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I had a reMarkable 2 and gave up it almost solely because it didn't support USB mass storage (like Kobo devices do), making it really annoying to transfer files

I had a reMarkable 2 and gave up it almost solely because it didn't support USB mass storage (like Kobo devices do), making it really annoying to transfer files. Also, their software update made the reader worse, since I went from being able to manually crop the page to fit the viewport to having to carefully pinch-zoom with a bunch of latency and really weird sensitivity. And they seem oddly insistent they're not a reading device anyways; if they supported ePub 3 (particularly ePub 3 fixed layout - again, Kobo supports this) that would have made it a nice comics machine, but no. (And their weird web interface choked if you tried to transfer "large" books.) 100K JPY too, which is in the range of an iPad Air. I hope some of these software issues get ironed out and maybe I'll consider it again...

elric 2y ago
Similar experiences with the reMarkable 1. The USB interface really bugs me. It's nice for annotating and highlighting PDFs, but pretty bad for reading. Great for taking notes, but awful at extracting them, unless you get an expensive subscription to their "cloud" garbage, which feels extortionate considering how expensive the device is.
_ph_ 2y ago
You can ssh into the remarkable and copy files via scp.
- lidavidm 2y ago
  Yeah. Still way more effort than Kobo: plug it in, drag and drop.
  - chickenimprint 2y ago
    I've switched to exclusively using SSH on my Kobo, because I find it less effortful. The connection procedure consists of enabling wifi on the Kobo and clicking on the sftp bookmark in my file browser.
    - whycome 2y ago
      Wait is this an official method?
      - SSLy 2y ago
        No, it's KFmon stuff.
  - MayeulC 2y ago
    What's wrong with the USB web interface of the remarkable, though? It is quite spartan, but I haven't updated mine in ages, so I imagine they have improved it. The workflow is plug -> web browser -> remarkable IP -> drag and drop.
    - lidavidm 2y ago
      That's still quite a bit more than just plug -> drag and drop, also especially because sometimes I had to manually bring up the interface, and remember some IP that I might only use every week or two at most. (I guess I could set up a bookmark, sure.) Also, it chokes on large-ish files (it would just never upload, no indication in the UI), so I had to split up books. Anyways, I think I could have dealt with it if it handled large books fine.
    - wpm 2y ago
      What does the customer gain from having a web interface you have to navigate to by IP rather than a simple external storage device that shows up like a flash drive?
      - m4lvin 2y ago
        I think one reason for the web interface is that the device stays usable. If it would export a block device then it would need to unmount the file system on itself or at least block changes. If I remember correctly in the old days before MTP, all Android did this, making storage on the device itself unavailable while making it available via USB.
        MayeulC 2y ago
        Yeah, that would be an issue with presenting the device as a block storage device. The web interface also has a couple of other advantages: the tablet simultaneously listens for ssh connections, and can be used over Wi-Fi, IIRC? Though it could also expose a "USB HUB" with both the network interface and block storage. I just wish we had a more ubiquitous "network file storage" protocol. The tablet itself could offer NFS, but mounting it under different operating systems would be a pain, requiring manual user intervention.
- tecleandor 2y ago
  But, afaik, they keep an index and some extra files in their own format to track them [0], so you can't "just" upload the files. You need a tool to do that additional work. I use RCU [1] for that. 0: https://remarkable.jms1.info/info/filesystem.html 1: https://www.davisr.me/projects/rcu/
Terretta 2y ago
> Remarkable 2 and gave up it almost solely because it didn't support USB mass storage, making it really annoying to transfer files We had hoped to buy these for all our paperless office employees, and gave it up almost solely because it was far too easy to transfer files. If they deliver a device with on-device encryption (as this claims) and sync or manual transfer tied (and locked) to company-owned storage, we'd buy them for all our Pro(fessionals). To your point, instead we give our professionals iPad Air with Paperlike™ for pencil-feel and a keyboard for on-the-go use. We'd rather (for reasons) give them Remarkable Pros if it was capable of meeting Professional data-loss-prevention (DLP) needs.
- donatj 2y ago
  Let me ask you this in all seriousness and with minimal snark - do you confiscate employees paper notebooks when they leave the company?
  - rkangel 2y ago
    We expect people to have a labbook per project. They are logged when handed out, and signed back in at the end of the project. For a science/engineering firm, this sort of arrangement isn't uncommon, because stuff you do in the lab leads to customer deliverables. Of course, people can also do things electronically, which they increasingly do.
  - lovecg 2y ago
    If you can transfer gigabytes of data with a paper notebook then I’m really impressed! But seriously this is similar to banning usb flash drives and the like, it’s not that unusual.
  - jabroni_salad 2y ago
    I used to work at a federal contractor. Any paper you bring to the building /never/ leaves again. I liked to keep notes in a legal pad and would just shred them.
  - lynndotpy 2y ago
    This isn't unreasonable or unheard of in some contexts, especially anywhere requiring a security clearance.

elric 2y ago

Similar experiences with the reMarkable 1. The USB interface really bugs me. It's nice for annotating and highlighting PDFs, but pretty bad for reading. Great for taking notes, but awful at extracting them, unless you get an expensive subscription to their "cloud" garbage, which feels extortionate considering how expensive the device is.

_ph_ 2y ago

You can ssh into the remarkable and copy files via scp.

lidavidm 2y ago
Yeah. Still way more effort than Kobo: plug it in, drag and drop.
- chickenimprint 2y ago
  I've switched to exclusively using SSH on my Kobo, because I find it less effortful. The connection procedure consists of enabling wifi on the Kobo and clicking on the sftp bookmark in my file browser.
  - whycome 2y ago
    Wait is this an official method?
    - SSLy 2y ago
      No, it's KFmon stuff.
- MayeulC 2y ago
  What's wrong with the USB web interface of the remarkable, though? It is quite spartan, but I haven't updated mine in ages, so I imagine they have improved it. The workflow is plug -> web browser -> remarkable IP -> drag and drop.
  - lidavidm 2y ago
    That's still quite a bit more than just plug -> drag and drop, also especially because sometimes I had to manually bring up the interface, and remember some IP that I might only use every week or two at most. (I guess I could set up a bookmark, sure.) Also, it chokes on large-ish files (it would just never upload, no indication in the UI), so I had to split up books. Anyways, I think I could have dealt with it if it handled large books fine.
  - wpm 2y ago
    What does the customer gain from having a web interface you have to navigate to by IP rather than a simple external storage device that shows up like a flash drive?
    - m4lvin 2y ago
      I think one reason for the web interface is that the device stays usable. If it would export a block device then it would need to unmount the file system on itself or at least block changes. If I remember correctly in the old days before MTP, all Android did this, making storage on the device itself unavailable while making it available via USB.
      - MayeulC 2y ago
        Yeah, that would be an issue with presenting the device as a block storage device. The web interface also has a couple of other advantages: the tablet simultaneously listens for ssh connections, and can be used over Wi-Fi, IIRC? Though it could also expose a "USB HUB" with both the network interface and block storage. I just wish we had a more ubiquitous "network file storage" protocol. The tablet itself could offer NFS, but mounting it under different operating systems would be a pain, requiring manual user intervention.
tecleandor 2y ago
But, afaik, they keep an index and some extra files in their own format to track them [0], so you can't "just" upload the files. You need a tool to do that additional work. I use RCU [1] for that. 0: https://remarkable.jms1.info/info/filesystem.html 1: https://www.davisr.me/projects/rcu/

Terretta 2y ago

> Remarkable 2 and gave up it almost solely because it didn't support USB mass storage, making it really annoying to transfer files We had hoped to buy these for all our paperless office employees, and gave it up almost solely because it was far too easy to transfer files. If they deliver a device with on-device encryption (as this claims) and sync or manual transfer tied (and locked) to company-owned storage, we'd buy them for all our Pro(fessionals). To your point, instead we give our professionals iPad Air with Paperlike™ for pencil-feel and a keyboard for on-the-go use. We'd rather (for reasons) give them Remarkable Pros if it was capable of meeting Professional data-loss-prevention (DLP) needs.

donatj 2y ago
Let me ask you this in all seriousness and with minimal snark - do you confiscate employees paper notebooks when they leave the company?
- rkangel 2y ago
  We expect people to have a labbook per project. They are logged when handed out, and signed back in at the end of the project. For a science/engineering firm, this sort of arrangement isn't uncommon, because stuff you do in the lab leads to customer deliverables. Of course, people can also do things electronically, which they increasingly do.
- lovecg 2y ago
  If you can transfer gigabytes of data with a paper notebook then I’m really impressed! But seriously this is similar to banning usb flash drives and the like, it’s not that unusual.
- jabroni_salad 2y ago
  I used to work at a federal contractor. Any paper you bring to the building /never/ leaves again. I liked to keep notes in a legal pad and would just shred them.
- lynndotpy 2y ago
  This isn't unreasonable or unheard of in some contexts, especially anywhere requiring a security clearance.