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I was really excited for this - I’ve been saying to all my friends that I wish I could use my kindle for more. Obviously the kindle is quite slow so it’s not a good fit for reading on the web (I use Instapaper a lot and wish I could have that experience in eInk). I also read scientific papers and those often have figures that are very hard to read on a small black and white display, and I tend to scribble in the margins when I referee for conferences.

For these tasks I use my iPad Air, but the eye strain problem is real if you’re reading for hours at a time. Since I bought a small laptop, I exclusively use my iPad for reading and writing. The writing experience could be better, with the surface feeling a little too glassy.

My big worries are the app support. I use notability to write notes, which has OCR and allows syncing to my laptop and phone. My bookmarks sync across browsers. My reading list syncs with Instapaper and my citations with Zotero. Can I get a similar syncing system?

Another perennial problem with such devices is the stylus. I’ve lost 2 apple pencils at conferences. It’s horrible - you now can’t write anything until you get a replacement. At least with an Apple Pencil you can walk into any store and pay the exorbitant $120 to buy a new one (imagine if you could never borrow a pen from anyone ever again and each pen cost over $100 - that’s what it feels like). How will I get a replacement pencil for this device if it falls down in an airport or out of my bag in some conference center far from home?

But as others have said, the iPad is a tried and tested device. It has a powerful ecosystem and great resolution. The base model comes with 128GB of on device storage. And it’s $600, significantly cheaper than this device. I find the price tag hard to justify in comparison .




The new Pencil Pro has Find My, which might help in such a situation.




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