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Op-Ed: Kobo eReader is simple, affordable but no touchscreen (Includes first-hand account)

First, full disclosure: I’m a voracious reader. From fiction to non-fiction to newspapers, I read everything. So when the eReader movement began gaining momentum, I was skeptical at first. Can a gadget really replace the intimate feel of a real book?

While my skepticism remains years after Amazon’s Kindle and Sony’s Reader have passed through my hands, I’m excited to test the Kobo eReader, distributed by Indigo Books & Music. It launches on April 30 (but also on shelves at Walmart later in May) in Canada and will spread to the US in summer 2010. It’s also available in the UK.

Why should I care about the Kobo? First, its list price. At $150, Kobo costs $340 less than Amazon Kindle DX. The Sony Reader costs $50 more than the Kobo.

Second, the Kobo is pre-loaded with 100 books (most of them from Project Gutenberg). This is an incentive for someone who wants to test the waters before diving in head-first. The gesture is appreciated. The free books include Alice in Wonderland, Crime and Punishment, Moby Dick and more.

Third, it offers a paper-like display using eInk, the same technology in competing eReaders. The eight-level grayscale display is rumoured to allow for a superior reading experience. Oh yeah? We’ll see about that.

The Kobo eReader  available April 30 in Canada. It costs $150

The Kobo eReader, available April 30 in Canada. It costs $150
Courtesy Kobo

DigitalJournal.com tested the Kobo for several days, reading a variety of e-books. We were first impressed by the size of the device, coming in at 120mm x 184mm x 10mm thick and weighing only 221 grams (the nook weight 317 grams). The size of a paperback, we could fit the device in our jacket pocket without much strain. We also liked the rubber backing so we can get a grip on the unit, ensuring any dropping mishap is solely due to our own clumsiness.

Kobo is available in a porcelain colour only, but we don’t see that as a drawback. Anything darker and it might bother the eyes when reading in low light.

What about booting up? The Kobo falters here because it takes around 30 seconds for the unit to load, and then a further 10 seconds or so to access a book. Yes, e-books require loading, and with 100 books in the 1GB storage already, the eReader does have some chugging to go through. But it can be bothersome to wait for the unit to load when you want to quickly access that chapter (just like you’d open your book in seconds).

One five-way rubberized button rests on the bottom-right of the Kobo, and it lets you navigate to read books, turn pages, scroll through various options. We are right-handed here at DigitalJournal.com so we didn’t have problems with the button’s placement, but we expect left-handed users might feel uncomfortable. Also, six other buttons on the upper right edge lets you access HOME, MENU, DISPLAY and BACK. The POWER button is placed at the top right edge.

What we found most stunning was the eInk technology. Boasting a resolution of 600 x 800 pixels, the six-inch screen lives up to its claim of easy readability. Selecting from various font sizes is helpful, especially for those with eyesight problems. We found the text easy to read, especially without the backlight (but that makes the text harder to read in darkness or very low light).

The Kobo eReader  distributed by Indigo Books & Music in Canada

The Kobo eReader, distributed by Indigo Books & Music in Canada
Courtesy Kobo


Navigating from one page to the next was also simple and quick. And not a paper cut to frustrate our reading sessions, too.

To some, the lack of a touchscreen might be a drawback. After all, every person who saw our Kobo test unit wanted to touch the screen to make it work and they looked disappointed when we told them there was no touchscreen. The latest Sony Reader sports a touchscreen, especially cool for those who want to add some notes in the margins, and we all know the iPad is looking to unseat other eReaders.

Turning to battery life, the Kobo can last up to 8,000 page turns on a single full charge, the company claims. We didn’t read enough to fully test that theory, but on a full charge we found the Kobo to last a long time. It was pretty low maintenance.

A few other positives make Kobo a winner: it supports EPUB and PDF formatted documents, which means you can buy your books through Barnes & Noble, Sony, Fictionwise, eReader – not just through the Kobo store. Also, public library books in these formats are also supported. It’s a smart move for Kobo to open e-book availability beyond its own store (you listening, Sony?).

You might think 1GB isn’t very impressive storage (the nook and Kindle allow 2GB) but luckily the Kobo is expandable to 4 GB thanks to an SD card slot.

Kobo also has iPad, iPhone, webOS, Google Android, and BlackBerry applications, a newsworthy add-on for smartphone fanatics. You can also read e-books on your Mac or PC.

Looking at the Kobo as an inexpensive eReader option, it shines above the rest. It might not have the 9-inch screen of the Kindle DX or the touchscreen expected by the Apple-obsessed. Rather, the Kobo should earn praise for being simple to use and read, and offering many e-book formats for seamless download.

Now, whether an eReader can wholly displace the experience of holding a book and flipping pages and taking in that new-book smell…that’s the subject for another post.

Ed. note: DigitalJournal.com was unable to review the newspapers and magazines on the Kobo because they were not available at the time of publication

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