Android reader than syncs Moon+ progress with my phone

[MISTER READER]

Hi, I really like the Moon+ Reader on my Android smartphone. One feature I really enjoy is the "Sync via Google Drive" option. Another is that I can manually load up most book formats (particularly epub, mobi), since I often read free books and do not use a store to get my books.

So, is there a reader that:

• Is e-ink (easier on my eyes)
• Supports Moon Reader (and supports it well)
• Allows for the Google Drive syncing option in Moon+ so that my reading progress is synced between my phone and my ereader
• Makes it easy to manually load ebook files (e.g., via Google Drive ideally)

Ideally looking for a budget option as I don't care about bells and whistles, but happy to hear any recs you may have. THANK YOU!

[barryem]

I have a partial solution for you but it may not be enough. When I had an LCD phone I as limited to about 15 and sometimes 20 minutes of reading per session. Then I could take a short break and do it again. So I could get a lot of reading done and I found the breaks to be useful. 5 minutes to think about what I'm reading.

Actually that's another possible solution for you but it's what I had in mind.

Then I got a Samsung Galaxy 5 phone with an AMOLED display and by experimenting I found I could easily read a half hour per session. Longer than that and my eyes were done for but that nearly doubled the length of my sessions.

After I got this phone I did some experimenting. I planned to read on it exclusively for a month to see how well I did. I ended up doing it for 2 months and then I went back to the Kindle. At the moment I'm reading my second consecutive book on my phone again. I'm not sure this is the future of reading for me but it's probably going to be part of it.

I've decided that if I have to I could do all my reading from now on on the phone. I don't have to and I'm glad. Sometimes I really enjoy those long sessions without a break. But most of the time I have to take breaks anyway so it's not a big deal.

In case you're not aware, LCD has a backlight. The LCD itself emits no light, it only changes color and tone value. The light is provided by an LED behind the LCD that shines through the screen ... and into your eyes.

AMOLED works a different way. Each pixel is a Light Emitting Diode or LED. There's no need for a backlight. That means greatly improved contrast and also far less light shining into your eyes.

E-ink is better yet. It uses reflected light, which means less light yet gets into your eyes. It's sort of like reading by lamplight. No direct light shining in your eyes.

Anyway by taking the breaks and by using an AMOLED phone I've really improved my phone reading. I also mostly use Moon+ and I like it.

By the way I often read the same book on my Kindle and on my phone in Moon+ and I've learned to use the search feature to manually sync. I've found that I can pick up the Kindle (or the phone) and enter a 2 or 3 word search phrase and find my place faster than the Kindle can automatically sync. Moon+ syncs faster than I can manually but I can beat the Kindle nearly every time. I have a few Kindles so it's something I've done a lot.

I hope this helps a bit.

Barry

[John F]

Originally Posted by barryem

In case you're not aware, LCD has a backlight. The LCD itself emits no light, it only changes color and tone value. The light is provided by an LED behind the LCD that shines through the screen ... and into your eyes.

...

Barry

Is this accurate, I thought I read (on this forum) that LED lit LCD display are actually side lit with a light guide to shine the light behind the LCDs?

[DaleDe]

Originally Posted by John F

Is this accurate, I thought I read (on this forum) that LED lit LCD display are actually side lit with a light guide to shine the light behind the LCDs?

Well the LED's themselves are at the edge of light guide (to reduce the number of LED's needed) on portable devices but the light guide is still behind the screen and is usually defused a bit and there is a reflective surface on the bottom of the light guide to send as much light as possible through the LCD display. It behaves the same as if the LEDs themselves were behind the screen. (The light guide on a E Ink is in front of the screen and works differently)

[church mouse]

Have you considered one of the Android eink readers which come with Google Play? Most are based upon the Boyue T64D running Android 4.2.

In Europe (I don't know where you are based), getting a Boyue is not cheap (if one gets landed with import taxes) but the Icarus Illumina E654 and the Energy Sistem Ereader Pro HD are easily available. There is also the InkBook Prime (I don't believe that is a Boyue T64 based reader), but that does not come with Google Play, or Google Services and those apps are difficult/impossible(?) to install on it.

In the USA, I think getting a Boyue is easier.

They all only have a 212 dpi screen.

Onyx Boox have the C67 Carta (the Carta2 has a 300dpi screen) and the expensive Onyx Kepler (again, 300 dpi screen), but I have no experience of Onyx. (Not easy or cheap to obtain in Europe).

On this site you will find pretty detailed postings of user experiences for the Boyue and Onyx readers.

I have a ES Pro HD. I also have Moon+. Moon+ works with Google Drive (though I do not use it) but, on the Pro HD, Moon+ does not work in full screen mode without rooting, so you lose a bit of screen acreage at the bottom. Also, Moon+ does not integrate fully with the running software, so one has to do a manual screen refresh to every now and again to remove ghosting (or, if rooted, one can configure the hardware to page turn and refresh at the same time).

Do not expect Android performance on eink to be as smooth or pleasant as on a phone.

[John F]

Originally Posted by DaleDe

Well the LED's themselves are at the edge of light guide (to reduce the number of LED's needed) on portable devices but the light guide is still behind the screen and is usually defused a bit and there is a reflective surface on the bottom of the light guide to send as much light as possible through the LCD display. It behaves the same as if the LEDs themselves were behind the screen. (The light guide on a E Ink is in front of the screen and works differently)

Thank you.

[barryem]

Originally Posted by John F

Is this accurate, I thought I read (on this forum) that LED lit LCD display are actually side lit with a light guide to shine the light behind the LCDs?

That's true of e-ink displays with lights. It's also been true of a few LCD displays historically but only very few. I used to know how those worked but I don't recall now.

Nearly all LCD displays have LED lights behind them shining through the screen and that's what makes the LCD colors visible.

Barry