I have a pretty old paperwhite. When it started deleting books i had side-loaded via calibre, I decided to get a kobo. I have a libra color, and I have to say: price notwithstanding, it's a great device. I don't have a lot of experience with more recent devices, but compared to my 2nd gen paperwhite, it is _amazing_.
Color is good enough to read comic books on it, the google drive integration means it's not too hard to get my CBR/CBZ files on directly. The annotation / notetaking featureas are nice (I haven't leaned into them yet, but they work well even on the small screen size), plus all the regular stuff with normal book reading. Also, since it's kobo/rakuten, the libby integration is better (search and select library books right from the device).
The actual reading app is maybe 90% as good as reading on the kindle (or a more specialized reader like perfectviewer on android). There's some annoyingly fiddly features- font size is kind of weirdly variable, when going through CBR files there's no "read next in the folder" gesture nor is there a "this is read/unread" state in the google drive ui, so you always have to remember which book you are finishing when opening the next in the series.
I tried out one of those boox readers with the android apps, which would be even better software-wise, but the boox hardware seems like garbage (for an N=1 at least). My display came with several rows of stuck pixels, and apparently it's a good thing that I ordered from amazon instead of the boox store, because the reviews indicate getting an RMA from boox directly is a pain.
I switched from a Kindle to a Kobo (monochrome), and simply having the book cover as the lock screen makes me like it so much more. I always paid to not have ads on the Kindle, but it would show a bunch of generic images. The book cover is the obvious choice. Kobo gets it.
The reading experience is a little more bare bones, but good enough, and still offers things a physical book does not.
I've got a Boox Note 3 and love it for what it is (my hardware has been fine), but I'd find it very hard to recommend generally. Boox are dodgy at best (GPL violations, random connections to china, etc...), you start with an already old version of Android and if lucky you might get another major version, they aren't cheap, Android stuff is mostly not designed for black-and-white/low refresh rate and some apps have unreadable buttons, things like that.
But, with that all said... it's great for my specific uses. Android is just so much better if you want to run self-hosted stuff. When it dies or the software just gets that old I'll be really at a loss for what to get to replace it.
Yeah, I have a Max Lumi and I feel broadly the same way. My hardware has been great, I use it daily and have read 100s of books and written thousands of pages of notes on it, but wouldn't necessarily recommend it to others because I think mine has already stopped getting updates, the GPL violations aren't great, and the cloud stuff seems a bit dodgy.
On the cloud stuff though -- note syncing has support for WebDAV, so I've fully disabled the Boox Cloud integration and all notes get synced to my self-hosted OwnCloud server, which is nice.
I'd love to figure out how to install some stock Android or Linux on it down the road, though Boox's notes + reading apps are really quite good, and likely very optimized for the hardware.
I stopped using Calibre because it turned out to be more annoying than simply emailing an epub to my designated kindle address. I've never had anything removed. Most of the content comes from libgen.
> When it started deleting books i had side-loaded via calibre
Could you expand on that? I load all my books via calibre but I also have the kindle set to aeroplane mode at all times. Does this happen when syncing?
Happened to me too… Yes, it happened during syncing. I searched up on how to disable Kindle auto update and it’s happening less, but last time I bought a book from Kindle store I got bit again. I guess it’s a sign to stop feeding the hand that bites me.
That is strange. I have had a Kindle for years (probably around a decade), upgrading mutliple times. I am using a Paperwhite Signature for the past year or so and I have not experienced this with any books. I have probably 70% Amazon purchased books, but that still leaves a decent amount of side-loaded books (mostly epub).
The only annoying thing I experience is that the cover art will unload on the side-loaded books where you just get the generic cover with the text of the book. But once you click the book it loads the artwork, which seems to last a few days before quickly going back to the generic cover. But the book itself never leaves the device. I can't say I have experienced this ever (except for once, mentioned below) and I have over 150 books on my 32Gb device.
Just some random thoughts I am wondering:
- Is it an ads-supported model (mine isn't)
- Are the books in a broken-DRM .mobi? Not judging, i've done it too, just curious if Amazon has some sort of "signature" in mobis that allow it to detect a book that had DRM removed?
- Are they standard .epub?
- What is the size of the device? (Maybe smaller 8Gb devices will clean up and prioritize non-Kindle content to make way for "official content)
- Which device is it? (Scribe, Oasis, Paperwhite, older paperwhite, etc)
The one time I had it deleting my book was a large book (it was 400Mb) and it was on an older 8Gb paperwhite. I still had PLENTY of storage space available (I was using around 4Gb) but it kept deleting that book. This was the only time I have seen it happen and it was with this one specific book. That was many years ago and I haven't seen it since. That book was a DRM-removed book I got through "shared" means. Which has led me to question if the Kindle removes it because it could detect that the DRM had been removed or because of its large size. But this was a one-off experience for me. The book was readable by the device. It would download for several weeks at a time before being removed. You could redownload it and it would work for weeks again before dissapearing. I never could figure it out.
Interesting thread. I wonder if this has anything to do with what I experienced with the one (two, actually) I set up for my mom years back. The books were visible on the filesystem but nowhere to be found when using the device.
Fortunately, getting two units in a row with jarring pink blotches was enough of a non-starter to suggest that she just revert to a V4 without my having to explain the confusing behavior.
It also deleted all my side-loaded books. That was the last straw for me. I only buy DRM-free media from now on and only use respectful hardware. I use my Remarkable 2 primarily for e-reading now, though I concede fully it's not the best user experience for reading. But I don't have to worry that it will delete my books! I can also now "write in the margins" which I've found to be a powerful way to take notes. I can't bring myself to write on physical books, but with Remarkable you can have a copy that is stock and a copy with your notes on it. Best of both worlds!
We had books, but then we thought, what about screens.
Then we had screens but we thought, what if screens were more like books.
Then we had book screens and we thought, what if the screens we made to look like books were more like screens.
Similarly, I saw someome on social media yesterday post about buying "Monopoly Go" boardgame at the store. The box says "Based on the popular mobile game".
The joke was the same, we had a board game, then we made a mobile video game based on the board game, now they are selling a board game based on the video game that was based on the board game.
I get the joke, but color has been present in books (manuscripts, before the invention of the printing press, even) basically since their inception, many centuries ago, so just adding color wouldn't make these devices more similar to screens as much as it would make them more akin to... well, books. Just look at these marvels: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Illuminated_manuscript.
I own a Kindle Paperwhite (last gen, relative to this new one) and a Kobo Clara BW (purchase in the last 6 months). IMO, the Kindle is the premium e-reader when it comes to look and feel. It's just a fantastic experience. The issue is Amazon and how even if you want to put your own purchased ebooks on it, you have it send it through their servers. That tied with a few other privacy issues over the years led me to also get a Kobo.
The Kobo can run in a fully offline mode (called "side-load mode" or something like that) and I can transfer my ebooks directly via USB. I use the Kobo most of the time now since most of my reading lately has been independently published ebooks, but I still use the Kindle for books I purchase via Amazon directly.
With all that said, I personally think the Kindle Paperwhite is already the perfect size. It fits snuggly in my back pocket and strikes the perfect balance between screen size being large, but not too large to hold for my average male hands. I'd be a bit concerned about the size increase for my personal use case, but Amazon does a great job with the Kindle in general so I'd like to see some reviews.
As for the new Colorsoft, I'd really like to see some reviews. The color Kobos that came out earlier this year got some mixed reviews for colors, but I'm not sure if that's just the nature of color e-ink or not.
> The issue is Amazon and how even if you want to put your own purchased ebooks on it, you have it send it through their servers.
You can sideload your books over USB too, using Calibre for instance.
I own a few Kindle models and a Kobo Forma as well. The Kindles do have some quirks and bugs (e.g., disappearing books, issues with sideloaded fonts…). But my Kobo Forma’s battery completely died after a couple years of usage, and the device became completely unreliable. After that experience, I’ve resigned myself to live with the Kindle’s problems.
My Kindle had this "bug" where my side loaded books randomly disappear. As a workaround, I have to keep it in flight mode at all times. Not a big issue since that’s what I would do anyway, but in case my Kindle would break, I wouldn’t think long to buy an alternative
This happend to my kindle to! After keeping in in flight mode for years I put it online again in order to buy a few new books from the kindle store, poof suddenly my entire library of side loaded books was gone, with progress and everything. I could see random metadata files related to the books on the drive, be books was gone. Super annoying as many of the books I didn't have locally anymore and to loose the "archivement" of finished books sucks big time.
I can see this may be implemented by amazon to counter piracy, but alot of these books was perfectly legal.
So the result of this is that I will never put my kindle online again and just stop buying from the Kindle store.
Same, though I don't think it is going to help Amazon the way they hope it does. I moved books over to my kindle and had it nuke my humble bundle collections when I added a purchase from Amazon. I've not connect it again until I figure out how to backup and restore MY metadata.
Out of all the devices where having a physical airplane mode switch would be nice, I'd put the kindle pretty high up. Kinda sucks having a battery that lasts ~45 days in airplane mode, and like a week and a half when I forget to turn it off.
Physical switch is less prone to the whims of a capricious, resume-driven product owner who thinks their users may just want to get rid of airplane mode. Most are diving into firmware.
You make an interesting point. Maybe facilitating the usage of sideloaded books is not among Amazon’s priorities. Yet I don’t know how much of that comes from malice rather than simply negligence or lack of interest.
I recently picked up a refurbed Kobo Forma, and I absolutely love the device -- with the caveat that, like you mentioned, the battery has been completely unreliable.
Multiple times I have picked up the device to find it completely dead, while it was at full battery less than a day ago. I haven't quite narrowed down the cause yet -- since I did install KOReader and Nickel right after getting the device, it's not running stock software, so I'm not certain if the issue is hardware or software related.
It definitely seems to be doing something in sleep mode that's draining the battery, even with wifi turned off. This really shouldn't be the case -- I'd expect close to 0 power being used when not actively refreshing a page. I've recently turned to mitigating the issue by setting the device to turn off completely after an hour... which is not ideal, but having to wait for the thing to boot up is definitely preferable to waiting for it to charge.
It's annoying because otherwise this thing is pretty close to perfect for me -- the form factor is excellent, extremely lightweight, and I can connect to my Calibre-web server and download any ebook I have on demand. I'd seriously consider buying an extra one to crack open and install my own battery if I knew that would fix the issue.
Edit: Lastly, I have a sneaking suspicion that "refurbished" does not mean "replaced with a new battery", which, honestly, should probably be illegal to advertise a device that way vs "used".
My biggest problem with the Forma is that, even when completely turned off, the battery dies and refuses to charge for days on end. One day, the device says it is charged to 100%; the following day, it dies without an apparent reason. I’ve calibrated the battery many times, but the issue remains. I agree that if it didn’t happen, the device would be excellent.
Sorry, you're absolutely right. The overhead of it was more than I cared to do (needing to use Calibre instead of a drag and drop of a file), especially since Amazon would then report my newly loaded books back to themselves. That's the part that I really didn't like.
Shame to hear about your Kobo's battery. FWIW, they have great repairability (in newer models at least). That said, the Kindle's battery does smash the Kobo's in my experience as well.
You can drag-drop the file from the file explorer, at least on my Kindle (2022). I think the OP mentioned Calibre because sometimes you need to convert the file for Kindle if you have a bespoke format.
Why do you need a few Kindles and also a Kobo? Are you keeping them in different places and don't move them? I only have the first Paperwhite which I carry along, it's 11 years old already and it still does the job. The battery keeps up and I was probably lucky to not have noticed any hiccups.
I read several types of books, multiple hours per day: reflowable fiction books, PDFs, books generated from my Markdown notes… I’ve got a Paperwhite, a Scribe and a Kobo Forma, but I’m still searching for the perfect e-reader.
The Paperwhite is too small for PDFs, but great for fiction and portability. The Scribe is excellent for PDFs, but it makes my books disappear sometimes, and it does not work well with sideloaded fonts. The Forma is a middle ground in terms of portability, but its battery died after a couple years and nowadays I only use it near a power outlet.
I use a combination of a Kindle Paperwhite Signature for novels and mainstream books. THen I use a Remarkable Tablet for PDFs, research papers, my own notes, etc.
I find it to be a good combination. Like you said, the paperwhite is amazing for laying in bed at night (really like the backlight) or on the couch or traveling to read. But it is too small for PDFs or serious notetaking. The Remarkable is perfect for those things. The remarkable also gives you full control over your files to do whatever you want. You can connect it to Google Drive, Dropbox, OneDrive, etc and/or just manage files directly on device (plug it in via usb-c and it shows up as a USB mass storage device).
The two tools compliment themselves nicely. Just my 2 cents.
I think you just naturally end up with that because the things appear indestructible. The first ever kindle I bought (dunno how long ago, it was before paperwhite, so more than 11 years) still works without issue. Even retains all the music I put on it 14 years ago when it was still an experimental feature.
I think the only thing that has been discontinued is the free 3G internet all over the world that they apparently figured was too expensive.
I _loved_ my Kindle Voyage for its adjusting backlight and glass display.
I wish it were less destructible! I upgraded to a Paperwhite (2021) when the Voyage's power button broke. Water resistance is nice, but having to get the "signature" edition for a light sensor and an easily scratched plastic display is quite disappointing.
My wife is a pretty voracious reader and has 3 active Kindles that I believe are mostly segregated out by genre/collection. I wouldn't be surprised if this is as much for convenience as anything else, I don't use it much but Amazon's library management and navigation on the Kindles has never impressed me.
She's also one of those folks who sideloads with Calibre as well as purchasing through Amazon.
Whenever I’ve converted books to mobi in Calibre it seems they fall back to a slightly worse experience - using “location” markers instead of real page numbers as official Kindle books display, cover art is tricky to get working on the lock screen, etc.
Is this a poor Calibre configuration or are there real limitations to reading books side-loaded on Kindles?
It’s been a few years since I’ve had to do this, but I think that (at least back then) Calibre defaulted to MOBI for the conversion. However, you could manually select KF8 (AZW3), which is essentially EPUB with a different file extension.
You can find Calibre plugins to convert the books to KFX, Amazon’s native format. There’s also a plugin to recover actual page numbers rather than loc markers in the books. It’s not very intuitive, but it’s doable given the options Amazon gives us.
I decided to ditch their devices because of the support I got — or lack thereof. First they refused to talk to me, because, for privacy reasons, my device was unregistered. I ended up registering it, and even so they offered just a 10% discount on the purchase of a new device.
Sadly, Amazon’s support is not far behind, considering its inability to fix certain persistent Kindle bugs. But I’ve never seen the hardware itself fail.
Another fully-offline, sideload-only, airplane-mode-forever ebooker here. Plus I didn't even buy it in the first place - a relation had one they said they never looked at, so I asked if I could take it off their hands.
Had a funny experience once with a fellow (who was in his third year of computer science at a reputable university), where we just so happened to get on to the topic of ebooks. I told him how I operate my little machine, which I'd only started using. He was shocked, and stated clearly that he thinks it's unethical towards authors to use a "jailbroken" device like that and not get books through the Amazon store...
As someone who has self-published a book on the Amazon Kindle store once, Amazon's cut is something like 70% + bandwidth fees (author only gets maybe ~25–28% of the selling price).
> you have [to] send [books] through [Amazon's] servers.
No, you can sideload books using USB mass storage. It's pretty easy. Kindle Paperwhite is still a great experience even without using the Amazon book ecosystem.
You are correct, you can sideload, but as soon as you open them in your Kindle, they get an Amazon-DRM; so you can't read the very same files on another e-reader. And - as soon as you go online with your Kindle - said DRM is checked and all non Amazon books deleted. At least, that was the case 10 years ago: I still own a Paperwhite 1st Gen which is now basically defunct.
I switched to a Poke 5P (Onyx) and was surprised at the tons of features. No ads, no DRM and reads basically all formats. Win.
I downloaded all my Amazon-bought books, so I can still read them on PC, but otherwise I'm done with their product.
It sounds like you are trying to move DRM'd books you bought from Amazon to another Kindle, which is indeed not possible – that is the purpose of DRM. You'd need to strip the DRM for that to work.
But as other commenters noted, if you sideload ebooks which do not already have DRM on them, the Kindle will certainly not add any sort of DRM to the files. This is true both if you sideload via USB or even if you use the "email to Kindle" feature.
I've literally never run into the problems you are describing. It might be true (it seems implausible but I don't know), but it is not a significant factor in day to day ergonomics.
Text crispness, page turning speed, battery life, physical dimensions are all much bigger factors in an ereader IMO.
What you wrote is completely untrue. I have myriad of books on my Kindle which are not on Amazon, and they are not deleted. Neither does anything weird happen to them.
I had the exact opposite experience. My kindle battery went wonky after a few years, but my kobo has gone on for a lot longer with no issues. It's made me a little wary of buying a kindle again. Aside, or on top of, not wanting to support Amazon.
Where do you buy DRM Free books from? (I assume that's a requirement for the device to be fully offline, right?) Do you run everything through that DRM-stripper Calibre plugin?
It's usually a small marketplace like Leanpub. Tilted Windmill Press (Michael W Lucas) [0] is another one I've done a good bit of purchasing from in the last six months or so.
Some of the books on the Kobo store are also sold with DRM. They only mention it in small print under eBook Details at the bottom of the page, e.g. Download options: EPUB 3 (Adobe DRM)
Yet Amazon has been consistently increasing the size of the Paperwhite models over time, each one a bit larger than the previous one. They remain portable, but no longer fit into one’s pockets, for instance.
I am running a kindle voyage (2014). It is the perfect size for male jeans pocket carry, PPI is above 300 and battery works.
Most important! The yoga cover is great for laying on either side, so I can toss and turn in bed and keep reading. Literally no e-reader I have seen since has a symmetrical stand-cover that can be used sideways both ways.
As for Kobo, I just looked the other day and saw they have some great prices for e-readers that have similar features, plus they advertise being completely repairable! And you're not in the Amazon ecosystem. My only gripe years ago was the don't rendering on side loaded books wasn't as good as Amazon, and that Calibre couldn't De-DRM Kobo books as well as Amazon. I think the game has changed a bit, though, and I haven't tested anything in a while.
If Kobo books are crackable, my next e-reader will likely take me away from Amazon. I want that USB-C in my life.
I was hoping they'd revive the Oasis. That form factor is _perfect_ IMO. Scribe is too big for a replacement. I settled for a Libra 2 which is similar to the Oasis but I feel it's a bit sluggish when it comes to chapter turns, highlights and page turns w/ images but I don't have something in the Kindle line-up to compare it to now.
I love the oasis. Specifically the fact that it’s made out aluminum and is water proof. My daughter is an extraordinary reader since a very young age, long before her motor skills have matured, and ended up with my oasis. She does all the things a young kid does like smear food all over it and drop it all the time. I can just wash it off in the sink once a day and we are all good. If it had been less sturdy and not waterproof there’s no way she could have used it.
Finally the physical page turn buttons are great as well as the bevel on the back for holding it with one hand.
If not traveling, getting to read an open paperback, two pages side by side, on Kindle Scribe is super enjoyable, then turn it to portrait to read white papers or textbooks.
I love mine, and somewhat dread the day when it dies. I've decided I'll probably switch to onyx boox of the same form factor when it dies. I've got the big one from them, which I use for sheet music, and it works nicely. Runs Android too, so you can install the Kindle app and read your old library
Came here just to say this. I've owned an Oasis since 2018 and recently bought the first Scribe model when it went on sale, and naively thought "at this price and 6 years later, it must be a better overall experience" — even as I knew its main selling point was having a writeable interface.
I did know of its drawbacks beforehand — e.g. no physical buttons, not waterproof. The page-turning response/refresh time is noticeably better, but I'm left feeling pretty meh by the overall experience. I haven't had much need to scribble notes so as of now, the Scribe is basically an iPad-sized device with the limited feature set of the Paperwhite.
The size is good for textbook-type material, but not enough to make me pick it over an iPad if I'm traveling. The Oasis is small enough that I can carry it in a coat pocket.
But the buttons really are the killer feature. Being able to disable the touchscreen — especially when I'm anywhere where moisture is an issue (at the beach or gym) — easily makes the Oasis worth bringing even if I could read on my phone. I would have easily gone for a new version of the Oasis but I guess consumers haven't shown enough interest in paying extra for a button interface.
The Kobo Libra 2 and Libra Color look to have a similar form factor to the Oasis. At least having a chunky area on one side with buttons that give a good spot to hold it.
No update to the Oasis; I guess when I refresh I'll get a Boox or other Android-based device with page turn buttons and run the kindle app on it.
I have a first generation Kindle Oasis, which is a great device, in no small part because of its asymmetric design and page turn buttons. The newer Oasis (still last refreshed in 2022) have better lighting (temperature adjustable) and inverse text mode, which are both nice but have not been enough to get me to upgrade. It lacks the battery cover of the original oasis, which while kind of a pain was nice because it gave a very natural way to hold the device.
I'm sad to see that the Oasis line is not mentioned here. I have little to no interest in using my kindle as a writing device, and honestly would prefer that the touchscreen was as little used as possible -- an unresponsive or slow screen is the worst case for a touchscreen, since the feedback loop is terrible.
I don't know if they'll have an OS update to go along with this. I have found successive updates to be worse and worse -- my pages are all crammed with ads (not actual ads since I paid to have them removed, but "recommended books") and large page covers. I can barely fit five titles from my library on a screen; I would much prefer to have just the title/author/progress and fit twenty on a page.
The integration with the Amazon ecosystem is probably the best selling point, but until somebody shuts down Libby I've switched my habits to be almost entirely rent-based rather than buying books.
You should check out the PocketBook Era. It's what I moved to from the Kindle Oasis and I've really enjoyed it. The device isn't as svelte as the Oasis since it isn't subsidized by Amazon, but has an assymetric design and even more physical buttons which you can fully customize the control scheme. Also like the Oasis it gets amazing battery life with it's light weight OS compared to the Android based e-readers.
The PocketBook cloud is just as seamless as the syncing with Amazon if that is something you use. Only time I notice problems is during the weekly maintenance window which just looks like an outage. It has bidirectional sync for your progress as well as syncing new books and has a web interface and a phone app. Also offers the same email endpoint service as Kindle and you can set up Adobe DRM to use with library borrowing as well as other places that distribute ascm. The builtin store probably doesn't have the same availability of titles as Amazon but I haven't used it since I manage my library with Calibre and buy my books from various stores.
Best of all is the customizability. Don't want to use their store or cloud? You can turn off (really just not setup and hide) all the features and integrations individualy to make it an "offline" reader but still bring it online for things like Wikipedia lookup and web searches. You don't even need an account to set it up. You can also load additional dictionaries, fonts, and even applications on it. It has a healthy if small development scene.
There is a new color version but if you don't read things that require color I would get the original; Based on reviews it has the the same downside as Kobo and others that use the Kalaido screen where it's relatively dimmer in ambient light compared to the B/W one and so needs a higher average backlight level to compensate.
Overall I've been really happy with my switch and can't see myself going back to Kindle.
I have a significant library with Amazon -- does this have any support for Kindle books? The Android-based ones let you run a Kindle app, which, while not ideal, at least lets me access the library.
I've considered doing a sweep to download all of my kindle books and de-DRM them so that I have an archive, but this is a tortuous process if your library has over a thousand titles, as mine does.
Not seemlessly because Amazon has their store locked down to Kindle. But you can export all your books from the Amazon web interface or use the desktop Kindle app to download them all. You would then use Calibre with a couple plugins to deDRM them. At that point you have plain ebook files in Amazon's format to do what you want with. Calibre can convert them to any one of the open ebook formats (I personally prefer epub) and sync them to your device(s)). Those ebooks are treated like any others and fully supported by PocketBook cloud if you use it. The convenience of Amazon's store for Kindle is nice, but it's also how they lock you in to their ecosystem and devices so you keep only buying/paying for a subscription with them.
The process is really not bad at all if you use the desktop Kindle app to download your library before importing to Calibre. Each step is fully automated with the only manual parts being setting it up and doing each step in sequence for the whole library but not each individual book.
I have the first Oasis as well. Prior to that I'd pretty much bough every single kindle refresh. Since then I haven't. I'm in the same boat: give me physical buttons.
Doesn't seem like there's an official announcement since any news articles about it describe it as a "quietly discontinuing" [0]
I'm in the U.S. and a search for "oasis" has nothing but eye drops in its top results. You have to scroll down to find a listing for the "International Version — Kindle Oasis", selling at just $135 [1], but which Amazon refuses to ship if your address is in the U.S.
As with all previous kindles, the only official bit is the removal from the store. There hasn't been a case (so far) of a kindle that was removed from the store and then a later model being released.
I am very, very, very sad to hear this. This does match with my experience of fiddling with various Kindle competitors over the years (nook, kobo), but between generally faster processors and the increasing bloat of kindle OS, I thought maybe the gap would be narrower.
Can confirm. I own a Poke 5P and the ghosting is really more obvious until you've fiddled with the settings enough - and I do mean fiddle here. Might take a while.
Other than that I'm a real fan: latest update delivered dark mode (black background, white text) and like I said above: no ads, no Amazon-DRM, all formats, cloud storage (if you want to), TTS, annotations that are really comfortable to handle, bluetooth.
I loved my kindle paperwhite so much. I have a case on it all the time, there is not a single scratch on my kindle. One day, out of the blue, the touch screen stopped working. it is unresponsive to any touch, I've soft reset it, hard reset it, googled everything. Apparently its a common thing in amazon forum, and of course what does amazon support say? just buy a new one. At this point my kindle is only 2.5 years old and I'm pissed.
I've bought an ipad since and just read book from my ipad. at least my old ipad doesn't break even after 8 years
The thing is that the iPad screen truly doesn’t compare to e-ink in reading black-and-white books. If the e-ink screen is made properly, with high resolution and no PWM, one can read for hours on end without eye fatigue. Battery life on e-ink devices is in another league as well.
For me at least, issues with an e-ink device simply mean moving on to another device, or another manufacturer/brand, instead of switching to tablets.
I switched from an older Paperwhite to the latest version (before this announcement) IMHO the 6.8 inch size is too big and now they go up to 7 inches? My wife has the regular kindle (because it got USB C before the Paperwhite and she lost hers just in time) and that size is imho perfect. The screen is noticeably worse though.
The color model is uncharacteristically expensive for Kindle at $280, more than the color Kobos which are $220 for the same 7" size (which also has physical buttons and stylus support) or just $150 for the smaller 6" size. Kindles are usually the cheaper option, at the expense of being less amenable to sideloading and jailbreaking than Kobos are.
This article really buries the lead. It talks about updating monochrome kindles, when they just released their first color Kindle (not counting the Fire). I had to look elsewhere to confirm this was indeed a brand new line of products, and others give it top billing.
> In addition to the monochrome e-readers, Amazon introduced its first color e-reader today. The new Kindle Colorsoft, covered in more detail here, looks almost identical to the new Paperwhite and launches on October 30 for $279.99.
Yeah, black friday is near. I am thinking older models will be given higher discount via their deal site woot.com. And latest model on Amazon with 20-50 dollars off depending on original price.
I wonder if they’re still using soft touch/rubberised plastic on the back? My last-gen Kindle Paperwhite has already started to go sticky and gross.
I’ve also got an issue where the latest software update is causing frequent hangs when opening new books (literally 5+ minutes) and I quite often get stuck in books, unable to summon the menu to go back to my library. Seems to be a fairly common problem judging by Reddit.
I ended up buying a Kobo Libra Colour just this week. So far I’m very happy with it. Performance is better and it’s compatible with a lot more stuff.
The plastic on the back feels normal to me, after many years of usage. I use a case, don’t know if that helps to minimize the “sticky and gross” aspect.
However, I have been experiencing annoying software bugs with both my Paperwhite and my Kindle Scribe. Unresponsiveness, disappearing books, issues with sideloaded fonts… the devices’ software quality has greatly diminished lately.
I’m on the latest update too and, yes, sometimes I can’t get the menu or bookmark to open. I have to reboot the device to get it working again. The previous updates were fine.
I was quite hopeful for this refresh to upgrade my Oasis but it looks as though they've regressed on weight: 188g for my current Oasis vs 211g for the Paperwhite. The new entry level kindle is indeed lighter but unfortunately lacks a warm light. I hope something else will be on the horizon!
My Paperwhite 4 is 6.6” x 4.6” x 0.3”. This new one is 5” x 7” x 0.3”. Unless the bezel is significantly smaller (and from the pictures it doesn't), I'll wait for the next version. I read in landscape because in portrait mode the rapid scanning back and forth is annoying.
I second giving landscape mode a try. There is something more comfortable about it and you get more space to hold onto each side of the screen.
Of note, the screen seems slower to update when waking up or going to the home screen and keyboard touch points seem slightly off and I'm not sure why that is.
I am so excited for this. I've run into so many books where color would make it ten times better. Also, the Comixology subscription will be so much more valuable with this device. The only thing I have a wish for is that the device is more responsive than the original Kindle. There is nothing more frustrating than tapping a touch screen and waiting 5 seconds for it to respond.
I don't think any Kindles still have physical buttons. Kind of a bummer because buttons make it much easier to change the page while holding the Kindle with 1 hand
My partner has a Kobo and I'm seriously considering one. My Kindle has done more for my sleep than any other device. I get sleepy reading it, unlike my phone or tablet. I really wish I could my content on either device.
> Also, physical buttons! Such things are only available on the most expensive Kindle
Or the old ones you can get for $10 on eBay :) I use exclusively old models that have physical buttons for Kindles because they're just insanely cheap and still perfectly reliable (the battery too) even a decade later.
I don’t know if you’ve used a recent paperwhite but they’ve gotten very responsive.
I have the newest paperwhite (prior to the one announced here) and it is incredibly fast and zippy compared to the kindles of old. And they claim the new one is even 25% faster.
Ah. So it's just the color filter that basically everyone (except ReMarkable) has done.
I'm kinda curious to see it in person, to see if they are doing it better, but other brands' results have not been appealing at all to me. Washed out, worse contrast, and a consistently pixelated / screen-door look.
The new Kindle Scribe looks kinda lame compared to the new reMarkable Pro, though significantly cheaper. Maybe the colored ePaper isn't that great, but at least you get some color for highlighting, which is probably a non-insignificant use of these types of devices.
Either way, sad there's no Oasis refresh. I'm not super attached to the physical buttons, but I'd prefer it to not. Oh well.
I had an original Scribe and while the writing experience was superb, I felt like the software experience was minimal and over the year or so I had it, it didn't really get enhanced any. My review of it was: It's just like paper, only more expensive.
It seemed like if you wanted a large ebook reader AND occasional note taking, it's probably great. For my use, I would have been just as happy with just a spiral notebook, probably happier. I used it every day for work notes and todos.
I sold it on ebay and got an Boox Note Air3, similar cost, and the writing experience is not nearly as good as the Scribe, but it is a much more capable device with many more features in the notebook. However, I've fallen out of the habit of using it, I think just because the writing experience isn't as good.
This is similar to me with my reMarkable 2. The writing experience is strictly worse than even cheap notebook and dramatically worse than a nice one with a nice mechanical pencil + lead.
I had exactly the other response when compared to my current scribe. I'm not sure they are trying to compete with remarkable on the design front, or that they should.
Remarkable, as a newer, smaller company, needs to seriously differentiate itself. Amazon can play it safer.
Having said that, I think the white bezel and introducing a professional looking colour to the Scribe, is so much better looking than my current Gen 1.
I normally wouldn't care, I didn't feel my scribe was ugly, until I saw the new one. I'm half considering passing mine to my mother, and buying the new version.
Color e-ink (both versions) isn't yet fast enough to be used for writing. Boox and Remarkable had to do a lot of hacky things to make the experiences usable on their color e-ink devices. (Boox currently uses the older color technology, Remarkable uses the newer one.)
That makes sense. Another comment pointed out that even the resolution of colored content (150 ppi) is half that of black-and-white content (300 ppi). Trying to take notes with bad refresh rates and lower resolution would not make for a good experience.
The Scribe is neat, but it's too small (same goes for the Remarkable devices).
It wish it was A4/Letter size to read PDFs at full size. There are a few devices like that out there (I've heard the Fujitsu Quaderno is nice), but none of them can be used with books purchased at Amazon.
And yes, I know about Calibre and the DeDRM tools. They don't work on KFX files and the workarounds degrade the book (you lose typography improvements that are only in KFX).
I'm also disappointed by the Oasis being discontinued. I wanted to trade mine in for a USB-C version.
I want to upgrade my Kindle but first I need to know where the power button is. My current one has the power button on the bottom and it turns off when I rest it on things - extremely annoying. Can't be certain from the product pictures, but looks like it's on the bottom again.
The last Paperwhite model, for example, did not work upside down, just in landscape mode (and even so, only rotated to one direction). I don’t know whether Amazon finally added a gyroscope to the Paperwhite in order to fix this issue.
If the new Paperwhite supported immersion reading (highlights the word as audible book plays), I'd grab it. It works on my Boox with the Android app but as far as I know not on any kindles (battery life + screen refresh speed allegedly. I really want to ditch my Boox, horrible company.
Using the wisdom of the crowd here: what is the best ereader for tinkering? I'm browsing the answers here looking for that and I don't know if anything actually fits the bill. Something with Android, tablet-type machines, seems to be the answer? Is there nothing better?
Get a Kobo, which model depends on your needs. A Kindle is never yours since Amazon can push arbitrary updates wipe your stuff. Don't buy Boox either, as they include a lot of bloatware, not to mention they're blatantly disregarding GPL.
Kobos are mostly just arm linux machines. You can install KOReader on them for a better reading experience.
I’ve read this, but I’ve also heard various downsides to Kobo, including in the discussion on this post. (Battery issues, general device glitches, etc)
Which Kobo do you use, and how has your experience been?
Libra H2O. Never had noticeable issues I'd say. Battery life is quite long. I couldn't get syncthing to work reliably, though it isn't super necessary.
My kindle paperwhite is my favorite tech that I own. It has changed by life significantly for the better and allowed me to cut down the time I waste on doom-scrolling social media. I find a book on shadow libraries, convert them into epub format and then send them over to my kindle via USB. Calibre helps in all this. I have read close to a hundred book now--all for no dime.
You should also try using Libby / Overdrive to see if your local library has the book. I've borrowed 20+ books this year and it's pretty seamless and easy!
- the authors are unfairly compensated by amazon and the public libraries due to publisher issues with ebooks already. OP is hardly contributing to this disparity.
- I choose to purchase expensive copies of books I love - but the digital copy is the one I read.
The fact that the situation for authors is already poor hardly makes it better to opt not to compensate them. If you or the OP feel that you’re only playing a small part, that’s between you and your conscience.
And sure, if you’re buying some copy of the book and downloading a convenient second copy, that’s totally different. I was responding to the OP being pleased about not having spent anything at all (except on the kindle itself presumably).
I was thinking about this recently when a friend group argued that someone getting out of paying hospital bills is unethical since doctors are just as much victims of America's bad healthcare system as patients (due to exploitative pay structures I guess). To me this feels like some kind of victim blaming. The writer isn't getting paid (much), the reader is paying too much to a stranger, yet somehow the reader is the bad guy if they opt out of the process.
I get that the idea is "if everyone opted out the writer would get nothing instead of peanuts!" Or maybe the company shafting the writer would go under and direct sales would happen instead?
I don't know about the commenter above, but most writers I read have been dead for at least a hundred years. Should I purchase their e-book online for $850 each or should I get it from a shadow library?
Looks like the base Kindle also hasn't been updated at all. Same dimensions, screen, weight and battery life. They also nixed the base Kindle Kids which was the best deal considering it was the same price as base and they'd fix it if it broke.
I've been buying the kids versions because in the past, it was the ad-free version and came with a free case, but the new kids version seems to have ads if not used in kid mode:
"Will my kid see ads while using this device?
Kindle Paperwhite Kids is automatically set up for your kid to enjoy an ad-free experience. However,
if you exit Amazon Kids using a passcode, sponsored screensavers will be displayed on the device's lockscreen."
I can confirm that the new versions have to be placed in a child mode in order to hide the ads. It seems they have closed this admittedly nice loophole
After trying a third-party E-ink tablet that has Google app store support, I'd never go back to Amazon devices where they prevent you from accessing content that isn't blessed by Bezos.
My Kindle Keyboard still works. You can't use the shop from the device, but you can push books from the website (although on mobile, only 3? devices are listed and there's no way to choose from more if you have them...)
Still no remote/bluetooth capabilities. That's the only thing that would make me upgrade, the third-party remotes you can buy are all pretty clunky (bulky clip on the side of the Kindle, need to be recharged often, can only flip forward as they just fake a swipe on the right of the screen).
I paid $20 for a remote page turner on Amazon and the battery lasts weeks. There’s no Bluetooth involved, it just uses basic radio signals to trigger a pulse that the kindle interprets as haptic input.
It’s one of my favorite purchases, because now I can actually fall asleep while reading the kindle since I’m not activating my arm muscles to turn every page.
This is the item (my kindle is one of the earliest versions, from 2011, if that matters): https://amzn.eu/d/aJaesjd
I recommended the PocketBook Era to someone who has an Oasis in a sister comment. It supports Bluetooth remotes, keyboards, probably any Bluetooth HID with buttons. You just map any button press you want to reader actions (including ones beyond just page turn). It doesn't support input from them outside the reader interface, but fully usable without the touchscreen (you can map turning it on and off to the button combos too) when reading with a remote or the built in physical buttons.
Why is no one making higher dpi ebook readers? I've been waiting decades now for an ebook that would actually have the resolution of printed 600 dpi pages. The chunky text simply makes ebooks for me uncomfortable and unpalatable for long reads.
My understanding is that e-ink with higher than 300 dpi is very difficult to produce which means it is rather expensive and doesn't look that much better to most people. Additionally, people think of an e-reader as a sub-$200 device so the market for a premium high DPI e-reader is just rather small. People are already complaining about the price of the Kindle Colorsoft, think what they would say if amazon put out a Kindle high DPI and it was in the $400-$500 range.
Probably because it's enough for most people. I have a Paperwhite with (I think) 300 dpi and unless I reduce the font size to the minimum and look really close I can't see any issues at any reading distance. It feels like a printed book to me.
huh the site has an interesting way of doing internationalization — it's just a different blog post w/ Spanish, rather than another language like /[sp]/[blog link]. Curious why they chose that route
It's a website where most articles don't have translations. This article seems like an exception, and I can't think of a simpler way to do this either.
If you had separate paths for each language, most links would have an unnecessary /en/.
I wish they would do a bigger size kindle scribe. I read pdfs all day on my scribe, and often I wish the screen was bigger so the font size would be large.
The size is good for PDF reading, but PDFs with huge margins or small font sizes don’t work well.
One way to fix the margins issue is to use the “Send to Kindle” feature, which converts PDFs to the Print Replica format and trims their margins in the process. Sideloaded PDFs actually appear with more margins (thus reduced font sizes) than books sent through Amazon’s servers.
It says that a color image is 150ppi, and black and white is 300ppi. How does a colored highlight work on a mostly b&w page? does that section have reduced sharpness?
for what I've seen it acts like a filter on top of the b&w screen, so used in b&w you don't loose sharpness. however you loose contrast compared to a b&w only screen
The Kindle is one of the best things Amazon ever did. They made subsidized ereaders and made them cheap. Ofcourse they did it to promote their store but they've never blocked side loading.
You might be interested in the Kindle Basic. It's the smallest in the lineup and a comparable size to the first-gen oasis (before they increased the screen size) – my previous daily carry.
It's almost a pocketbook form-factor. I overlooked it initially because who wants a basic model? but the only thing I miss in practice is waterproofing. That, and the Oasis OEM cover which was unexpectedly nice, like a leather-bound pocketbook.
I still might prefer 5" model. Compared to current 7th Gen paperwhite, it is not that much smaller. A bit more would make it even more sensible in size.
When e-readers first started, one of the big companies offered a machine that would display an entire page of The New York Times on it large enough to be able to skim the headlines, then you'd tap on the article and it would take you to that part of the page.
Back then, I didn't have the money for it. Now I do, and the only options seem to be too small.
Same, I'm still rocking an older Kindle because it fits in my hip pocket on my cargo pants and so can always be with me whenever I get a quiet moment day-to-day to read.
I've been using a Kobo Clara Color for several months. I love the size and functionality, but the color isn't that big a deal since I'm not reading picture books.
I used to use a Kindle Oasis, but I like Kobo's software better than Amazon's, so I switched.
Instinctively attracted to the Kindle scribe because I love writing on books as I read them, however I've been disappointed by every device that's taken a crack at this, and I've tried them all. Nothing beats paper, which sucks because digital formats are infinitely copy able, backup able, etc.
I always wonder how they implement write-in-books. Never found a FOSS version. I wanted to add it to an android e reader maybe so at least I could try write in books on various Android tablets or a zfold. Failed at that too!
I bought a used paperwhite in 2015 and have read many hundreds of books on it. Still works flawlessly and even great battery life despite taking it around the world through -45 and +45 many times.
I don’t love Amazon, but this may be the best device I’ve ever owned. It does one thing really, really well.
I’ve said for the past decade that the device that had the most net positive impact on my life is my Kindle. I went from reading a couple of books a year to 30+. It brings me knowledge, calm, joy, adventure and growth with basically 0 downside.
Maybe other devices have been more life changing but their trade offs have all been greater than the Kindles.
Having a pocket-sized wifi-only kindle is what saves me from doomscrolling. Instead of spending god-only knows how many hours a week on social media, I read. It's an mental health game changer.
I bought a Voyage in 2015 and don't want to give it up. I like it more than any of the newer models I've tried. Battery life is starting to get poor, but even 'poor' gives me about a week of typical reading before I have to charge it again.
I find stuck pixels gradually build up and kill kindles for me, after 4-5 years.
I'm on my third device now, and I have a couple of them which just won't clear. Not the end of the world but eventually there will be so many that reading is just a pain.
Kindle Scribe should show your calendar, news, weather, etc when it's plugged in.
I hope Scribe note sharing is improved from "email yourself a PDF".
And come on, still no physical page turn buttons?
I also want a Kindle Scribe with a scroll display: a high-refresh-rate LCD touchscreen that sits just below the bottom of the eink screen. Use case being: swipe to a bookmark or page very quickly. It would stay off until touched and would be about 2cm tall, with the same width as the eink screen.
I adamantly disagree. There are 10,000 devices in this world that will feed you your email if you really need to see it in the second it comes in. You probably have one in your pocket right now and another on your wrist and a third that you are staring at to read this post.
I use a Remarkable tablet (the Scribe's competitor) for the exact reason that it doesn't come with apps for email or web browsing or an app store or a weather app. It writes really really well (the scribe does too) and lets you focus on that. It doesn't try to be the 4th version of a smart device when you already have so many.
The "email yourself a PDF" note taking issue made the Scribe a no-go for me. Basically, if you transfer your PDF over USB, it wouldn't allow you to use certain note taking features. You had to email the PDF to yourself through Amazon's servers.
I hope Kobo releases a new Elipsa. I waited for the new reMarkable, but it is full of subscription garbage.
I'm in the same boat. Give me USB-C, page turn buttons, maybe even wireless charging and I'd upgrade almost reflexively. I've been eyeing various Android-based eReaders (like Boox Page) that have Kindle support through an app.
Yes. surprising to know that more people are interested in kindle as owners or planning to buy one. Instead of planning to buy mini nuclear plant or its spare parts.
Not everything is a conspiracy, sometimes things are just posted at the magic time for them to be noticed. You can always post a link again if you think it needs a second chance right?
When Amazon decides to cut you off, you’ll know. Example: bought Albums on iTunes over a decade ago. Can’t re-download. Not even for a nominal bandwidth fee.
We have a pretty fundamental disagreement then on what we want from content we've purchased. If I'm buying it then I expect to have it forever. It really blows my mind to think that somebody wouldn't even be upset if some big corp suddenly stole all the content they've purchased over the years.
Color is good enough to read comic books on it, the google drive integration means it's not too hard to get my CBR/CBZ files on directly. The annotation / notetaking featureas are nice (I haven't leaned into them yet, but they work well even on the small screen size), plus all the regular stuff with normal book reading. Also, since it's kobo/rakuten, the libby integration is better (search and select library books right from the device).
The actual reading app is maybe 90% as good as reading on the kindle (or a more specialized reader like perfectviewer on android). There's some annoyingly fiddly features- font size is kind of weirdly variable, when going through CBR files there's no "read next in the folder" gesture nor is there a "this is read/unread" state in the google drive ui, so you always have to remember which book you are finishing when opening the next in the series.
I tried out one of those boox readers with the android apps, which would be even better software-wise, but the boox hardware seems like garbage (for an N=1 at least). My display came with several rows of stuck pixels, and apparently it's a good thing that I ordered from amazon instead of the boox store, because the reviews indicate getting an RMA from boox directly is a pain.
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