now, a day or two late for some.