Still one of my favorate pictures. I took this with a friend’s camera, his brand new D200. I didn’t really know much on the technical side of photography at that point, but I saw this, and knew what I wanted framed.
The Kobo Mini Review
(Edited on 10 August with some fixes)
I am a gadget geek, but that is not news to anyone. Since starting my publishing endeavors, I’ve been looking into all the ebook reader options, not just the Nook or Kindle. With the advent of eBooks, we are in a situation where the tactile experience of our books are independent of the intellectual one. As such, I am enjoying exploring all that is offered to see how different companies tackle this same issue.
I recently picked up the Kobo Mini and it is fantastic.
What is it? it is a small (5 inch) epaper reader
What isn’t it? anything else
This thing has one purpose in mind: read. And for that, it does a great job. The size is really the killer feature with this reader. It is about the size of a paperback book. The screen is responsive and the device is easily held with one hand. And light, it is nice and light.
The software is responsive, and reasonably customizable. They have an achievements type system built in which marks your accomplishments: number of books finished, number of pages read, etc. Not essential to any experience, but can be fun to look at.
It works well with Calibre, which I use to organize my ebooks from Smashwords or Storybundle, allowing me to read on whatever device I want.
I found my only real complaint is that it is difficult to operate left handed because of where on the screen the “next page” regions are. A small softer customization on this part would make it fantastic. There are three options for the screen on how to change the pages on the Kobo. While none of them are what I’d prefer, it is set up so it can be used either left or right handed. After changing the setting, this became much better to use.
Small, light, great battery life, this reader really is a fantastic single minded gadget.
