4 ms·

An A4 e-reader is one of the best things I purchased despite being insanely expensive for what it was and having slightly dubious firmware. I used to print stu

An A4 e-reader is one of the best things I purchased despite being insanely expensive for what it was and having slightly dubious firmware. I used to print stuff out to read as I find backlit screens and notifications on my tablet annoying when you are trying to grok a paper or read a textbook. Mine is a Boox Max 3, though Sony had an offering aimed at lawyers etc and I think some people like ones by remarkable too, though I have never tried them as my one hasn't broken yet and they are rather expensive.

TedDoesntTalk 3y ago
Still not easy to skim, flip through e readers. Especially remarkable which is damn slow to turn and render a page.
- quacksilver 3y ago
  True - I miss looking at bookshelves of myself and friends / colleagues / libraries to discover new stuff spontaneously too. Still, I can take what would have been a big stack of paper with me to the coffee shop / park / forest and like the ability to search for text strings. Maybe I should see if there is a 'give me a random page' button in my software or if a spotify / netflix style recommendation engine would work well for books and papers. Have never seen a remarkable in the flesh, though that would annoy me.
  - smaudet 3y ago
    If you could build a physical book that had e-reader pages (and took no power to read), that would solve some of the issue(s) both have. Its nice that you have a stack of books, but I also don't really want a stack of books even in tiny form factor. I want, maybe one or two books at a time, and I don't want to worry about them getting stolen/dropped/spilled on/not being charged/need an account to login to. I also don't want to search on a tiny bad UI for which book it is I actually want to read. So for me e-readers remain a non-starter. Give me a real book any day. IFF I want to search it I have a tablet if I'm doing work or taking a note on it. And other than leaving it behind, I'm not afraid of someone swiping it when I order another coffee.
    - jaaron 3y ago
      “ If you could build a physical book that had e-reader pages (and took no power to read), that would solve some of the issue(s) both have.” Check out the physical ebook for Fist of the North Star as an example of this: https://goodereader.com/blog/reviews/hands-on-review-of-the-eonebook-dual-screen-manga-reader https://goodereader.com/blog/reviews/hands-on-review-of-the-...
  - jaaron 3y ago
    Sometimes I’ve thought of creating physical cards or a binder or something like that which would act as a physical representation of my digital ebook library so that I and others could quickly peruse it.
- tzs 3y ago
  What I don’t get from e-readers is a good sense of location. With a book or magazine I get a feeling of moving through a 3D object. As I move through and the right side gets thinner and the left thicker it gives each place a different feel. Later if I want to find something in the book my memory of it includes that feel, which helps get to the right general area easily. I’ll also often remember if it was on a left or right page, and if it was near any particular graphics.
  - kstrauser 3y ago
    My Kobo has a little progress bar across the bottom if I tap the screen. That scratches the itch for me.
  - weaksauce 3y ago
    yeah that's one of the many reasons i don't like reading textbooks or anything substantial on a computer
- adhesive_wombat 3y ago
  And then try to read an Archive.org PDF. Every page is compressed with JPEG2000, and the tiny application processor in an ereader can take 10 seconds or more per page to render. Files archived over 10 years ago use DjVu which is near-instant, but they don't generate those any more.
  - jbaber 3y ago
    DjVu was such a wonderful technology.
    - adhesive_wombat 3y ago
      Sadly you can't even make the hyper-efficient IA-style DjVus yourself because the MRC (mixed raster content) compressor they use is proprietary to LizardTech and there's no open source equivalent. So even if you wanted to re-render the file to put into an ereader with the same readability, it'll be huge (like 500MB vs 10MB). The best thing you can do is just delete the JPX layer because it's probably just the background of the page. It'll destroy non-bitonal images, but the book will render literally about 1000 times faster. Keeping that compressor locked away probably killed the format because PDF can package up a straight image compression just as well, but the JPX decompression is a dog. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_raster_content https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_raster_content
JW_00000 3y ago
I also have a Boox, but do you have good suggestions on how to get articles or books on the device and sync? I end up not really using them because there are so many options: e-book apps from different stores (e.g. Amazon Kindle) or that read from local storage (e.g. PocketBook), syncing of PDFs (e.g. Dropbox) which are difficult to read, syncing epubs but then you have to find them back... What is your process for getting stuff on the device, and for keeping it organized (or at least finding back what you're currently reading)?
- quacksilver 3y ago
  My process has been creating a separate Google Account for the device and putting everything on the Google drive account associated with that account. I can then upload books to the cloud. I could probably also set up an upload email address with something like ifttt if that way inclined. I then download things from Google Drive and open them in the Boox Neo Reader app (the reader that ships with the device) which seems to organize things OK and track which page you were on (though I only tend to be using 2 or 3 textbooks actively at a time) Maybe there is a better workflow, but that seemed to work at the time when I bought the device and have served my needs. I have never met another Boox owner in my life to compare workflows with and it isn't something I have thought about looking for. Perhaps someone could write an app or SaaS to simplify it...

TedDoesntTalk 3y ago

Still not easy to skim, flip through e readers. Especially remarkable which is damn slow to turn and render a page.

quacksilver 3y ago
True - I miss looking at bookshelves of myself and friends / colleagues / libraries to discover new stuff spontaneously too. Still, I can take what would have been a big stack of paper with me to the coffee shop / park / forest and like the ability to search for text strings. Maybe I should see if there is a 'give me a random page' button in my software or if a spotify / netflix style recommendation engine would work well for books and papers. Have never seen a remarkable in the flesh, though that would annoy me.
- smaudet 3y ago
  If you could build a physical book that had e-reader pages (and took no power to read), that would solve some of the issue(s) both have. Its nice that you have a stack of books, but I also don't really want a stack of books even in tiny form factor. I want, maybe one or two books at a time, and I don't want to worry about them getting stolen/dropped/spilled on/not being charged/need an account to login to. I also don't want to search on a tiny bad UI for which book it is I actually want to read. So for me e-readers remain a non-starter. Give me a real book any day. IFF I want to search it I have a tablet if I'm doing work or taking a note on it. And other than leaving it behind, I'm not afraid of someone swiping it when I order another coffee.
  - jaaron 3y ago
    “ If you could build a physical book that had e-reader pages (and took no power to read), that would solve some of the issue(s) both have.” Check out the physical ebook for Fist of the North Star as an example of this: https://goodereader.com/blog/reviews/hands-on-review-of-the-eonebook-dual-screen-manga-reader https://goodereader.com/blog/reviews/hands-on-review-of-the-...
- jaaron 3y ago
  Sometimes I’ve thought of creating physical cards or a binder or something like that which would act as a physical representation of my digital ebook library so that I and others could quickly peruse it.
tzs 3y ago
What I don’t get from e-readers is a good sense of location. With a book or magazine I get a feeling of moving through a 3D object. As I move through and the right side gets thinner and the left thicker it gives each place a different feel. Later if I want to find something in the book my memory of it includes that feel, which helps get to the right general area easily. I’ll also often remember if it was on a left or right page, and if it was near any particular graphics.
- kstrauser 3y ago
  My Kobo has a little progress bar across the bottom if I tap the screen. That scratches the itch for me.
- weaksauce 3y ago
  yeah that's one of the many reasons i don't like reading textbooks or anything substantial on a computer
adhesive_wombat 3y ago
And then try to read an Archive.org PDF. Every page is compressed with JPEG2000, and the tiny application processor in an ereader can take 10 seconds or more per page to render. Files archived over 10 years ago use DjVu which is near-instant, but they don't generate those any more.
- jbaber 3y ago
  DjVu was such a wonderful technology.
  - adhesive_wombat 3y ago
    Sadly you can't even make the hyper-efficient IA-style DjVus yourself because the MRC (mixed raster content) compressor they use is proprietary to LizardTech and there's no open source equivalent. So even if you wanted to re-render the file to put into an ereader with the same readability, it'll be huge (like 500MB vs 10MB). The best thing you can do is just delete the JPX layer because it's probably just the background of the page. It'll destroy non-bitonal images, but the book will render literally about 1000 times faster. Keeping that compressor locked away probably killed the format because PDF can package up a straight image compression just as well, but the JPX decompression is a dog. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_raster_content https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mixed_raster_content

JW_00000 3y ago

I also have a Boox, but do you have good suggestions on how to get articles or books on the device and sync? I end up not really using them because there are so many options: e-book apps from different stores (e.g. Amazon Kindle) or that read from local storage (e.g. PocketBook), syncing of PDFs (e.g. Dropbox) which are difficult to read, syncing epubs but then you have to find them back... What is your process for getting stuff on the device, and for keeping it organized (or at least finding back what you're currently reading)?

quacksilver 3y ago
My process has been creating a separate Google Account for the device and putting everything on the Google drive account associated with that account. I can then upload books to the cloud. I could probably also set up an upload email address with something like ifttt if that way inclined. I then download things from Google Drive and open them in the Boox Neo Reader app (the reader that ships with the device) which seems to organize things OK and track which page you were on (though I only tend to be using 2 or 3 textbooks actively at a time) Maybe there is a better workflow, but that seemed to work at the time when I bought the device and have served my needs. I have never met another Boox owner in my life to compare workflows with and it isn't something I have thought about looking for. Perhaps someone could write an app or SaaS to simplify it...