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reMarkable 2

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Re: reMarkable 2

#361

Post by nashashmi »

BossingAround wrote: post #318

Before buying remarkable, compare remarkable to a BOOX device. I did just that and my conclusion was that remarkable is an overpriced piece of tech at risk of being abandoned. For example, just the reading software on BOOX is leaps and bounds ahead of Remarkable. Similarly, on BOOX, you've got Android, which opens up a number of possibilities, while remarkable uses Linux (which sounds awesome until you realize that n…

Fan of remarkable 2 here when it launched.

Boox is a next gen version. And it is incredible. Just don't compare it to remarkable. Remarkable was always hobbyist turned company product. And it was great.

But this onyx Boox is several iterations better.

Re: reMarkable 2

#362

Post by chatterhead »

ChildOfChaos wrote: post #302

The ReMarkable 2 tablet has been out of awhile and is a well known device, this post just links to the main homepage as far as I can see, what am I missing? Something new announced?

No. You're just watching modern advertising at work.

Re: reMarkable 2

#363

Post by tomtheelder »

goosedragons wrote: post #206
afandian wrote: post #198

Earlier quoted context omitted.

These promotional videos show their deliberate positioning as an anti-"mobile device". (warning- jump scare!) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OcdxW2XF0v8 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FUZ9QEbJ5sc https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pEw6N9Xd6uE

Right. But as someone with a similar Boox device I find I get most of the benefits while still getting a lot more functionality. When I had an iPad I found it was a lot easier to just go hop on YouTube or Reddit or whatever than to read that paper or think about my problem. With the Boox device YouTube and Reddit are still miserable to use because low refresh rate B&W eInk but I still have the ability to read my Kind…

I think reMarkable as an org just isn't very good at software. They are continually adding functionality, and it's like really basic core stuff a lot of the time, but it just comes in at a _glacial_ pace. They are older than Boox's notepad type offering, and much older than Kindle Scribe, but they are already behind in software support and quality.

I have one, and the physical device is excellent, and the experience on it is great if you stay WAY in your lane (note taking on top of PDFs is probably the single strongest use case), but the software just always feels behind.

Re: reMarkable 2

#364

Post by pdntspa »

boesboes wrote: post #329

Not sure why this pops up now, nothing new afaik, but I'll take this as a chance to leave a quick review ;) I bought one during the kickstarter, mostly for note taking; but also as a ereader & perhaps drawing tool. - For note taking: I prefer a simple paper notebook, as my notes are more procedural. I don't really look back often. It's fine. Just not better then paper for note taking imo. - As a e-reader, it is absol…

The e-reader is alright, they have been adding features to it on a regular basis and now it's decent. But it has one big advantage in that you can drop PDFs onto it with no changes and then you can scribble all over them with the pen. (I am not a big fan of MOBI/EPUB and most of my content is in PDF.) My amazon ereader couldn't do that.

I love mine! It's a fantastic device and I am glad I got on the bleeding edge of this tech.

I do wish it would sync with Calibre, I don't like having to maintain two ebook libraries

I also wish it had a touchscreen calibrator, as the pen is slightly off around some of the corners

Re: reMarkable 2

#365

Post by fishywang »

jseliger wrote: post #357
tjbiddle wrote: post #350

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Why is it 'dog shit' as an e-reader? I mean, how badly can you fuck that up? I feel like that should be a pretty simple feature.

I'm not the OP but also have a reMarkable 2: the reMarkable 2 doesn't appear to mount as a standard USB external disc on MacOS (Kindles do, however). This makes it hard to manage a library via Calibre or a similar system. The reMarkalbe 2 really, really wants users to sign up for subscription services that manage the device through reMarkable's servers, which adds a bunch of unpleasant and difficult-to-manage steps,…

I actually use my reMarkable 2 mainly for reading. I'm not big on note taking (I did use it to draw graphs for presentations occasionally, though). I picked it over other e-ink readers mainly because:

1. It's big enough for PDFs. 2. It's a relatively open system (compared to other e-ink readers), so it's pretty fun in terms of hackability.

I did get the forever free subscription which helps, but I also totally understand why they would want to charge for that, and I think the new $3/month is a pretty reasonable price for it.

Regarding instapaper use case and also hackability, shameless plug: I wrote https://github.com/fishy/url2epub for my own use case, so instead of relying on a third party service and manually sync stuff to reMarkable 2, I just send the link to the telegram bot (I picked telegram bot so that I can easily send links from my phone, not only desktops), and the epub will be auto synced to my reMarkable cloud account (they did made some changes to the cloud api causing I have to manually open their official mobile or desktop app to sync once before the reMarkable 2 itself would accept the new epub I uploaded through url2epub, haven't figured out how to avoid that yet, but it's still mostly automated).

Re: reMarkable 2

#366

Post by iammjm »

I bought RM2 last year and sent it back within 2 weeks. It is just a way too isolated experience for me - next to no connectivity sold as a “feature”. Instead I went with a Android-based Boox e-ink tablet, which allows me to run OneNote, Edge and OneDrive on it. All the connectivity with a similar writing and reading feel as RM2. Plus, RM2 also charges monthly for their subpar Cloud services.., I cannot recommend RM2

Re: reMarkable 2

#367

Post by epakai »

drcongo wrote: post #164

There's no mention anywhere on that page of whether your drawings on the device are vector or not. Anyone know?

It's a vector format. It's better documented here: https://plasma.ninja/blog/devices/remarkable/binary/format/2... and there's a 3rd party API by the same author at https://github.com/ax3l/lines-are-beautiful

The desktop app has the ability to export to SVG: https://support.remarkable.com/s/article/Exporting-files

Re: reMarkable 2

#368

Post by AlanYx »

tjbiddle wrote: post #350
boesboes wrote: post #329

Not sure why this pops up now, nothing new afaik, but I'll take this as a chance to leave a quick review ;) I bought one during the kickstarter, mostly for note taking; but also as a ereader & perhaps drawing tool. - For note taking: I prefer a simple paper notebook, as my notes are more procedural. I don't really look back often. It's fine. Just not better then paper for note taking imo. - As a e-reader, it is absol…

Why is it 'dog shit' as an e-reader? I mean, how badly can you fuck that up? I feel like that should be a pretty simple feature.

It works well as an e-reader if you're loading it with PDFs. If you're loading it with ePubs, it converts these to PDF behind the scenes, but the internal converter is terrible (although it has improved). It also has a very peculiar/frustrating way of highlighting text; if you're trying to highlight a paragraph, usually at least one of the lines won't "snap" to the text and you'll have to hit undo and try again.

You can install koreader or plato on it, which turns it into more of a traditional ereader, with good ePub support. But occasionally you'll have to reinstall the launcher you use, because there is no officially supported launcher and the option to disable updates doesn't always work.

I wouldn't personally recommend an RM2 as an ereader; there are better options.

Re: reMarkable 2

#369

Post by dihydro »

iammjm wrote: post #366

I bought RM2 last year and sent it back within 2 weeks. It is just a way too isolated experience for me - next to no connectivity sold as a “feature”. Instead I went with a Android-based Boox e-ink tablet, which allows me to run OneNote, Edge and OneDrive on it. All the connectivity with a similar writing and reading feel as RM2. Plus, RM2 also charges monthly for their subpar Cloud services.., I cannot recommend RM2

They just lowered the cost of the cloud features and added more to the free tier. As someone who struggles with focus, the exact negative you cite is a positive to me. Reading a PDF and marking it right on the device, or reading a physical document and taking notes is great. It is also very nice for me during meetings and conferences. I find that my recollection is better by writing than by typing, with a much more "in the moment" focus.

Re: reMarkable 2

#370

Post by [deleted] »

tjbiddle wrote: post #350
boesboes wrote: post #329

Not sure why this pops up now, nothing new afaik, but I'll take this as a chance to leave a quick review ;) I bought one during the kickstarter, mostly for note taking; but also as a ereader & perhaps drawing tool. - For note taking: I prefer a simple paper notebook, as my notes are more procedural. I don't really look back often. It's fine. Just not better then paper for note taking imo. - As a e-reader, it is absol…

Why is it 'dog shit' as an e-reader? I mean, how badly can you fuck that up? I feel like that should be a pretty simple feature.

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