this post was submitted on 25 Sep 2025
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Plenty ? Really ? And what are those ?
Four times the prices and from four years ago ?
Kobo e-readers are 1-to-1 alternatives that allow you to easily transfer epubs or PDFs to it with a USB cable.
As far as I can tell, Kobos are bootloader locked now https://old.reddit.com/r/kobo/comments/1ewadpc/kobo_is_now_using_secure_boot_on_at_least_one_of/
You can still transfer epubs and most books on the kobo store are sold without DRM (publisher choice)
That's a far cry from
mentioned in the first comment
Not arguing with your point, it’s valid. But I wanted to make it clear from OPs point about book DRM that this is not an issue with Kobo. The books themselves as mostly DRM free and you can put whatever you want on the device.
It's not necessarily about the devices. Kobo books are very easy to remove DRM from, and don't require owning a physical Kobo device or their app to do so. All it requires is two Calibre plugins. And EPUB is not a proprietary format, unlike AZW3 and KFX.
Also, I might be wrong, but it seems Kobo has a lot more DRM free books in general, compared to Amazon.
Kindle has always required either the Kindle app or an actual physical Kindle to de-DRM.
Having your cake and eating it too isn't on the menu
Kindles were loss leaders to get you in their ecosystem, just like all the shitty cheap tablets they sold.
The from four years ago part is real, but honestly, 4 year old devices read books about as well as current devices as long as you're not trying to go all fancy.
It's just matter of time before they're all locked down, even the bad ones from 2020.
Just like android where basically it's all bootloader locked, except for a few suspiciously special models like the Pixel. Or a "new" 1000$ model with hardware from 2018.
Instead of pretending there isn't a problem because there are still option, you should realize the WINDOW IS CLOSING
A Raspberry Pi with an E-INK screen is surprisingly doable.
The raspberry pi has no low power modes / suspend states, to prevent it being used as a cell phone or tablet.
The standalone eink display are also very expensive, more than a entire eink reader and there is very little choice and they cannot be harvested from a working device.
Low power states is a good call,
Looks like there's a lot of work on using ESP32 for this kind of thing, even a couple open projects, but they end up bit-banging the screen into submission. not super elegant.
You can get 7" eink panels for $50.
Unless Kindle prices came way down, Boox are comparable in price, nicer in features, and allow side loading any eBook or Android APK (including the Kindle APK, if you can still get a copy of it.)
https://shop.boox.com/
I don't think you've used anything but a Boox in a long time, and have forgotten what the standard is. Boox has 1/10 the battery life, takes forever to wake up, and doesn't support deep sleep properly (so it either drains battery when sitting idle, or shuts off entirely taking 5+ minutes to power back on). It's decent hardware with very badly designed software. Neither Kobo or Kindle devices have these problems, they have battery that actually lasts, deep sleep when idle for any length of time, and power back up, even from deep sleep in 10 seconds or less.
Agreed, the battery life is way worse. I find the features of full unlocked Android to be a worthwhile trade.
But my point is that the prices of various eInk Android tablets aren't unreasonable anymore.
Edit: Although, for anyone worried - I literally don't remember the last time I charged my Boox. It was sometime last month - and I read with it most days.
The battery life can be fine, when configured with conservative screen refresh settings.
But I think there is still a difference - when I binge-read something for many hours multiple days in a row, I'll notice that I need to recharge my Boox sooner than my Kindle needed.
Oh yeah definitely. It's a slow EInk Android tablet on a very old version of Android. If you need more than just an EReader it's the only reputable brand.
You can read books for free on just about any general purpose computer.
My wife doesn't let me bring the Thinkpad to bed anymore