I’m a lover of physical books but I’m looking to get an e-reader as well, for those books that are hard to find physical copies of, or are just very expensive.
I’ve ruled out Onyx, because I try to avoid Chinese tech as it’s usually poorly made. But I’m not sure whether Kindle or Kobo is best. Is being tied to Amazon’s ecosystem too restricting? Are the Kobo e-readers compatible with everything you need? Which ones have the best screens, ideally how a physical book would look?
So many questions, but hopefully some of you can help. 😁
I did a lot of research and ended up buying a Kobo for my wife who was looking to switch from paperback. At the time the Clara HD was the newer model in the size and feature family she was looking for. I made the choice based on e-ink quality, wide compatibility of formats (including public library rental), and price.
Keep in mind that Amazon keeps device prices artificially low by pushing ads to your screen. I have had four different Kindle Fires over the years, and hate how intrusive the advertising is on their devices.
After spending a year or so jealous of my wife’s Kobo Clara HD, I bought myself the then newer Kobo Libra 2. Then she was jealous of my Libra and bought herself one, and gave the Clara to our kid who is a bookworm as well.
We love our Kobos.
How bright are Kobo’s in a dark room? My wife and I have used kindle paperwhites for years but at some point they changed their backlight and now it’s a beacon at night even on the lowest brightness
Get a Kobo. They are excellent. I had a 2020 or so Paperwhite from 'zon but it made me feel sad all the time. My Kobo Libra 2 has caused me to read more since I got it than the entire before portion of my life.
If you get any books off amazon use calibre and DeDRM. IIRC DeDRM has stopped but also has been forked on git and continued by someone else so you would want the more up to date fork. Adobe digital editions DRM or whatever it was called I believe can also be removed up to a certain version but you have to download it for the first time with an old enough Adobe app version get the old drm version or it will get permanently locked to the newer version that can’t be removed. Anyway removing DRM let’s you read the ebooks on whatever device you want. It’s not illegal in any country I have bothered to research except if you are doing it to distribute or sell.
As a side note if it helps anyone, I was able to get the whole procedure to work on Linux too by installing the required versions of kindle desktop and Adobe digital editions via Lutris and wine. Calibre and plugins are already cross platform.
Edit: updated DeDRM fork link because goog search results are utter shit these days. https://github.com/noDRM/DeDRM_tools
Last I checked, Kobo will be better specs (screen, water proofness and connectivity) for the money, and if you’re technical it can be modified very heavily, including pretty easily user expandable storage.
Kindle will have a more seamless Amazon experience and maybe better support.
I have a Kobo Clara HD, and I love it to bits. Warm temperature backlight, and I have installed custom firmware on it which lets me use a different reader app, and run an SSH server on it so I can remotely transfer files etc.
And you don’t have to pay to remove ads because there are none. I have 2 Kobos and I love them
This is probably not what you’re looking for, but if anyone is looking to make their own Ebook reader I recommend checking out The Open Book Project
I use a Kindle Paperwhite which works well for me–colour shifting screen, USB-C charging, and incredible battery life. That being said, I have never connected it to wifi, and instead prefer to sideload books so my reading history/money are not sent to Amazon
