Recommendations for e-ink tablets?
Last year, I took a promotion at work which meant I would be managing a few people and also involved with/overseeing a number of long term projects. As I've learned how to manage people, I've also learned that my previous methods for note taking are insufficient for what I'm doing and I'm losing track of things in my paper notebooks.
My employer has offered to buy me a new laptop but I'm actually pretty satisfied with my current laptop, so I've been doing some research into e-ink tablets which I think will help me stay more organized while also allowing me to take notes by hand (my preference) rather than typing things into a Google doc as I've been doing for my one on one meetings.
I don't have any experience with this technology and no way that I can get any hands on experience before buying something, so I'd love to hear from anyone who has used something like this, and especially if there's anything I need to consider that I haven't thought of.
My use cases:
- note taking / digital organization
- online reading (I run literary magazines and our submissions come in through an online system, and there's no convenient way to download them as pdfs to read offline, so having access to a web browser is important)
- access to Google Drive ideally so I can get to my notes from my desktop or laptop
- it'll be used at my desk or on my couch in full light, so no backlight or front light is not an issue
One of my coworkers has a remarkable tablet but he told me it's been less useful for him than he thought. In my research, this seems to be too limited for my uses.
The Onyx Boox Go 10.3 seems to be what would work best for me but I've also read a lot of warnings about their poor customer service so I'm a bit hesitant.
I would definitely recommend any of the Boox devices if you're keen on online functionality. They essentially operate like an android tablet which gives you a lot of flexibility.
You can buy them on a store like Amazon if you're concerned about returns and whatnot. That's what I did and how I managed to swap it with no trouble when I noticed a defect.
I have the Boox Go 7, an android E-ink tablet that is by far the best reading focused machine I have ever used.
With that said, my sister is staying with me over the summer and she has the Boox Note Air 4c tablet (Color) e-ink tablet for when she is taking notes for class + doing rounds as a veterinarian and the quality on that thing is incredible. The visual depth, the battery life, how smooth and perfect the stylus and note taking is, is just incredible and makes me incredibly jealous (don't tell her).
I've looked at the Note but I'm not sure I need color at all, and that seems like the biggest difference to me (unless I'm overlooking something)
I have a Supernote Manta and it works great for note taking. I don't connect it to the internet for security reasons though, so I dont know how it is in that regard, but it supports sideloading any Android apks so should be fine in theory.
How is the battery life for you? That's one of the biggest complaints I've seen on that tablet
Haven't had any issues, lasts a pretty long time for me. But again, maybe enabling internet and sync would change that.
I have the Nomad so I can't comment on the Manta specifically, but I haven't had any issues with battery life. The software and community are excellent.
I use mine for daily tasks and meeting notes at work, tracking a handful of long-term projects (just me and two others so nothing crazy), personal writing and puzzles/games (plenty of fun and interesting PDFs around the internet!), and of course reading ebooks. I chose the Nomad to fit in my crossbody bag or cargo pants for site walks and inspections, but if I had more desk time the Manta would make more sense.
I don't connect mine to the internet either, but they just rolled out a private self-hosted cloud option if you don't want to use their servers. About once a month I plug into my computer and make a backup.
I can confirm that you should stay away from remarkable products. I have the remarkable paper pro and the writing experience is amazing, but everything else has been a pain.
I had a serious ghosting issue that required me to send it in to remarkable and get a replacement. I appreciate them replacing the device under warranty relatively pain free, but they made me send my device back first before sending a replacement. I had to wait for my tablet to be received by them before they even sent the replacement, so there was about a 3 week gap where I didn’t have any tablet.
Now, I’m having charging issues where when I try to charge with a USB-PD cable, it doesn’t actually charge. I have to use a standard USB cable connected to a 5V, 0.5A source to get the tablet to charge. This takes an incredibly long time to charge the tablet.
Everything about their hardware just feels a bit half baked even though it’s amazing when it works properly.