I was in a rare office visit the other day and a colleague was enthusing about his Boox which he'd had for a long time. I borrowed it, did some doodling, some scrawl to text, and read a couple pages of comic book on it. If I wanted such a device, it would be on my list. Felt great to write on.

I don't own one, and don't really want one, my e-reader is enough for me.

At risk of being the person who completely ignores the assignment, I would recommend getting a normal Android tablet and getting a paper-feel screen cover for it. If you're in iOS land get an iPad, if you're Android you've got great options, but anything Samsung Galaxy flagship (S-pen doesn't use battery), or I recommend the Google Pixel Tablet, which I specifically bought for note taking with OneNote. I recently got a Galaxy S7 Tablet and stuck LineageOS on it which would also be a great option for significantly cheaper if you can stomach used. I'll never buy Boox because they have massive licensing issues with sharing source code which has soured them in the enthusiast community, and these Chinese vendors tend to be pretty bad about updating their stuff and already tend to have new products with Android versions several versions behind, Boox included. If I could get LineageOS on one of their devices I'd buy in a heartbeat.

With this post, I would do a ton of research to see if I could reasonably beat a SuperNote into shape, apparently Sideloading is an option. Looking at that company, if I were to buy an e-paper tablet I'd lean that way. Somebody side-loaded F-Droid which would give you access to Logseq, for example, an amazing app that (sort of) supports pen note-taking but operates more as a journal than a strict note app.

I have the supernote nomat and really like it for the most part. The writing on it feels really good compared to what I have experienced with remarkable. It also runs custom android btw so you can sideload apps on it (more on that below).

Backlight

The biggest downside for some people might be backlight. Apparently the lack of a backlight has to do with the writing feel and battery life.

Why no front/backlight?

We completely understand why a frontlight/backlight is a valued feature in other e-readers, especially for low-light reading, and how convenient it can be.

At Supernote, our core philosophy is centered around providing the absolute best handwriting experience possible – we truly believe in "for those who create (write & sketch)." To achieve this, a deliberate design choice was made to forgo a frontlight/backlight, and here’s why:

1. Unmatched Pen-on-Screen Feel: Our Supernote pens feature an incredibly fine ceramic nib. Adding a frontlight/backlight requires an extra layer on the screen (even a thin 0.25 mm one), which would create a small but perceptible gap between the pen nib and the writing surface. This subtle distance would compromise the natural, seamless, and precise pen-to-paper feel that our users cherish. We prioritize this intimate connection for an optimal writing and sketching experience.

2. Extended Battery Life: As an added benefit, omitting the frontlight prolongs the device's battery life. This allows for longer, uninterrupted creative and productive sessions without the constant need for recharging, giving you more freedom to focus on your work.

So, while we appreciate the convenience a frontlight/backlight offers for reading, our decision not to include one is a conscious compromise made to deliver what we believe is a superior and authentic handwriting experience, directly aligning with our mission. It’s about optimizing for that specific, precise connection between pen and digital paper.

I haven't really missed a backlight for the most part. But I can certainly see it being a dealbreaker for some people.

Writing experience

The writing experienced on it has been great! I really love the simple but workable interface that offers enough options to make it work for me. For example, I am left handed and that is no problem as everything can be moved around. I should say that I don't use most of the "smart" stuff like headers and OCR. Writing for me is a process that helps me form my thoughts, the majority is just writing it once and then never look back at it. Which was one of the reasons I got it as I had notebooks full of notes which did seem wasteful to me.

One of the cool things is that they also offer basic kits for the pens so you can put them in the housing (with some modification) of your favourite pen. Or you buy one from people who made their business out of it.

Sadly pens are not cheap and shipping to the EU adds to the price. The good news is that they use special ceramic nibs that don't wear out, although you can use regular EMR pens as well. Those just don't feel as great as the ceramic Supernote specific nibs.

The writing app supports various "templates" which are basically background images that provide you with lines, dots, etc just like a regular notebook. You can also add your own and there are websites like this one where you can download templates other people made.

Support and other stuff.

Besides the writing feel I also went with Supernote as they seem to focus on their products holistically as opposed to Boox throwing newer versions out there every other week (hyperbole). So far I have gotten fairly regular updates and they have slowly been working on giving me better control over my data.

There is also a subreddit which I do sometimes check. For the most part it is your typical subreddit with thousands of identical photos of people who just got the product and are exited to show it off. But every now and then there are some good informational posts on there as well.

Managing files is also very easy. It shows up as a mass storage device over USB. But I rarely use that as you also get a quick button to temporarily enable a web interface over your local network to manage files on the supernote. I tend to use that most often.

Sideloading android apps

Sideloading is extremely simple, you just need to enable it in your settings.

You'll want to do this if you want to turn this thing in a decent e-reader as well. I have installed koreader on it and now it is also a very nice e-reader for my use case. What I did is install F-droid and from there I sideload most of the other apps, which works great. One tip here is to force close F-droid once you are done for better battery life.

Would I recommend it?

Solid "yes but depends on the person". If you just want to write this is a great product. If you expect to want to do a bit more with it I'd only recommend it if you are okay with sideloading and such.