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Kobo announces color e-readers

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Re: Kobo announces color e-readers

#151

Post by m463 »

teroshan wrote: post #30
ashton314 wrote: post #18

I've had a kindle for years now. A while back I jailbroke it and stuck KOReader which has been so awesome. (Custom fonts? Yes please! Gestures for going to the TOC or bookmarks or back in history? Absolutely!) Problem: it was a lot of work getting my kindle to this state. I'm terrified to turn on WiFi for fear Amazon will send an OTA update and nuke KOReader from orbit. So, when this kindle dies, I am thinking I'd li…

Have been using various Kobo's for years with KOReader now, it's basically as simple as copying files on the device to install it. There is no need to jailbreak it; it's an open device. Also, I haven't heard any mention of covert update to worry about. So yes, I would absolutely recommend a Kobo for your use case. A few months ago, I attempted to do install KOReader on a kindle, and the experience is definitely not f…

> it's an open device.

non-obvious but you just use it like a usb device ereader when you receive it:

  - connect to computer with usb-c
  - mount as usb drive
  - edit .kobo/Kobo/Kobo eReader.conf adding SideloadedMode=true
  - remove .kobo/KoboReader.sqlite
  - reboot, then just use kobo as usb drive from then on, no account necessary
got one and use it more than my remarkable because it has a backlight for indoors (in addition to e-ink for outdoors)

Re: Kobo announces color e-readers

#152

Post by msmithstubbs »

parlortricks wrote: post #143
amaccuish wrote: post #66

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Same journey here; except using the Calibre Web integration, an absolutely gamechanger. No need to plug-in to sync my own books, they're pulled straight from my Pi. And I love how all that was required was editing a line in the config file on the storage; they seem like fairly open devices. Also glad to get away from the Amazon proprietary formats.

Is there an artile explaining how this is done? Im more interested in the whole setup.

This would be a good place to start:

https://brandonjkessler.com/technology/2021/04/26/setup-kobo...

There is also a number of home brew readers and utilities available for the Kobo readers. Plato is a reader written in rust, and covered in this post:

https://blog.videah.net/my-e-reader-setup/

Re: Kobo announces color e-readers

#153

Post by gnicholas »

JZL003 wrote: post #125
gnicholas wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

It's true that the contrast is not as good, and IIRC the color resolution is also a bit lower (but is not bad overall). But people who plan to read B/W documents could still benefit from a device like this because it makes highlighting much better, and it enables color-based reading enhancements like BeeLine Reader (which improves focus while reading). I'm certainly biased (I created BeeLine), but IMO the color scree…

beeline readers works on kobo? Via colorizing a pdf -> kobo, or is this is just something planned?

Coloring a PDF for now...and I'll certainly be working on more streamlined options now that this is available!

Re: Kobo announces color e-readers

#154

Post by gnicholas »

rahimnathwani wrote: post #137
jsheard wrote: post #50

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> It's true that the contrast is not as good, and IIRC the color resolution is also a bit lower It's generally halved, i.e. the display is 300dpi in mono mode, but 150dpi in color mode.

Halving the DPI in each direction (vertical and horizontal) means you end up with only a quarter of the pixels: 0.4 megapixels instead of 1.6 megapixels.

IIRC these panels are 150 DPI color, which means it's less than halved in each direction.

Re: Kobo announces color e-readers

#155

Post by Rebelgecko »

teroshan wrote: post #4

Know that while useful in some scenarios, I'd avoid buying a color e-ink display if you're still going to primarily be using it for B&W colors. To quote the eBook Reader Blog [1]: > The main drawback with color E Ink screens is they look darker than regular B&W screens because of a color filter layer that is applied over the top of the screen, which makes the contrast appear lower. Kaleido color screens are really ju…

Does that mean these have better refresh rates than other color eink screens? Lower contrast is not the end of the world for me, but a 15 second refresh time is :)

Re: Kobo announces color e-readers

#156

Post by gnicholas »

Rebelgecko wrote: post #155
teroshan wrote: post #4

Know that while useful in some scenarios, I'd avoid buying a color e-ink display if you're still going to primarily be using it for B&W colors. To quote the eBook Reader Blog [1]: > The main drawback with color E Ink screens is they look darker than regular B&W screens because of a color filter layer that is applied over the top of the screen, which makes the contrast appear lower. Kaleido color screens are really ju…

Does that mean these have better refresh rates than other color eink screens? Lower contrast is not the end of the world for me, but a 15 second refresh time is :)

Yeah, the refresh times are much better now. They used to be 10-30 seconds but are now manageable. I think it might be a little slower than B/W, definitely not 30 seconds. Some color eink displays even offer video, with different settings for higher fidelity/slower frame rate versus lower-fidelity/faster frame rate.

Re: Kobo announces color e-readers

#157

Post by eiiot »

I have a Kindle Oasis right now that I want to get more use out of, but also can't stand using Amazon products (and have found the Oasis increasingly frustrating as of late, especially as I download more content from non-Amazon sources for my classes). Can any Kobo owners speak to how much of an improvement it is over the Oasis (or any other more recent Kindle)? Should I pre-order the Color or just get one of their existing models?

Re: Kobo announces color e-readers

#158

Post by gnicholas »

6gvONxR4sf7o wrote: post #141
dustincoates wrote: post #25

I have very little to add about the color aspect, but I can say that I love my Kobo. I've had three Kindles before buying the Kobo, which I got because it has a "better" integration with my local library (better in quotes, because I still have to do with the Adobe DRM, which is so bad on Linux that I borrow my wife's computer just to transfer). The Pocket integration is fantastic, as are the physical page turn button…

The only reason I've held off on switching to Kobo is that I always switch back and forth between the audiobook and the text for what I'm reading. Kindle books make it seamless, but as far as I can tell, there's no audio-text sync in the Kobo ecosystem. Is that still accurate? Even if you use books bought from amazon/audible?

FYI Kindle is in the process of rolling out a new feature that enables read aloud with synchronized text highlighting. It doesn't sound as good as an audiobook, of course, and it's not as good as the Alexa-powered read-aloud. But it's still nice because you don't have to switch between the Kindle app and the Alexa app.

I understand that some users currently have access, and it will be rolled out to everyone in the next month.

Re: Kobo announces color e-readers

#160

Post by dillydogg »

chme wrote: post #51
dustincoates wrote: post #25

I have very little to add about the color aspect, but I can say that I love my Kobo. I've had three Kindles before buying the Kobo, which I got because it has a "better" integration with my local library (better in quotes, because I still have to do with the Adobe DRM, which is so bad on Linux that I borrow my wife's computer just to transfer). The Pocket integration is fantastic, as are the physical page turn button…

I owned a Kobo Glo and Pocketbook Touch, and I preferred the Pocketbook, because it allows to install koreader as a application into the stock firmware, while on Kobo you need to quasi dual-boot your system into koreader or stock firmware via a menu. In my experience koreader integrates much better with calibre and allows managing my library with a filestructure. So that is a requirement for me. Also the stock firmwa…

There are multiple ways to install Koreader now. I think the most common is to use KFMon and NickelMenu which installs the quasi-operating system into a book in your main menu.
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